Distance Measurement in a Conformal Universe

I apologise in advance for the convoluted and vague title, and — as this is written in one short burst — less copy-editing than usual. This is not a technical Aperiodical piece. It concerns my own meta-physics as research, career, and life unfolds. No equations.

I type this in a hotel room in Bielefeld, NRW, covered by my own funds, and on an important academic visit. One of two this month here, one of five this month in the world. Around noon I returned a letter to the editor about the revision work on the previous paper, and updated it on arXiv. The listing refreshes in a couple of hours. It has been a great first week to my last year at Göttingen Cosmology.

This-and-that-thing, physics turned out to be the tone-setting piece, perhaps unexpectedly so, of the third quarter of my twenties. There was no denying I was cynical: a twisted version of my Olympiad and Undergrad days’ romanticised notion that there existed infinite discovery and one should be content in any motion into the unknown, forward, around, zigzag.

The sense of wonder became, rather unchecked and not without external facility or enabling, a fundamental despair that the CV linked to on this website is never competitive for a bright office window with an apple tree outside, ideas never listened to, and calculations interrupted — mocked — to the point I reduce the efforts. I rant — that I rant so much — I lose my coherence, and begin to believe that opportunities are rightfully withheld from this mess that is myself and obfuscating what I am doing is a blessing.

Nor is it infinity in your hands.

But all along there has been a way to bring infinity close, or at least make it less scary and more manipulable, a conformal map, shape- and angle-preserving but scale bending. Relabeling the coordinates. Making it my own.

Without too much details, today contained a high density of reminders that I should not have let my life drift as far as it did. My name and (earlier) work were mentioned in the body of a seminar slideshow several times, and being in the audience, pointed to as an expert in ULDM soliton flinging, was really what got me thinking.

Through several interactions during the day I marveled at how many people whose ideas shape the field and the Zeitgeist of physics I have crossed paths with — some are patient enough to still greet or acknowledge me despite my quagmire of slowness and loss of purpose — and that I see no reason I do not belong with them. Perhaps — this is new — I begin to see the division itself as toxic, an implanted idea that ones only duty is to shut up and listen. We are all in this; any can build and lead.

I realised the problem behind why I felt more professionally isolated than my doctoral years in such a geographically well-connected corner of the world was exactly that I was using the map the opposite way, making infinities what are indeed small and manageable gaps. Giving up at attempts that were mine to make. Distorting all that built on it, uprooting an entire campaign in search for happiness and progress.

Today this ends. I need to remap my world and my abilities. There will still be edges, but they are marked, land traversed with diligent and perseverant steps of explorations and attempts. And not told. Between countless yet-to-come occasions of faceless CV evaluated, tossed, and artless mumbles forgotten and drown out, and beyond them, I will always be my own person. As I’ve elsewhere uttered to myself in increasingly clear articulation, to become a trusted voice in the room and bring people together to do amazing things, or Dedicated Scientist with Artist Characteristics, properly.

At the end of last month, a diary entry of mine read

I am fairly in touch with how I am doing now.
I wasn’t a while ago. I don’t know what changed that allowed me to be in touch again, which of course causes the fear to brew that I wasn’t really in touch enough to control how long it lasts, and might lose it again.

29 September 2026

A simplified gist of today — hopefully, this holds true beyond just today — that I got in touch again is because I stopped tying my values and honour on random individuals passing by my life. They don’t deserve my time or attention.

I know fully that now, today’s optimistic thinking was still triggered by an external voice, one of authority, just not one who slams doors, but one who opened a window, into a bygone world from my timeline that is thriving and current, with such people in it.

At the same time, the old problem still exists but takes a new shape, that I tended to trust an authoritative voice saying things are closer than they are far (previously, farther than they are close); overall, that I was letting them define what I can and cannot reach within this life. Not contesting it is finite.

My simplification overlooks things, I caution myself.

There are things I eventually — soon — tie my values and honour to. Well-developed productive projects driven by my passion and competence, life experiences enabled for others and self for the better, and as far fetched as it seems, especially tonight, romance and family.

There are things on this map of life. By existing one charts a course through them. And I’ve now found time to chart mine, myself. Hopefully I chart it well.