At first, I admired his prose/argument but then found it depressing. Why bother at all?
On Sep 23, 7:36 am, Slip Disc <[email protected]> wrote: > Oops! Try again: > > Rigsy, I must inject this piece of what think is pertinent to a > portion of our interaction, if not of the whole. > Only because we all find so much significance to this world, > to this life when in all actuality it is so much the opposite. This is > from a speech Carl Sagan made at Cornell University on Oct. 13, 1994 > based on a photo from Voyager I in 1990 and also the title of Sagan's > 1994 book. "Pale Blue Dot". > > Carl Sagan: > From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of > particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that > dot. That's here, that's home, that's us. On it everyone you love, > everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who > ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and > suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic > doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every > creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every > young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor > and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every > "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the > history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a > sunbeam. > > The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. 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. > > The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is > nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could > migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment > the Earth is where we make our stand. > > It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building > experience. 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. > > ------------------------------------------------------------------- > > But truthfully Rids, this photo, for me, has an enormous impact on the > consciousness. To imagine that all of this is taking place on a spec > of dust in the universe. > > http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123614938 > > Of course it begs the question "why?" > > It is ultimately a study in consciousness. IMHO (take out the humble > part) LOL
