Glossary

Cosmology

Cosmology is the pursuit and attempt to make sense of the universe in its entirety, its origins, evolution, and destiny, making it a distinct ‘cousin’ of astronomy as the study of celestial entities in the universe. The term appeared in English in 1656, briefly defined as “speaking of the world;” [1] and cosmologies are just as varied as the linguistic cultures that establish them. They are, however, connected by similar constructions of meaning as to “systems of creation” and “the genesis of the material world.” [2] Historically, cosmology has been a rather theistic enterprise, with a God (or Gods) as creators and regulators of the universe, however a scientific, physicalist cosmology began to dominate after the discovery of the “cosmic microwave background in 1965,” from which the well-known Big-Bang model of the cosmos emerged. [3] It remains noteworthy, however, how theistic and scientific cosmological questions align, revealing their enduring enchantment: How and when did the universe start? How and when might it end? Not to mention the most elusive: Why does the universe exist, and why is it arranged in the way that it is? [4] 

According to International Relations scholar Bentley Allan, transformations in geopolitical orientation can be traced to cosmological shifts. These (rare) shifts are what lay the basis for Stately purposefulness, and thus a ground upon which political decisions are made (i.e. such as the ‘purposefulness’ of economic growth). Cosmological re-orientation in this model is composed of transformations across the spectrum of: 1) ontology (the contents of the universe); 2) epistemology (what is known about the contents of the universe, and how knowledge practice is legitimated); 3) temporality (the nature and direction of time); 4) cosmogony (origins of the universe); and 5) destiny (the role and position of humanity). [5] Because the diversity of human cultures have produced equally diverse cosmologies, the uptake and consolidation of certain cosmological views over others, takes on political dimensions. The discovery of anthropogenic climate change, and thus the capacity to model the Planetary, arguably positions us on the brink of such a rare cosmological shift.

Poetically thought, one theoretical astrophysicist described cosmology as a “historical science” because the farther we look out into the universe, the “farther we look back in time”. [6] To see the sun, is to see how it was eight minutes ago; thousands of stars, as they were a hundred years ago; and the light from our nearest significant neighboring galaxy, Andromeda, takes some 2.5 million years to reach our retina, a moment in time before any human had yet to exist. Cosmologies open us to metaphysical wonder, and with notions such as these that radically unsettle our phenomenological negotiations of time and space.

[1] Thomas Blount, Glossographia: Or Dictionary Interpreting All Such of Hard Words, (London: Tho Nevvcom, 1659), 171.
[2] Bentley B. Allan, Scientific Cosmology and International Orders, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018), 11.
[3] Hans Halvorson and Helge Kragh, "Cosmology and Theology", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2021 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2021/entries/cosmology-theology.
[4] Sara Imari Walker, Life as No One Knows It: The Physics of Life’s Emergence, (London: Penguin Random House, 2024). 
[5] Bentley B. Allan, Scientific Cosmology and International Orders, 11.
[6] David N. Spergel, “Cosmology Today,” in Daedalus, the Journal of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, 2014, 125–133

Author: Patricia Reed