As Above, So Below

The etymological derivation of the word “understand”, if memory holds true, derives – quite simply – from, “to stand under”; therefore, it would appear to be merely a contraction of sorts; however, the further question posed – or at least implied – by such an exposition, distils to the obvious: “under what?” Let me rewind for a moment and furnish the circumstance from which inspiration forged the grounds by which I now expound forth upon. Whilst I live close to the centre of a largish city, the street lighting is intermittent and stretches of unlit open spaces – mostly by virtue of historical inheritance in the form of Victorian planned parks or the abandoned topological relics of demolished once cathedral-like expanses of industrial premises – permit the observation of the circling celestial bodies wedged in the gravitational firmament of the void, especially during the winter months, when a crystal night bestows: the heavens, theologically speaking: the very same silent light show viewed across the civilised stage of space and time. To stand, one presumes, is to do so upon grounds of sufficient surety such that one may, at least momentarily, rest assured, but what inverse logic of perversity would have us root – again, at least metaphorically – our epistemic knowledge – the confidence to be found therein – in what lies in the distant stellar atrium above us and from which we ought draw down upon? Space in the abstract has or up nor down.