Something To Be Thinking About.

[Grall]

Bah. We're definitely more significant than some faint dots in the sky, trust me.

More significant in OUR eyes, sure.

Then again, we're way more significant in our own eyes compared to everything else on this planet as well, including little forgettable things like wildlife, nature, yes indeed our entire biosphere which sustains us and makes our existance possible; stuff which we're rapidly in the process of either overexploiting, polluting, eradicating, squandering or all of the above.

If you don't find our human shortsightedness (to the point of self-elimination is my wager) depressing then there's no hope for you.

 

[suryad]

More significant in OUR eyes, sure.

Then again, we're way more significant in our own eyes compared to everything else on this planet as well, including little forgettable things like wildlife, nature, yes indeed our entire biosphere which sustains us and makes our existance possible; stuff which we're rapidly in the process of either overexploiting, polluting, eradicating, squandering or all of the above.

If you don't find our human shortsightedness (to the point of self-elimination is my wager) depressing then there's no hope for you.

I do. But I cant stay depressed for too long. Thats when I go for a blast in my gas guzzling 09 M3 or my noise polluting emissions go to hell MV Agusta. And it kinda cheers me up. I know I am a bad person...

 

[Acert93]

Bah. We're definitely more significant than some faint dots in the sky, trust me.

For once we agree :smile:

I agree that there are a lot of oooohs and awwws in the above. Massive. Awesome. Consuming. Unsearchable. Confounding. It does make something, someone, as fragile and small as a human seem oh so insignificant. We are a vapor and these objects in comparison are eternal monoliths.

But look in a mirror and notice your face. Look at your skin and hair, how they all work in concord to give life, sustaining life. Look at your amazing eyes, glassy reflections that absorb light and is processed to give the human the very real ability to gather, process, and act on information. All those galaxies are balls of gas and elements, but in them is no life. Life is an amazing thing, something we have not found elsewhere. The depths of complexity of even the simplest single celled organisms is profound, even defiant in the face of the general trend of entropy.

But more amazingly is that we mere lumps of cells can think beyond ourselves. We often don't, but we can. We are each a universe unto ourselves with hopes, dreams, passions, and hurts. I don't think we can qualify how unique, special, or awesome how something as profound as a mothers hug given to a tearful child at the loss of his pet truly is. We hurt and we laugh. We cry and care.

Human life is profound, every individual significant. As awesome as our universe is I do believe the most amazing miracles are the one seen every day yet overlooked. I think we are just absolutely desensatised to the human condition. It isn't even our technology, history, societies, or biology so much that amaze me but the abilities for humans to reach beyond theselves for acts of kindness and compassion. You don't see galaxies demonstrating altruistic qualities as they are bound by laws.

Maybe I have a huge ego, wouldn't be the first time someone said that Maybe I am fatalistic--none of us are going to get much closer to any of those pictures than we just did. But what I see in humans is infinitately more interesting and amazing than what I see in those pictures. That doesn't diminish how cool they are, but they do underscore how different and significant we are.

 

[RobertR1]

In macro signifiance we are nothing. To ourselves and those we influence, we are everything.

However, I do find it very unfortunate that in my life span I'll never get to experience the vast universe.

 

[_xxx_]

More significant in OUR eyes, sure.

Does anything else really count for you?

 

[_xxx_]

So you think you are more significant than a galaxy, oh wait that was in plural so galaxies?
Are you by any chance a huge black hole?

I, from my own perspective, am the most important thing in this universe.

Which does NOT mean that I devalue the rest or don't care about anything. Such an extreme black and white thinking would be rather crazy.

But saying that anything out there makes you feel insignificant is devaluing yourself, and that's just as crazy IMO.

As awesome as our universe is I do believe the most amazing miracles are the one seen every day yet overlooked.

That too. Or to put it in a proper perspective, we all have a little universe of our own, which doesn't exclude the existance or importance of the rest out there.

 

[Simon F]

I, from my own perspective, am the most important thing in this universe.

Surely, you, from your own perspective, would result in a division by zero error. You have to use near clipping which will remove quite a considerable chunk of your body.

 

[CouldntResist]

What's the source of this image? I consider posting about it on some other site, so I'd like to know if it's a new thing.

I found this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJ8UAMR98y4
It's year old, but doesn't include the Hubble image part.

 

[Grall]

Does anything else really count for you?

Yeah, actually it does.

I'd gladly see every human being eradicated from this planet if it would mean we wouldn't cause the extinction of any more species of life, or further destroying and polluting the environment.

We're just one species amongst hundreds of thousands, if not millions, on this planet. We're not THAT important seen from such a perspective. Only our own ridiculous pride, conceit and self-centered viewpoint wants us to think otherwise.

 

[Acert93]

Wow, gladly see every human eradicated? Nothing against good stewardship, but organisms have primarily survived through the exploitation (even death) of competitors. Survival of the fitess and all. the success of any organism either directly or indirectly comes at the expense of another.

You are free to wallow in the guilt of your worldview but where it boggles the mind is when you incite judgment on all of humanity for engaging in the basic activity every organism engages in. Sounds like a logical reason to destroy all life to me...

 

[_xxx_]

Yeah, actually it does.

I'd gladly see every human being eradicated from this planet if it would mean we wouldn't cause the extinction of any more species of life, or further destroying and polluting the environment.

We're just one species amongst hundreds of thousands, if not millions, on this planet. We're not THAT important seen from such a perspective. Only our own ridiculous pride, conceit and self-centered viewpoint wants us to think otherwise.

Yeah well, it is our species after all. So no thanks, I'd rather keep the human race alive and well if possible.

 

[Brad Grenz]

Wow, gladly see every human eradicated? Nothing against good stewardship, but organisms have primarily survived through the exploitation (even death) of competitors. Survival of the fitess and all. the success of any organism either directly or indirectly comes at the expense of another.

You are free to wallow in the guilt of your worldview but where it boggles the mind is when you incite judgment on all of humanity for engaging in the basic activity every organism engages in. Sounds like a logical reason to destroy all life to me...

There's a lot of people out their who romanticize nature to what can only be called a unhealthy degree. The truth of the matter is like you say, and even worse. Animals can be dicks, too.

 

[Davros]

Yep ive seen animals do the funiest things

 

[Grall]

ou are free to wallow in the guilt of your worldview but where it boggles the mind is when you incite judgment on all of humanity for engaging in the basic activity every organism engages in.

I wouldn't quite call wholesale destruction of our own habitat 'basic activity every organism engages in'.

For any other predatory organism, rules of supply and demand dictates population growths. Lion cubs are born, their mummies hunt to feed them. If there are too many cubs born, antelope levels drop. Game becomes scarce, lion cubs die. Antelope population recovers. And so on and so forth, for every species in their respective biological niche.

Humans however, when our population expands we burn more rainforest to grow crops on, spray the crops with pesticides to kill bugs, birds eat the dead bugs and die as well, pesticides give farmers cancer and cause hormonal imbalances in those who eat the food. Then, in a few years, the farmland has been wrung dry of nourishment. The land is abandoned, turns into an unfertile steppe and the topsoil blows away. More forest is burnt to compensate.

In the seas, we're busy pulling up the last tuna fishes because they fetch a shitload of money in Tokyo, yet when they're all gone nobody will be able to either earn money from fishing them, or eating them on little rolls of sticky rice.

I fail to see what about our current existence is analogous to other animals on this planet. Not even in the past, before the rise of technology did we avoid leaving our footprint on the environment. Ancient greeks harvested the forests of that land, turning the landscape into the arid land it is today. The population of Easter Island used their trees to build scaffolding which to raise their gigantic stone face statues. Then when famine struck, there were nothing left for them to build boats out of to leave their island, and they all died.

That's ultimately how I see we'll end up. We'll turn this planet into one giant shithole, maybe 20ish billion people living here and not much else (other than our parasites), then find out we've no means to escape...and we perish.

This earth is better off without us, if for no other reason the mistaken belief this place is our to do as we please with.

 

[homerdog]

 

[Acert93]

For any other predatory organism, rules of supply and demand dictates population growths. Lion cubs are born, their mummies hunt to feed them. If there are too many cubs born, antelope levels drop. Game becomes scarce, lion cubs die. Antelope population recovers. And so on and so forth, for every species in their respective biological niche.

Your understanding of the long history of species on this planet is deficient. The above is nice in theory and there is no denying that systems tend to seek equilibrium but this entire planet is complete with a long record of the destruction of one species for the benefit of another. Not just a balance of complimentarianism but the wholesale destruction of entire species for the success of another. Just look at the fossil record. If you believe in evolution you would be well aware that this competition is both from within and without. While it may be advantageous for some species to have checks and balance for the long-term survival of a species even this has come at the expense of other less proficient species or those that burned hot and fast and then created a vacuum. Hence this ability is evolutionary to gain an advantage for a species.

Your momma lions while trying to find a balance with their food supply have doubtlessly out-survived many other less capable, and now extinct predators, without any assistance of mankind. Likewise those cute little antelope have succeeding in capturing resources and making better use of them than their ancestors and competitors. If they had not they, too, would be but fossils.

I won't argue that we are accelerating the demise of species compare to "normal" rates, but this planet has undergone many processes of much, much greater extinction and the fossil record bears out that humans are in no way responsible for the very nature of life on this planet--which is to compete for survival, damned be the competition (or even your own species). If this wasn't the case life would have never adapted and would have surrendered long ago to the difficulties life presents.

This is really Biology 101 material. Your arguement really relies less on the facts and model of life and more with a romantic concept that man is unlike other life and is bad and other life has more value than mankind. That doesn't mean man, with a mind, shouldn't use this special gift to care for the world in which mankind dwells with care and responsibility. That would be one way that man could exhibit that, once again, we are superior to other life on this planet. I am all for reducing, re-using, repurposing, and recycling. That is what a smart creature does that wants to succeed.

I know it is hard to be at the top of the food chain, some people have a hard time winning I guess

 

[Scott_Arm]

I don't agree with eradicating humanity, obviously (at least I hope it's obvious), but humanity is very much anti-darwinian now, and we can choose how we impact our environment, where other animals are in a bitter war for survival. Saying that we're just doing what other animals are doing is a poor excuse for causing for more damage to the planet than we need to.

 

[holsty101]

What's the source of this image? I consider posting about it on some other site, so I'd like to know if it's a new thing.

I found this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJ8UAMR98y4
It's year old, but doesn't include the Hubble image part.

I don't know where the complete image is from, but the Hubble galaxies picture is called the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, I had it as my desktop for a while . I'm interested to see if they will be able to produce any better images following the updating of some of the systems earlier this year, but I guess they will only come once the James Webb Space Telescope is operational.

 

[Bigus Dickus]

For those saying that we are insignificant in the grand scheme of the universe, I suggest reading the years old book "Fabric of Reality" by David Deutsch. I was caught off-guard when I first read it by his description of the significance of life (in the context of the multiverse interpretation of reality that he espouses, or at least did at the time).

I can't retell it with the same literary flourish he did, but here's the basic idea the best I can recall. Assume for now that the multiverse is a correct description of reality. Not only are there stars that dwarf our sun, but there are an infinite number of reality each containing such stars. Each reality is different from the one "next" to it by only one random quantum difference. There is a spectrum of realities ranging from ours, through ones almost exactly like ours, to ones so foreign as to be unimaginable. The quantum variations are random from one to the next or to any other.

Now imagine that you line up these universes, arranging them so that each one is next to the one it is most like, giving a smooth gradation through them all. And then imagine that you could somehow take in the view of all of them simultaneously. The random variations from one to the next will eventually just look like white noise. All averaged together to be a bunch of nothing special. Except for us.

Life is about the temporary creation of order from chaos. We hold off the second law of thermodynamics locally, pushing our waste outside our local system. In that expansive view of the collection of universes, life will stand out of the white noise as glimmering islands of order. Something absolutely beautiful in our reality. And not at all, not in the least, insignificant.

I'm sure a lot was lost in the retelling, but that perspective was always inspiring to me. Life isn't insignificant. It's the one thing in all of reality that isn't.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

Saying that we're just doing what other animals are doing is a poor excuse for causing for more damage to the planet than we need to.

I don't think we are damaging the planet actually. We are damaging our living conditions, but the planet doesn't care. It will just continue to go around the sun no matter what we do. If a giant meteor crashes into earth it will kill all or most of the life here, but it really actually only scratches the surface, basically not harming the planet significantly. Now that doesn't mean that I wouldn't like us humans to have a better balance with our eco-system, but it's not about saving the planet, it's about preserving ours and other species living conditions.