NOW, BACK TO THE step-by-step elimination of emptiness inside atoms: When a collapsing star is of a certain size, its gravity squeezes the plasma ferociously, until the electrons push back with enough resistance and prevent further collapse. This is a "white dwarf" star -- and its substance is astounding. It's 10,000 times denser than steel, and weighs 10 tons per thimbleful. Nothing on planet Earth is remotely like that. Can you imagine a thimble that couldn't be lifted by 100 strong men?

But that's only the first stage of collapse. A brilliant Indian teen-ager, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, figured out that if a collapsing star has mass 50 percent larger than our sun, the electron resistance will be overwhelmed. If the mass passes "Chandrasekhar's limit," the result is a pulsar (neutron star). The huge gravity crushes the electrons into the protons of the nuclei and makes a solid mass of neutrons.

The matter in a neutron star weighs 10 million tons per cubic centimeter. Think of it: a bouillon cube weighing as much as the Empire State Building.

Next, a collapsing star more than 3.4 times the mass of our sun won't stabilize at the pulsar stage. Its gravity is too colossal to stop there. It proceeds to total collapse, into a black hole, which is utterly beyond human understanding. The dimension at which compressed matter becomes a black hole is called the Schwarzchild Radius. For planet Earth, this radius would be the size of a pearl. Can anyone imagine this entire planet squeezed down to the size of a pearl? But that's what matter is without empty space between particles.

ALL THIS SHOWS THAT matter is 99.99999 percent void -- just an illusion of whirling electrical charges. If a c.c. of matter from a pulsar weighs 10 million tons, how much actual matter is in a 200-pound person like me? If the empty space were squeezed out, there wouldn't be enough of me to see with a microscope.

But regular, everyday matter is the only reality in our lives. Atoms in steel may be as empty as the night sky, but a steel knife can cut you. Even though it isn't real, it's extremely real to us.

MEANWHILE, PHYSICS REVEALS many other bafflements. Here are some:

• Although electrons peacefully occupy every atom of your body, they're violent when detached. Lightning bolts are cascades of electrons.
• Electrons have a quality called "spin" (but it doesn't mean whirling) -- and it can be used to suspend railway trains in the air. In most atoms, electrons are in pairs with opposite spin, neutralizing them. But in iron-type atoms, some electrons aren't paired, and the unbalanced spin makes each atom a magnet. When an electrical current causes all the atoms to line up in the same direction, the result can be an electromagnet strong enough to make "maglev" (magnetic levitation) trains float above rails.
• Last year, a new astronomy study established that the Milky Way galaxy is rotating at such a rate that our solar system is moving 135 miles per second. This means that we are traveling about 800 miles an hour with the rotation of the planet, 67,000 mph in the orbit around the sun, and 486,000 mph in our trip around the galaxy -- yet we have no awareness of moving. (In comparison, a bullet goes only 3,000 miles an hour.)
• Also last year, a NASA study pegged the age of the universe at 12 billion years. When we look at some stars, we're seeing light that left them hundreds or thousands of years ago. They've moved -- and perhaps exploded -- since then. Our eyes see the past.
• Relativity says that time slows and dimensions shorten as speed increases. This seems impossible, but many tests have verified it.
• Einstein's great equation, E=MC2, showed the colossal power that's released when matter turns into energy. An amount of matter smaller than a dime changed into energy at Hiroshima in 1945.
• Each human cell (except red blood cells) contains about six feet of DNA, and you have trillions of cells, so your body has several billion miles of DNA.
  

The point I'm trying to make is that we live our entire lives in what we think is reality -- but physics shows us that it's partly an illusion. Nothing is real in the way we think it is. And that has awesome philosophical significance.

West Virginia State College physics professor Jack Magan and retired physicist Charles Pique helped weed out errors in his talk, the author adds.

JIM HAUGHT is editor of the Charleston Gazette in Charleston, W.Va. , and author of five books, including "Holy Horrors: An Illustrated History of Religious Murder and Madness" and "2000 Years of Disbelief: Famous People With the Courage to Doubt." (both from Prometheus Books, Amherst, N.Y.) Another of his books, "Holy Hatred: Religious Conflicts in the 90s," outlines many ethnic struggles including the tragic war between Buddhist Sinhalese and Hindu Tamils in Sri Lanka.

	Page One | Editor's Notes | Buddhascope | Buddamerica | Dharmatalk | Foundobjects | GuestColumn | Meditation | Poetry | Quotes | ReadingRoom | SiteIndex | Contact Us | Subscribe