Yesterday’s announcement that anti-matter had been kept in existence for as long as fourteen minutes caught my attention. This is something remarkable. Matter and anti-matter existed in equal quantities at the time of the Big Bang, it’s argued, but matter instantly won out. We’re back the beginning of time. Not only do we have an alternative co-existing anti-matter universe, we have the possibility of other prior, parallel or alternative worlds, stretching into dimensions we cannot comprehend.

Buddhism curiously has already been there. It has no problem with multiple universes. Whether or not we believe in reincarnation, life and the universe endlessly recycle. We don’t try and hold onto a specific view of the universe, or a theory of its origins or a doctrine of a creator God. We recognise the importance of living in the moment, and avoid being tied down by ideas, theories, points of view to which we give an emotional charge. We’re part of a continuum, and that continuum always has been, whether or not we have. This is the ultimate reality. From that base we can engage in conventional reality, pursue projects and ideas, build castles on the ground and in the air, but we always know them to be transient and temporary, we never hold on, if a theory sinks we don’t sink with it.