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 "There you go. An asymmetry with respect to light anyway."

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"An asymmetry with respect to light anyway"
Ed Addle simply repeats what Merle explained the press reported about Blinky's eyes. Yeah, jerko. He sees two different things with each eye. Asymmetrical, you might say.

I think it's the asymmetry of the two separated beams of light from the same source was what Michelson and Morley were looking for to prove the existence of Æther. The light split in two perpendicular directions but measured across the same distance should result in two asymmetric wavelengths if Æther exists. The double-refraction of the light (but not resulting in parallel beams due to the use of mirrors) coming back together would cause the beam to intensify or dim depending on if the wavelengths "interfered" with each other (hence the name interferometer!).

Ed's "with respect to light" bit might also just be him conceding that, sure, he can imagine Blinky seeing the world this way but it's only in regards to the way Blinky's eyes receive light at different times or wavelengths. In other words, it has nothing to do with Æther. So there you go, Merle. Big deal.

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 "A double-refractor, for that matter."

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An interferometer splits light from a single source and then has them converge on a detector. A double-refractor polarizes the light to create two beams in parallel. So Merle's example is subtly different in that Blinky's seeing the same light but refracted to different wavelengths. I'll admit (again): I don't think I'm smart enough to understand the difference.

But what I am smart enough to understand is that Merle Rideout is getting into photography (or soon will, anyway) so he sees Blinky as a photographic or telescopic lens while Ed Addle sees him as just another tool to discover his beloved Æther.

Are their two viewpoints another example of the Theory of Relativity and how two observers can view the same events in different ways? Man, I'm really simplifying one of the most amazing scientific leaps of logic and experimentation of the 20th Century! I should probably just stick to playing video games.

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 "A walking interferometer, as you'd say," suggested Ed Addle.

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"interferometer"
Merriam-Webster's definition: "an apparatus that utilizes the interference of waves (as of light) for precise determinations (as of distance or wavelength)". The interferometer was the device used in the Michelson-Morley experiment to determine if the movement of the Earth caused a change in the speed of light as it moved through the theoretical Æther. Ed's suggesting that Blinky now has the same sort of ability. He can see distortions in space-time because each eye sees the same light from the same source but from two separate perspectives.

A Michelson interferometer invented by Albert Abraham Michelson in 1887.

Here's a quote from the Michelson interferometer Wikipedia page that sort of sums up why Pynchon's concentrating on this event at the beginning of the book, much like he began with the Columbus Exposition in Chicago because it signaled the end of the Frontier and the advancement of electricity:

"The null result of that experiment essentially disproved the existence of such an Æther, leading eventually to the special theory of relativity and the revolution in physics at the beginning of the twentieth century."

Thomas Pynchon has carefully chosen this time and place as the beginning of not just a new century but an entirely new world brought on by a new understanding and perspective, a changed observation, of that world.

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 Blinky gave out a number of stories.

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We only have two examples of the stories Blinky gave out which Pynchon probably did on purpose. What he's given us is two different examples of the violent trauma that altered Blinky's eye. Two different possibilities. Two different ways of seeing things. Blinky's eyes themselves. If your eyes see the world in two different ways, how can you be sure of the truth of anything you're seeing? Blinky's stories now match his vision. Do you believe the left eye or the right eye? And does it even matter if both are, in their own ways, true?

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 Each of Blinky's eyes, according to press accounts, saw the world differently, the left one having undergone an obscure trauma, either from a premature detonation during a box job or from a naval howitzer while fighting in the Rebellion.

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Not sure how Merle could tell this from Blinky's picture although I'm sure one eye must have been covered in a white film. Maybe the picture Merle is talking about which would be the picture Thomas Pynchon saw was the picture in my last blog post. And if you go by that picture, one eye is in the light and the other is recessed in darkness. Along with the rumors that Blinky's eye sees the world differently, Merle could have then come to the conclusion, skin covered in goose flesh, that Blinky somehow was seeing the world in a way that would prove the Michelson-Morley experiment a complete failure.
    The idea that Blinky's eyes saw the world in different ways finally reveals that my speculation was probably correct in that the "principle" is that of Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Here we get the most compact and literal example of that theory: a man whose two eyes themselves act as separate observers, each seeing the same world but from different positions and perspectives.

"obscure trauma"
The literal reading of this line indicates that the actual story of the eye's trauma is unknown to all but Blinky. But this can also be read as a trauma caused by darkness. Meaning, you know, no light since light's super important to this book. Illumination can be read as knowledge as well. In other words, the trauma has hidden knowledge from the eye, leaving it in darkness, a metaphor for the current times not being able to yet see the reality of the physical universe.

"premature detonation during a box job"
I'm not sure what this means but I assume it means robbing a box car on a train or a bank vault. I suspect Pynchon chose the two examples of how the eye went for specific reasons but, again, I can only speculate. Could Blinky's vision of the unknown principle (seeing prematurely in a way he shouldn't) caused by a premature detonation be a hint at how the atomic bomb was made possible by Einstein's theory? According to how I'm perceiving history in this novel, I mean that literally. The atomic bomb would not exist until a new way of viewing the universe came into view and not Einstein's theory was especially needed for an atomic bomb.

"naval howitzer while fighting in the Rebellion"
We don't get a mention as to what side of the Rebellion Blinky fought on. But that doesn't matter. Pynchon simply takes the opportunity to remind the reader of the historical context of this story: just mere decades ago, a bunch of racists rose up to try to maintain ownership of Black Americans. Sure, some moronic imbeciles who are stupid love to claim the Rebellion was started for States Rights. But you know which right they wanted their own say in, yeah? Slavery, dumb-dumb.
    Anyway, maybe this can be seen as Black versus White or, in other words, Dark versus Light (both in the color of the skin of the people at the center of the dispute and also the "dark" idea of keeping slaves versus the "light" of emancipation).

Double anyway, Blinky loses his eye through some sort of violent means and changes the way he sees the world forever. Rebellion. Detonation. Trauma. Look, Pynchon will get less subtle and metaphorical about these things once Lew gets to Colorado!