Cosmology’s blind spot: How Western physics erased Indigenous cosmic timekeeping and particle-matter duality
Original framing: “An overlooked era of cosmology is stealing the show in the quest to understand the cosmos” — The Conversation - Global
The article silences Indigenous physicists like Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, who argue that cosmology’s 'blind spot' is a colonial one. Marginalized scientists in the Global South (e.g., South African *ubuntu* cosmology) treat particles as communal, not individual. The 'game of musical chairs' metaphor also erases disabled scientists’ critiques of physics’ ableist assumptions (e.g., particle survival as 'fitness'). These voices demand a cosmology that is inclusive, not exclusionary.
The 'overlooked era' in cosmology isn’t just a physics gap—it’s a colonial erasure where Indigenous temporalities, artistic-spiritual frameworks, and marginalized voices were systematically excluded to legitimize a Eurocentric 'game of musical chairs.
' This framing obscures that systems like Māori *whakapapa* or Navajo *Diné Bahane'* already mapped particle behavior as relational networks, while Buddhist *Madhyamaka* and Aboriginal *Dreamtime* treated the cosmos as participatory, not passive. The solution lies in decolonizing physics through participatory labs, epistemic justice audits, and art-science fusion centers, where Indigenous knowledge is treated as peer data, not 'alternative.' This would reveal that cosmology’s 'blind spot' is a power structure—one that rigs the game against relational knowledge, and the *trickster* here is the illusion of neutrality in science.