The chance of you, me, or anyone ever being born and existing as we are, is one in four-quadrillion. In simple mathematical terms, that means zero. A zero chance, so the fact that we’re here means we won the biggest and most impossible lottery ever and we didn’t even buy a ticket.
However, … our importance is greatly over-imagined. Wait … what?!
Our home; this earth is but a speck of dust in a universe so vast, it’s unimaginable. Carl Sagan’s observation about this “Pale Blue Dot” we live on, provides some perspective.
He says, “Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.”
We’re so intelligent and advanced with our technology, but we’re not very smart, when it comes to what really matters.
We commit gross atrocities against each other in the name of politics, religious beliefs, race, national origin and so on. Some individuals and groups are affected so much that they’ll kill other humans and feel righteous about it as if they’re on the “good side”. So much misery and darkness inside an improbable being on a speck of dust.
Hate, division, and racism is big business and the purveyors of this poison have a wider and deeper reach than ever. It’s sick, twisted, and quite evil. All forms of media selling us on how we should feel, why we should be angry, and what side to be on and whom to be against. Telling us that we should be offended, ashamed, mad, repressed, or whatever else rows the oars of their massive ship.
My favorite sitcom used to be a place I could go for a healthy laugh. Not anymore. Now there’s a message and an agenda. I thought this was a comedy? I really liked that show. I used to enjoy your talent, your music, your jokes, and/or your writing, but now its tainted with preachy manipulation. And for that reason, I’m out.
Politicians, news media outlets of all genres, network television programs, movies and the actors who play in them, stand-up comedians, leaders, musical groups and individual singers, churches of all kinds on one side or another, newspapers, Universities and their staff, authors, social media, and … well, almost everywhere.
What ever happened to entertainment? What happened to the “news”? What happened to … us?
This planet is roughly 4.5 billion years old. Us humans; a tiny, tiny fraction of that. Somewhere around 200,000 years with civilization of any form having only been around for about 6,000. That’s nothing. When we’re gone; when this pale blue dot is gone, the universe will still be.
Our significance is minuscule in the grand scheme of things, yet our ego is immense. Such an advanced species and yet, so greatly flawed. There’s so much that we can’t truly know, yet we pretend we do. “We believe that what we know is true and if you don’t agree, you’re wrong!” Our party against yours, this religion against that one, and that “race” against another.
By the way, there’s only one race of humans, so we need to get our head out of our asses on that one. Different colors, shapes, sizes, and sexes, but we are all the same animal. Some are smart and some are quite stupid. Some are good and some are bad. Some have class, while others are classless. Some are assholes while others are just very cool peeps. Some cling to excuses, while others find solutions. Some are lazy and some work hard to improve life on this speck of dust. Some are selfish, while others do their best to help humanity as a whole. Most of us are a mix of all of those things along a sliding grayscale. And … we come in all colors. Same race though.
We will never be perfect. The mathematics make that an impossibility. There will always be war, hate, division, atrocities, tragedies, and evil. And there will always be peace, love, union, kindness, miracles, and good. We will never have world peace, but there is peace on earth. At this time however, the balance seems to be way off. We are giving the negative all our energy and of course it’s spreading and perpetuating. We need to quit feeding it.
We’re all on this dot together; 7.5 billion of us, yet alone in the cold, vast darkness of space. It’s an incredible existence and I am grateful to be a part of it, however small.
Cheers.
Photo by Voyager 1. Earth, from 3.7 Billion Miles.
