Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Dawn of Nightfall
    The Dawn of Nightfall
    The Dawn of Nightfall
    Ebook33 pages28 minutes

    The Dawn of Nightfall

    By Elias Rafferton

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Issac Asimov's classic short story Nightfall takes the reader to a planet that has never experienced darkness, as at least one of its six suns illuminates the sky at any given time. There is no such thing as "night" for its inhabitants. The story's progression reveals that both religious prophesy and scientific prediction have pointed to the imminent descent of complete darkness, and explores the various reactions of the populace thereto. The narrative develops over an approximate time of one hour leading up to the "totality".

    As a summary and philosophical interpretation of "Nightfall," The Dawn of Nightfall draws esoteric correlations with this science fiction masterpiece and inner pyscho-spiritual illumination. The intended purpose for the reader of this essay is to reflect as deeply as possible and be humbled by the magnitude of mortality, and to inspire the transition into the illuminated state. (Published under the pen name Edison Thomas.)

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherElias Rafferton
    Release dateOct 2, 2014
    ISBN9781310454653
    The Dawn of Nightfall
    Author

    Elias Rafferton

    After spending years trying to figure out life, death, God, Satan, the Devil, heaven, hell, suffering, Buddha, Krishna, Christ, love, sex, dreams, eternity, infinity, samsara, nirvana, mind, matter, energy... and just about everything else of the sort I could possibly get my hands on... I finally reached the 'end of the line'. At 29 years old I realized directly and undeniably that knowledge of the type I sought is fundamentally impossible. With this I also realized in the most complete sense that there is no such thing as a permanent 'ego' or 'self' as I'd always previously assumed by convention.Having experienced these strange and wonderful but somewhat terrifying realizations about the underlying nature of mind and reality, I felt compelled to share. While books of this kind cannot communicate what is incommunicable (of course), they certainly can help one lay the intellect to rest (or at least, such was my own experience). They can help show that ontological knowing according to any conceptual framework whatsoever is in fact fundamentally impossible, and that ego (or 'self') is really just an ever-changing, never-fixed construct of mental phenomena. Hence the book, "Message in a Bottle: The Obviousness of Infinity: An Ontological Inquiry", my feeble attempt to offer what I've learned (or unlearned, I might say) to anyone who similarly seeks 'the end of seeking'.I also like to write fiction (particularly short stories), and generally tend to blend elements of fantasy, science fiction, horror, and the supernatural. My first release is the short story collection "The Wispy Woodsy Willows and Other Strange Stories". I hope you enjoy!

    Read more from Elias Rafferton

    Related to The Dawn of Nightfall

    Related ebooks

    New Age & Spirituality For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Dark Matter Is in Our DNA

      Mar 16, 2018

      Dark Matter Is in Our DNA
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Bridge From Nowhere: How is it possible to get something from nothing?

      Aug 7, 2014

      The question of being is the darkest in all philosophy.” So concluded William James in thinking about that most basic of riddles: how did something come from nothing? The question infuriates, James realized, because it demands an explanation while de

      10 min read

    • Article

      Is The Search For Dark Matter An Act Of Faith?

      Oct 10, 2019

      The young physicist sits at his computer, watching for signals from Cygnus. His name is Christopher Toth, and his white lab coat is too big for him. Christopher speaks with calm clarity. His manner is modest, gracefully gentle, and I wonder if this c

      8 min read

    • Article

      A Language Beyond Reason

      Feb 27, 2020

      I grew up in a scientific family. My grandmother Irene was the daughter of the physicist Max Born, who won the Nobel Prize for his work on quantum mechanics and was a close friend of Albert Einstein. She was herself scientifically well educated and h

      4 min read

    • Article

      Books

      Dec 17, 2020

      Janna Levin Bodley Head £9.99 • HB We all love black holes. There’s something captivating about these mysterious, scary objects that can rip every particle in our body apart should we get too close. But did you know that black holes, quite literally,

      4 min read

    • Article

      A Space Odyssey

      Oct 14, 2022

      A Space Odyssey
      1 min read

    • Article

      Classical Corner

      Sep 9, 2021

      Classical Corner
      4 min read

    • Article

      Butterfly Effect On Steroids

      Jan 20, 2024

      Butterfly Effect On Steroids
      2 min read

    • Article

      The Disappearing Physicist and His Elusive Particle

      Jul 25, 2019

      The members of the physics institute at Via Panisperna were in the habit of giving themselves jocular nicknames: Enrico Fermi was “The Pope,” Orso Corbino was “God the Almighty,” and Franco Rasetti was “The Cardinal Vicar.” It was 1930, and the Itali

      11 min read

    • Article

      The Disappearing Physicist and His Elusive Particle: He ushered symmetry into theoretical physics, then vanished without a trace.

      May 8, 2014

      The members of the physics institute at Via Panisperna were in the habit of giving themselves jocular nicknames: Enrico Fermi was “The Pope,” Orso Corbino was “God the Almighty,” and Franco Rasetti was “The Cardinal Vicar.” It was 1930, and the Itali

      11 min read

    • Article

      Our Most Effective Weapon Is Imagination

      Apr 28, 2021

      In his Theaetetus, Plato remarks to Socrates: “This pathos is proper to the philosopher: It is the thaumazein. And philosophy has no other point of departure than this.” The word, which contains the root thauma, the same that appears in thaumaturgy,

      9 min read

    • Article

      The Eclipse as Dark Omen

      Aug 10, 2017

      The Eclipse as Dark Omen
      7 min read

    • Article

      Classical Corner

      Aug 11, 2022

      Classical Corner
      4 min read

    • Article

      Extraterrestrial

      Dec 1, 2019

      Extraterrestrial
      7 min read

    • Article

      Book Reviews

      Feb 17, 2022

      A year ago, in the May 2021 issue of this magazine, I reviewed a book by Erin Sullivan titled Where in the World: Astro*Carto*Graphy and Relocation, and though I certainly recommended it for the content, and for Erin Sullivan’s clear knowledge of the

      3 min read

    • Article

      The First Take Club

      Oct 25, 2020

      The First Take Club
      3 min read

    • Article

      Deep Impact

      Dec 2, 2020

      Deep Impact
      4 min read

    • Article

      My Own Personal Nothingness: From a childhood hallucination to the halls of theoretical physics.

      Aug 28, 2014

      My most vivid encounter with Nothingness occurred in a remarkable experience I had as a child of 9 years old. It was a Sunday afternoon. I was standing alone in a bedroom of my home in Memphis Tennessee, gazing out the window at the empty street, lis

      12 min read

    • Article

      My Own Personal Nothingness

      May 17, 2018

      My most vivid encounter with Nothingness occurred in a remarkable experience I had as a child of 9 years old. It was a Sunday afternoon. I was standing alone in a bedroom of my home in Memphis Tennessee, gazing out the window at the empty street, lis

      12 min read

    • Article

      Wowing The Crowd

      Sep 6, 2021

      Wowing The Crowd
      5 min read

    • Article

      Writing Outer Space

      Apr 12, 2018

      On the one hand, there is the world as we know it, the ground-level of human life and everything it entails: the whole arc of history, the transformation of our natural environment, nervous first dates over coffee. On the other hand, there is the rem

      9 min read

    • Article

      The Power To Endure

      Apr 19, 2021

      The Power To Endure
      5 min read

    • Article

      Welcome

      Nov 7, 2019

      What is phantom energy? You'd be correct in thinking that its cousin is the mysterious dark energy. And just like it, cosmologists are scratching their heads on its true identity. We have a rough idea that dark energy exists in the universe due to co

      1 min read

    • Article

      The Conspiracy Museum

      May 13, 2020

      The Conspiracy Museum
      6 min read

    • Article

      Too Much Space

      Mar 17, 2021

      Too Much Space
      5 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Dawn of Nightfall

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      The Dawn of Nightfall - Elias Rafferton

      THE DAWN OF NIGHTFALL

      By

      Edison Thomas

      Published by Edison Thomas at Smashwords

      Copyright Edison Thomas 2014

      Art and Cover Art by: A.J. Pasternak

      License Note: This eWord is licensed for your personal enjoyment only and may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share these ideas with another person, please cite the author and authors cited therein. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      The Dawn of Nightfall

      Isaac Asimov’s short story Nightfall is arguably one of the best short stories ever written. Its esoteric core is simple yet profound, penetrating many layers deep. I will attempt provide a thorough synopsis below as is relevant to the context of the interpretation to follow, but I highly recommend reading Asimov’s complete story in full before continuing further with this discourse.

      Synopsis

      The following Emerson quote is provided at the outset of the story, and is said to be the basis on which the idea was formulated:

      "If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city

      of God?"

      Nightfall begins with a news columnist, Theremon 762, who is investigating doomsday claims that have been made by a team of university scientists over the course of the previous two months. The meeting takes place atop an observatory tower, about 5 miles outside the city of Saro, the team headed by university director Aton 77, on the planet Lagash. Aton 77 is initially uncooperative and antagonistic with the young reporter, as he claims the columnist has publicly ridiculed his efforts and effectively thwarted his intention to warn the public of a coming apocalypse. He quickly changes his mind, however, and somewhat agitatedly agrees to answer Theremon’s questions. His staff believes it a good idea to allow the interview, in the case their theory proves false, as Theremon has promised to help with publicity should it be so. Aton is not thus convinced, as his unwavering certainty in the theory is made evident shortly thereafter, but seems to agree because, due to the imminence of the approaching cataclysm, it makes no difference anyway.

      Next ensues a discussion revealing that, according to their

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1