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Chapter 13
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CHAPTER FIVE: Pre- Science
This chapter is dedicated to the firsts and anticipations Da Vinci had for the future of science. I’ll explain why he isn’t given credit for some of his ideas and how he knew more about the world than most people do today. I’ll also show an example of this by demonstrating how he created one of the worlds most controversial and debated relics - The Shroud of Turin.
"Science is the observation of things possible, whether present or past. Prescience is the knowledge of things which may come to pass, though but slowly."
Da Vinci’s greatest fascination wasn’t with painting but with flight. He was obsessed and was bent on achieving human flight. He said that if he couldn’t do it, someone, someday would. He was right, although his ideas wouldn’t be expanded upon or accomplished for hundreds of years.
The greatest thing to realize when considering Da Vinci’s inventions isn’t their place in the world today, but in the world where they were conceived of.
He touched on evolution, medicine, philosophy, science, engineering, mechanics, physics, optics, biology, psychology, literature, art, all before there were even names for what he was pondering. He isn’t given credit for a lot of his “firsts” because the world was unaware he had made these discoveries until after other people discovered them as well. He knew about gravity and relativity and almost anything anyone has ever come up with well before they did themselves. It was just that he didn’t publish his findings but instead left them in his cryptic and jumbled notebooks. The people who had access to them wouldn’t have been able to read all of them, or translate, or even understand what they meant it they could.
I’ve found that the only boundaries Da Vinci had with his imagination was the world around him. For example; he designed his flying machines (that would almost surely work), but only had the materials he had. He couldn’t have designed it with polymers, plastics, and the amazing materials we have to work with today. He couldn’t completely anticipate things that really didn’t become possible until recently. Even if he had, it would have been pointless to design something with materials he couldn’t make. His limitations were his supplies which consisted of iron, wood, and ancient building products. He did quite a bit for what he did have and took them to their greatest heights. Had he been wealthier or had access to help from others -who knows what he could have accomplished. That is actually the strangest thing about Da Vinci and his journals.
What we see and read is coming from someone who was struggling to understand them himself. He had no support and had to rely almost completely on himself. If he would have told anyone else about his ideas or visions he would have been thought to be crazy. You could in a very obscure way think of him as an Ann Frank. Someone who ended up writing one of the greatest books ever, but at the time most would have considered it to be a silly journal. Who would have known how important and great her writing would be? Da Vinci wasn’t ahead of his time; he was hindered by his time.
Although he must have known a lot of his theories were correct and true, he would have struggled for support of them. As much as an independent thinker might pride themselves on their independence there is no way of accomplishing much without others. Yes, someone could have conceived of the pyramids or space travel and been correct in their designs and theories. But space travel and great buildings would be impossible without working with thousands of others. This explains at least partly, why societies crumble when their best interests aren’t kept in mind. Society and countries are not individual units but built on millions of individuals- each as important and unique as every other. You could have the greatest, best, most amazing ideas or plans but unless you can convince others of their merit - you’ll be stuck with the same fate of almost all great men.
“the sorest misfortune is when you’re views are ahead of your work”
Humans by nature long for acceptance and re-assurance and it takes someone quite special to be able to continue on when the only person who will listen to you - is yourself or your journals.
I have the greatest respect for Da Vinci, not for his accomplishments but for his perseverance. For doing what he did for the sheer joy and passion of it, and not for wealth or power or reputation. He spent his life on a journey to understand it, without prompt or reward. He was forced to leave his legacy behind in code, and never knowing for certain if the world - or anyone would ever understand, appreciate, or simply ignore and destroy everything he wrote. THAT to me, is true integrity and genius.
He deserves his reputation for our world’s greatest mind because of this determination and love of knowledge. His accomplishments pale in comparison to who he was - his essence. Instead of turning on the world he turned in on himself. This lead to frustrations and unimaginable sorrow, but as everyone learns throughout their life. It’s the struggle that makes us stronger and eventually wise.
What you don’t see in Da Vinci’s journals were his true thoughts about the world. You’ll get small glimpses in a snide tone, or masked meaning but his personal life and true passions were stifled by an ignorant world. His true love and the things that shaped him into who he was might have been lost due to popular opinion. Being forced to be ashamed and hide who he really was is the worlds’ loss. Learn from that and realize that through our ignorance we could have very well ruined the greatest insight into what made Da Vinci who he became. His personal life..
Conversely it might have been that very ignorance that created his drive. It’s said that Sir Issac Newton did the things he did because of the shame of his sexuality. That he traded those desires for a thirst of knowledge. It would seem the case with most great accomplishments. They aren’t driven by love but by extinguishing hate. I mean it in the way that when someone tells you that you CANT do something, it makes you want to prove them wrong. When someone tells you something is WRONG, you want to prove it right. When the world says you’re a bad person for being who you are you’ll show the world what a person should really be.
The Birth of Anatomy:
Da Vinci was one of the first to look inside the human body. He dissected over 10 bodies and drew the most complete and thorough anatomical drawings ever made. They’re still used today and are unparalleled. Some might consider this morbid but it was anything but. It’s what every doctor does during their education today.
I had called this book; The Anatomy of Mona Lisa partly in tribute to his fascination with anatomy but more so because it takes knowing the anatomy of something before you can truly understand it. You need to take something apart, piece by piece, layer by layer to truly experience it. You can’t know the whole without first knowing its parts and visa versa.
How do you move a finger? You can do it but do you really know how? Or why it’s happening? Is it magic? A miracle? Without knowing how, you can’t really understand something. If you think about the world how it would have been 500 years ago, they wouldn’t have even had the slightest idea how they moved their own finger. A lot of people today probably couldn’t explain it. Some don’t even know what nerves, bones, tendons, neurons etc. are. Da Vinci didn’t want to cut dead bodies open, he had to! He had to know
So how do you move a finger? After thinking about it I actually remember an episode of “the Wonder Years” when the main character got drunk for the first time at a wedding. I remember wondering why he was he was looking at his hand as if he’d never seen it before?? After getting drunk for the first time myself, It became clear to me. In an altered state of mind you’re more aware of things you never noticed before. Things you were desensitized to or are seamless to you sober, become more obvious when you’re messed up. Usually you never consider how you walk, but once intoxicated you’re forced to think about it a lot more aren’t you? Why?
TRY IT:
Hold up your hand in front of your face. Now point up with just your pointer finger. Now try to close it as slowly as you possibly can! Think about how you are doing it and what is really happening. How is your mind controlling your finger? Isn’t it weird that it’s apart of you, but in a way also not? It’s under your control but only as much as you understand how to control it. The process takes you thinking to move it, then electrical signals and chemicals telling the muscles in your arm - forearm - hand - then finally finger just to move it. But it happens so easily we forget how complex it really is.
I remember trying to do the “spok hand” when I was younger. It’s not something that comes naturally to most, you usually have to train your fingers. Isn’t that weird? It’s like learning how to walk. Muscles memory, knowing where your finger is, controlling each finger independently.. etc.
Why doesn’t your heart ever stop for a break? Isn’t it cool that it can beat every second for over 100 years? Or that we have to breathe in air to survive? That it’s like our gasoline!? That the air we breathe out, is different from the air we breathe in? We have the ability within our chest to turn oxygen into carbon dioxide?
Or how about the curiosities of when we can’t control ourselves? Da Vinci has a fascinating quote about the “mind” of an erection. Who, or what is it that controls it? Why can it come and go on its own accord. If you want it, it can refuse. If you don’t, it doesn’t care. BUT fortunately if you try you can learn to control it like anything else, it just takes discipline and practice. Most people would never even think about the dynamics and instead turn to pills and pornography.
“The art of procreation and the members employed therein are so repulsive, that if it were not for the beauty of the faces and the adornments of the actors and the pent-up impulse, nature would lose the human species. ~Leonardo da Vinci
Taking that idea a step further. Why can’t we control our hunger? Why can’t we just think - STOP being hungry?? It’s our body isn’t it? Why do people also turn to pills or something outside of themselves for something that can only truly be controlled inside of our minds? I assure you that you can say no to French fries and chocolate. You can eat vegetables and you can work out but you have to actually DO IT, not think about it.
Or better yet - why can’t we control our own thoughts? Why when we try to avoid thinking about something, it consumes us? I would say that these questions are the most important to ask yourself. Why can’t you control yourself? - The answer - you can. But like with everything else it requires patient practice. You can’t in a single day expect to be able to change who you are - but you could. The only limitations you have are the ones you place on yourself. Da Vinci is the prime example.
He wasn’t born knowing how to draw - he taught himself. He wasn’t born with all his knowledge - he learned it through experience. We didn’t leave our planet on a whim - it took thousands of years and specific and important steps along the way.
I didn’t look at the Mona Lisa and instantly know who she was. It took almost a year of my life and completely altering everything about myself to write this book. But this leads me to my own prescience…
Would it be possible to learn something instantly; just by looking at a painting? Yes or no? Don’t we learn by our sight? By our hearing? It takes significant and important steps in each individual’s evolution to understand anything. To know up from down, left from right. Sold from liquid. Hot from cold. We require a vast knowledge even for the most basic functions. This is what I truly believe the Mona Lisa to be. It’s a culmination of thousands of pages of knowledge and the life from the world’s greatest mind. When you try to answer her mysteries, you get come up with some mysterious questions.
When you see the first paintings on the walls of a cave and compare them to the Mona Lisa you will understand the evolution of man. From simple curiosity to “art.” When you consider the steps in human knowledge and understanding that were required to go from stick figures to the Mona Lisa you’ll also understand what it will take of yourself to make the same progression. You’re born an animal and it’s up to you how far you’d like to trek into humanity. How far that journey goes, no man could tell. It ends with your death and no one has gotten far enough to tell us what happens next for sure!
Da Vinci represents mankind’s furthest climb in the potential of our species. Will he be surpassed? Absolutely, that was his intention - the purpose of his life.
“it is a poor pupil who does not surpass his master”
We can be his students and you’ll find that Da Vinci wrote his journals to the reader. He wanted to progress humanity, but we’ve been pretty slow and disappointing. Yes - we can land on the moon and make 1000hp cars. But what good does that do anyone if we’re not happy? If EVERYONE is not happy? If we’re not content and fulfilled? Everyone is searching for the purpose of life while life passes them by. They forget that you make your own purpose and in doing so answer the question for yourself. You’re the only one who can, you’re the only one who really cares.
An example of Da Vinci’s “prescience” is something most people confuse with a miracle. Something so far ahead of it’s time it’s thought to be divine. People were unable to explain how it was created so they took it literally. This was also combined with the desire for it to be real - but that alone does not make something real. Does it? No!
The Shroud of Turin:
They say that this piece of cloth is “the single most studied artifact in human history.” Although there were reports of this shroud before Da Vinci’s time there are those that believe Da Vinci might have created this. This would have meant that the first version was replaced by one that Da Vinci created during his life. Interestingly Da Vinci knew and was friends with the royal family of Turin so it’s not like it’s a far fetched reach to assert this. I know from my research of Leonardo that he was fully capable of creating this shroud and did. Even more interesting is the technique that would have had to been developed for the shroud image. Most people who think it’s actually an image of Jesus burned into his burial cloth that managed to stay intact for 2000 years believe this because it is SO complex - there isn’t another explanation. It would be like finding a photograph of a pharaoh in an Egyptian tomb. There would be 3 different possibilities:
1. It’s not from the time you think it is (someone is fooling you or left it there recently ) 2. They had photography back then that we just didn’t know about 3. It was created from an Egyptian God.
After studying Da Vinci’s sketches, paintings, and journals for the past year I’m pretty good at noticing his style and technique. When I see the shroud of Turin that is what I see. I’m not saying there wasn’t a shroud that covered Jesus at some point. I’m saying this is not it. Those who think it is, -want to believe that it is but that doesn’t make it authentic. The cloth itself could have been from the time of Jesus and this would account for the “dates” of it, but that doesn’t mean the image wasn’t added at a later date by Da Vinci. Carbon dating is pretty shady anyways, it’s always being updated and refined.
It’s been shown and tested that the same effect could be duplicated with the materials of that day. It’s a basic form of photography which coincidentally I’m attributing to Da Vinci in this book through the Mona Lisa. I think by showing that Da Vinci was very capable of creating the Shroud of Turn and knew the TURIN royal family makes an excellent case that he created it. Not only that but his own face is very similar to that of “Jesus” in the shroud. This wouldn’t necessarily be because he wanted to make them similar but would have used himself as the model for the very complex process. He would have had to look into a mirror to create this image and this would be why there are facial similarities. Or he used himself in the “photograph” which is what the Shroud really is.
Also, although the image in the shroud appears to be a real man it’s really just a complex drawing. It’s similar to how the Mona Lisa looks so real, but is just a painting.
I think it’s obvious this is just a clever hoax whose only merit is it’s complexities but those alone don’t mean they were supernatural. Here are some additional things to consider:
What would be the process that this would happen? Although most people love to simply say “it’s a miracle” and have that answer everything - what about Jesus rising from the dead would create this? Think about it.
If you believe in the story from the bible the tomb’s entrance was opened so he didn’t phase out of it and into the air - ascending to heaven. No - angels supposedly moved the door open for him to walk out. If that’s the case then at what point did his image become transposed onto his burial cloth? When he was re-awakened? Randomly when he was just laying there?
Also the crucifixion wounds are too pronounced - by the time Jesus bled to death on the cross he would have lost most of his blood - especially after someone pierced his side with a sword and being beaten for hours before his death. He also would have been cleaned and dressed before being placed in a tomb and wouldn’t have bled much, if at all from his crucifixion wounds. You don’t bleed after you die, especially if you died from blood loss… right? It’s also shown that the materials on the shroud are not blood but pigments resembling blood. It’s also note worthy that those who own the shroud won’t allow further testing to be done - what does that usually mean? They don’t want people to know the truth!
Whoever made this cloth intentionally added and pronounced these wounds to make it look like it was Jesus - Without them there would be no indication what so ever that it was him or special. It’s like finding big foot tracks like this;
I’m not trying to insinuate anything about he validity of Jesus. Discrediting a piece of cloth has nothing to do with Christianity. The cloth isn’t a holy relic but a very clever and successful experiment with optics and art that Da Vinci made.
The one of the
left is the original; the one on the right is mirrored on top of
itself. As I was doing this I confirmed for myself that Da Vinci did
this. I’ve been mirroring and working with Da Vinci’s work for
months now and this had all the same properties as the Mona Lisa and
his sketches. There are even similar patterns that are created in
the mirroring that I’ve seen in his other art.
Also notice how the shroud looks even more clear and defined after it’s mirrored on itself. Just like I’ve seen after mirroring other Da Vinci art! Also notice the crosses and symbols that are created after the image is mirrored on itself. So Jesus presence also created an image that creates other images when mirrored on itself??? I think not.
This is Da Vinci’s self portrait mirrored on itself and moved to give you an idea of what it would look like facing head on. The fact that the sketch is able to do this is pretty interesting. You’ll notice the similarities between his face and the face of “Jesus’ in the shroud. Again I’ll reiterate that he wasn’t trying to make it seem that he WAS Jesus, it’s just the he had to use his own face as a model and then alter it to what you world “imagine” Jesus to look like. I don’t even think the face looks like a real person at all anyways. People just see what they want.
When I was trying to find a painting of Jesus that Da Vinci helped make, I came across an article where they were getting at the same thing. Someone actually wrote a book about The Turin being created by Da Vinci so at least I know I’m on the right track. He compared the Salvator Mundi (which was the painting I was googling) and noticed how similar they were. I’m going to take that a couple steps forward tho. Check these out.
Those are the image from the Shroud of Turin superimposed over the painting: Salvator Mundi which Da Vinci either painted personally or designed. Coincidence? It gets even better.
Ok so lets consider this for a second.. Da Vinci knew and was friends with the TURIN royal family. (The Shroud of TURIN remember) and it just so happens that Jesus’s spiritual impression on his shroud matches up with Da Vinci’s Vitruvian man? OR does this just prove that Da Vinci made it? Like I said, watch out for these coincidences; I’m almost starting to believe that nothing is a coincidence at least when it comes to anything Da Vinci is associated with!
Here’s what I would call “coincidence”…
You’ll see how incredibly similar they are in the non-inverted version. They are the same color and tone. It’s as if they were created.. By the same artist! The face matches up, the proportions are identical, and it actually appears to me that they were intended to do this. There’s definitely something going on there and by the end of this book you’ll know that Da Vinci was definitely one for combining images! So it’s very likely that the shroud of Turin was created by Da Vinci and he probably had it match up with the Vitruvian man and his other art so people could eventually credit it to him! I bet he never would have thought people would take it so seriously for so long.. if at all
Another thing I noticed was the exact same type of art that’s created when I mirror the image on top of itself and move it around. When I’ve done it with Da Vinci’s art there is a distinctive pattern that could at first look to be nothing but are actually small and complex images. You’ll notice these throughout the Images I’ve made by mirroring them on top of themselves. At first I thought these were just a side affect created randomly but after looking at them I’ve noticed similarities between the various paintings I’ve seen them in. They are like really abstract cartoons. I’ll get into that later but suffice to say those same types of things are present in the shroud of Turin!
So in conclusion, I agree with those that believe Da Vinci was responsible for creating the Shroud of Turin. I think I’ve provided some additional insight and again - things that could be coincidences that on deep reflection are definitely more.
In this one you can see what looks like a view from above. Da Vinci drew things from 3 perspectives – in front, behind, and from above (and sometimes below) When the composite images are altered in a certain way, it unlocks these alternate perspectives. I’m still working on the mechanics behind it, but once I figure it out I’m confident you can see completely around and through the “Vitruvian Man” an anagram of this is: “Turin I am, navv” I’m not making this up!
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