Merle,
The marvels and realizations you mention are ones that have had me going since
I was ten. That's a long time, now.
They led first to my career in Philosophy; and, then to my career in Natural
Science ("Natural Philosophy", as so-called in the 19th Century).
And I've had the super-duper advantage of living during the peak of American
space exploration up to the present (where it has now really petered-out).
But robotic missions have been PHENOMENAL in their returns, their results.
We are not yet a space-faring Nation (USA), because every mission is "special".
It has to cease being "special". We thought, initially, that that would be
the benefit of "the Shuttle", but even that was "special", and cost half a
BILLION dollars US for each launch. The advertizing slogan for it in 1972,
which I saw at Cape Kennedy then, was, "SHUTTLE SAVES MONEY". Never happened,
that way.
Ridiculous.
Merle, I never learned astrology; only Astronomy. And constellation lore. It
is a wonderful and fun study. If we meet, I will humbly show you your actual
stars. And the Magellanic Clouds. And Alpha and Beta Centauri. And Omega
Centauri, a huge globular cluster of 1 Billion stars, which looks to the naked
eye like a single star, or like a fuzzy star (it's a part of our galaxy, the
Milky Way).
All we need is a finger to point, and an eye to see. It's a bit like Zen
(practice).
I don't think of Humans as "orphans"; we have yet to MEET our distant
relatives. I mean, really, really, distant. In terms of distance. And they
may not even be relatives.
Except that they will be DeniZens -- CitiZens -- of our local region of this
dinky, dusty galaxy.
Let's please meet, ET, and We (all).
And compare notes on Zazen, etc.
I doubt this will happen before another 10,000 or 100,000 years.
I've given up on it. I'm just trying to keep us safe from asteroids which
could collide, so our very far distant ancestors may survive to meet ET. And
they, we. It would be about time. If we're careful about asteroid hazards.
Hence, we are the Night-Watchmen. Only a few of us on this round globe. About
27.
w/ Cheers!,
--J.
> Merle Lester <merlewiitpom@...> wrote:
>
> hi joe...
>
> i thought as much when i googled..thank you for this clarification... the
> night sky is certainly filled with awe and wonder..
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