"The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena...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."
This is a quote from Carl Sagan's book 'The Pale Blue Dot.' I first heard of this book as a one minute interlude song on a Story of the Year CD, and it struck me. It challenged some of my ideas about this planet and the people that occupy it. I was revisited by this book recently, watching a video that claims 'the world would be better if everyone watched this video.' And once again, I was impressed. I was moved, even.
Now, for the purposes of this post, I am strictly arguing against the quote I have previously stated. Though I believe that this is not taken out of context, rather, is a rather fair summary of this portion of the novel. So while I will be posing my 'counter-argument,' mind you, I still strongly encourage you to watch this video, if not to form your own option, at least to enjoy it for what its worth.
OK. So. Seeing the Earth from the rings of Saturn displays it only as a pale blue dot, and as Sagan describes, 'our planet would be just a point of light, a lonely pixel hardly distinguishable from the other points of light Voyager would see: nearby planets, far off suns.' But here's the deal, from a distance of 3.7 billion miles, I agree, we are insignificant. We blend in as a shell on Sanibel Island. And that perspective out shadows any war or peace, any hatred or love, any friend of foe. If you want to start counting stars and galaxies and planets and asteroids and every other bit of orbiting or stray matter that is floating somewhere in this existence, whether the light we're seeing is from eons ago or not, whatever, i get it, we're small.
They say it's all relative. So we're relatively small in comparison to the rest of time and space. A blip on the time line. A pale blue dot in space.
But the earth, relative to me, is on the verge of incomprehensibly big. The sun, is that much bigger than the Earth. Jupiter, is that much bigger than the sun. Earth's path around the sun, is that much bigger than Jupiter. Jupiter's path around the sun, is that much bigger than Earth's path around the sun. And the star, Betelgeuse, is bigger than that.
My mind cannot comprehend that. That is out of my mind's comprehension, and out of the things that impact my daily life, besides being able to spit out that little nugget while walking on a clear enough night to spot the constellation Orion. Break it down further, and the scale of things that do impact my daily life seems to dwindle. Now I completely understand the idea of a global economy, of the people, places, industries, environments, animals, jobs, and strategies that go into each moment of life, and how encompassed I am in that. But for me, the people, feelings, and personal impact on society is what drives my life.
So before I keep rambling and get off topic, relative to the rest of space, we are nothing, but relative to the rest of space, we are everything. To me, nothing exists outside of this planet. No life has spawned anywhere else, that we know of. This unique collaboration of rock, molten rock, metal, and water has come together to create the center of our universe. We are the center of the universe. Because what we do here impacts our lives. Aside from a stray asteroid taking out our planet, I'm going to say that we'll be the ones to destroy it.
Cuz like Sagan also appropriately describes, 'there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.'
This is a quote from Carl Sagan's book 'The Pale Blue Dot.' I first heard of this book as a one minute interlude song on a Story of the Year CD, and it struck me. It challenged some of my ideas about this planet and the people that occupy it. I was revisited by this book recently, watching a video that claims 'the world would be better if everyone watched this video.' And once again, I was impressed. I was moved, even.
Now, for the purposes of this post, I am strictly arguing against the quote I have previously stated. Though I believe that this is not taken out of context, rather, is a rather fair summary of this portion of the novel. So while I will be posing my 'counter-argument,' mind you, I still strongly encourage you to watch this video, if not to form your own option, at least to enjoy it for what its worth.
OK. So. Seeing the Earth from the rings of Saturn displays it only as a pale blue dot, and as Sagan describes, 'our planet would be just a point of light, a lonely pixel hardly distinguishable from the other points of light Voyager would see: nearby planets, far off suns.' But here's the deal, from a distance of 3.7 billion miles, I agree, we are insignificant. We blend in as a shell on Sanibel Island. And that perspective out shadows any war or peace, any hatred or love, any friend of foe. If you want to start counting stars and galaxies and planets and asteroids and every other bit of orbiting or stray matter that is floating somewhere in this existence, whether the light we're seeing is from eons ago or not, whatever, i get it, we're small.
They say it's all relative. So we're relatively small in comparison to the rest of time and space. A blip on the time line. A pale blue dot in space.
But the earth, relative to me, is on the verge of incomprehensibly big. The sun, is that much bigger than the Earth. Jupiter, is that much bigger than the sun. Earth's path around the sun, is that much bigger than Jupiter. Jupiter's path around the sun, is that much bigger than Earth's path around the sun. And the star, Betelgeuse, is bigger than that.
My mind cannot comprehend that. That is out of my mind's comprehension, and out of the things that impact my daily life, besides being able to spit out that little nugget while walking on a clear enough night to spot the constellation Orion. Break it down further, and the scale of things that do impact my daily life seems to dwindle. Now I completely understand the idea of a global economy, of the people, places, industries, environments, animals, jobs, and strategies that go into each moment of life, and how encompassed I am in that. But for me, the people, feelings, and personal impact on society is what drives my life.
So before I keep rambling and get off topic, relative to the rest of space, we are nothing, but relative to the rest of space, we are everything. To me, nothing exists outside of this planet. No life has spawned anywhere else, that we know of. This unique collaboration of rock, molten rock, metal, and water has come together to create the center of our universe. We are the center of the universe. Because what we do here impacts our lives. Aside from a stray asteroid taking out our planet, I'm going to say that we'll be the ones to destroy it.
Cuz like Sagan also appropriately describes, 'there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.'
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