Rainbows Don't Actually Exist
But, I experience them!
Friends,
I was flipping through an older astronomy magazine when this first sentence in an article caught my attention “Rainbows don’t actually exist”. Of course, I had to read on because I experience rainbows as a phenomenon. In our reality, we cannot “contain” rainbows. They are illusive. Rainbows are a literal event that happens in our brain. We experience them when sunlight interacts with “solar radiation, optical physics, billions of water droplets, and the ability of the human brain to separate white light into the visible spectrum”. 1
This article highlights the scientists who worked on figuring out the conditions necessary for rainbows appear to us. For instance, they only appear during certain conditions. First the sun needs to be 42° or less from the horizon. Second, it needs to be shining through clouds. Third, billions of water droplets have to be present. And, we have to look for them in the opposite direction of the sun.
What I find fascinating is that we each see our own rainbow! We only see the rainbow from our own perspective. A rainbow can only be perceived through your cone of vision within your eyes. So, depending on where you are, the refraction will be different. Each person has their own perception of a rainbow. So someone standing next to you may be able to describe it with the same colors you see but you each will have a unique experience, vision, of the phenomenon. That fact is amazing. And, that made me think about how we each perceive the Divine One. We know that God is intangible. Maybe there are certain conditions that need to be present for us to fully experience such a phenomenon? Who knows? People have been studying this for centuries. However, when someone says God doesn’t actually exist, I can hold that loosely for them and for me. I can also understand how we each can experience the same thing in many different ways and each of these being very personal. There is not a right or wrong way to experience Divine love. There is just our own perception based on how we experience through our own understanding.
Peace,
Jace
Not Just An Optical Illusion
Just because we cannot touch a rainbow
doesn’t mean it does not exist.
And just because a rainbow is predictable—
sunlight bent in a water drop
at an angle of forty-two degrees
and separated into all its wavelengths—
doesn’t mean it is not a miracle.
How many times have I been unable to touch you,
and yet I am certain of love.
And hasn’t a downpour taught us
to see all our own colors,
shown us how to bend to the world
in ways startling and new.
And isn’t it strange, how love
keeps shifting, changing place,
moves even as we move,
all the while shining, astonishing us
with what a little light in a storm can do.
Rosemerry Wahtola Trimmer
Even if you have heard this before, I hope you take less than 2 minutes to hear it again. I think this very short clip is one that the world needs now and I can’t think of any other expression about rainbows that is more beautiful than that expressed here by Maya Angelo.
Shubinski, Raymond. Astronomy. November, 2024. pp. 24-27.