The arcs of the sunflower seeds begin with an angle that corresponds exactly to an angle in a pentagon. And there are always exactly 34 spirals bent to the right and exactly 55 bent to the left.
Both are numbers from the Fibonacci series in which the golden ratio is hidden. And all this by chance?
One sunny morning I suddenly found myself on a new path that I had never travelled before. I had strayed into a completely unfamiliar neighbourhood.
In front of a detached house was a large, well-tended front garden with a roundabout full of different roses, and an incredibly tall sunflower towered right next to the fence; I estimated it to be well over two metres. Its large and heavy blossom bent down over the fence from above like an arc lamp.
I stop and look up at it. And it’s as if she’s looking back at me in a friendly way.
‘You are beautiful and shine like the sun’, I think. ‚Your seeds arrange themselves in harmonious rows in a perfect way. How did you create this perfection? – that is a mystery to me. I would like to fathom this riddle and I sense that it also contains an answer for me.’
‘Many people stop when they see me. The rows of my seeds make them think’, she says to me.
‘Yes’, I say, ‘me too. How can you do it so accurately – can you count?’
‘I don’t know what counting is’, she says, ‘but I was given a pentagon when I was born.’
‘A pentagon?’ I ask, ’what does that have to do with the order of your seeds?’
‘First of all the pentagon places itself in the centre when the seeds want to form.’
‘How are the spirals created? Do you map the sun’s orbit with the spirals?’
‘No, the spirals are formed at night.’
‘Do you look into the furthest distances – as far as the spiral nebulae?’
‘That can be like that. When the rows of seeds begin to arrange themselves, I shudder deeply and am infinitely happy. I have the feeling that they dance around each other at first and then slowly find their place.
What did you get for your birth?’ the sun flower asks after a pause.
‘I don’t know – did I get anything as a present at my birth?’
‘Of course! Everyone got something special as a present: … we flowers, the trees … the animals … the birds … the bugs … the stones … Everyone has received something special. I heard that you humans have been given the most of all. You can see, hear, feel, act, walk – and you are even said to be able to ‘think’. I don’t know what it is, but it must be something quite wonderful.’
I stand still. Have I really heard a sunflower speak to me – or is it just my imagination? But how is it possible – the image of a spiral nebula in the rows of seeds of a flower? I have to sit down.
‘Can you humans understand how the world came into being?’
‘Yes, scientists have calculated that around 14 billion years ago there was the Big Bang that gave rise to the world we know today.’
‘Haha’, the sunflower laughed out loud, ‘you’re joking! I’ve never heard that before … from a bang. The whole world is said to have been created by a bang. – I’ve never laughed in my whole life, and now I’m bursting with laughter … from a bang! … no, really too funny!‘
When she calms down again, she says: ‘I didn’t even know what laughter was and why you have to laugh …. Now I’ve experienced it. Laughter is a wonderful thing, something liberating! – But you weren’t really serious when you said that, were you?’
‘Yes, I was, most scientists are serious and that’s what they teach in schools.’
‘Don’t the children ask what happened before the Big Bang was?’
‘You’re absolutely right, that’s usually the first question and as far as I know there is no satisfactory answer to it, only evasive theories.’
‘Did no one tell the scientists about God, the creator of the universe?’
‘Oh yes, but most of them dismiss belief in God as child’s play. And if a scientist talks about God as a creative force, he’ll be expelled.’
‘Oh God!’ the sunflower bursts out, ’I thought that you humans were the highest, noblest and wisest creatures in the world. And now you say that most people don’t believe in God. All creatures, from the smallest beetle to the largest eagle, believe in their Creator; they not only believe, they know it down to every cell of their bodies.
Now you say that people don’t believe in God. That must be terrible, very dark! I am deeply shocked. A moment ago I was shaking with laughter and now I’m deadly sad, sadder than I’ve ever been in my life. – How is something like this possible?’
‘It’s not that most people have this attitude, but for many of them and for scientists, too, it is often that they publicly deny their belief in God, but then admit in private conversations that they believe in a creator.’
‘Perhaps you humans should go through this darkness in order to miss the Father and then long for him? Maybe …’
‘Do you like my sunflower, sir? A splendid specimen, isn’t it? I am proud of it!’
I startle – I didn’t even hear the landlord coming.
‘Er, yes … a big one … really a nice one … congratulations!’
I pull myself together.
‘Yes, you know, I’m a retired biologist and have been growing sunflowers since I was a child. It gives me great pleasure to see them sprout up so high from the small seed.
Do you know the secret of the seed arrangement? You see, they are arranged in two rows of arches, and there are always exactly 34 spirals bent to the right, and exactly 55 bent to the left. Even as a small boy I counted them and marvelled that they are always exactly these numbers.’
‘You might think that sunflowers can count,’ I interject.
‘Exactly – but that’s nonsense, of course. Incidentally, these two numbers 34 and 55 are from the Fibonacci series. Perhaps you’ve heard about it? The two preceding numbers are always added to be the new number. In this very simple series the number of the golden ratio is hidden.
And my colleagues have since discovered that the arcs of the sunflower seeds begin with an angle that corresponds exactly to an angle in a pentagon, to the nearest 0.01 degree! Isn’t that amazing, and it confirms to me that there are still many secrets hidden in nature waiting to be solved. And the biggest mystery is probably man, isn’t it? But why are we standing here at the fence, may I invite you for a cup of coffee or tea, would you do me the favour?’ And he opens the garden gate.
‘Yes, I’d love to,’ I say and step inside. I turn round once more to the sunflower, do I see a smile in its blossom? But that’s probably imagination.
I close the garden gate behind me. A new story begins here, but that will be another time.
