Spheres: A New Way To See The World

The following is a way to see the world that I came up with late one night while trying to sleep, several months, if not a year, ago.

This way of visualizing the relationships between people doesn't work if you want to picture it spatially, since spheres in 3 dimensional space don't interact the way they need to for this simulation, nor do circles in 2 dimensional space, so picture circles in 3 dimensional space whenever I say Sphere.

I am in writing club, and so are all of you. That is the Writing Club Sphere. All of us are points on the edge of that sphere. Spheres intersect only where there are people, and sometimes parts of the sphere get flattened out. Example: the Writing Club Sphere intersects with the (my school name) sphere at three points, therefore that side of it is a bit squished.
Here's some examples of spheres that intersect at me:

• Writing Club
• My school
• My school's band (when comparing only within the school)
• My relatives
• The elementary school
• People who are my close friends

The definition of a Sphere is this: A Sphere consists of a set of people who either all or almost all know each other or interact with each other at some level, and the basis for this knowing of each other is a central place, relationship, activity, etc., that everyone within the Sphere participates in.

What's the point, though? Why even bother thinking of things this way? Because when referring to someone of a different Sphere than the person to whom you are talking, you can use the name of the sphere: "This person at writing club," "This girl at my church," "A bunch of band people." In relation to the people outside of the Sphere, everyone within the other ones are, as far as they're concerned, the same entity. Their membership within that Sphere is the only thing that's important. We become generic in the minds of those outside of the specific.

Of  course, since "People who are my close friends" will span across several mostly-separate Spheres, the final picture will look like a very, very complex spatially impossible and asymmetrical Venn diagram.


I got a 93 on my CW exam, and went to see Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time today. The movie had some very well-done foreshadowing, I thought. Some was subtle, and some was obvious, but it wasn't cheesy like in The Lovely Bones.