I read a story the other day that seemed historical and true and was presented as such. It goes like this: Rome 31st December ,999 AD. Pope Sylvester II stands on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica, midnight mass for a packed crowd of nuns and peasants, monks and lords, all of them half-convinced that this is midnight for the world. The hands of the great clock edge towards the top of the dial. Tick.Tick.Tick. The clock begins to strike midnight. And then.... Then it stops. Just stops. People scream. Some die: their hearts stop with the clock. There is panic and madness and fear, in this dark midnight. Tick. The clock chimes twelve times. Time starts once more. The pope blesses them, each and every one of them, and bravely they return to face the world. Great story. Wonderful story.
Some problems though, it cannot, of course, be true. Chiefly because the dial face clock was not invented until the 1300's and the minute hand took another 300 years to appear! No clock. With no clock the story is meaningless. Rubbish. A lie. Is the story less true because it is a lie? We impose patterns on what we experience. And we die, because things that matter end. But sometimes the patterns we created carry on. ' You are not dead, until every person that knew you is dead as well' Where did I hear that? Perhaps I made it up. Does it really matter?