Carl Sagan Ripoff

We often consider ourselves an accomplished species. We look at the complexity in our world, the technology, the instant connection, time lapse videos of the earth whirling underneath the International Space Station. We regard ourselves with incredible import - we've gone beyond the reaches of our planet, we say to ourselves. We've reached the moon, our probes have left the solar system, we've gone interplanetary.

Every one of those dots is an entire galaxy, with billions
upon billions of stars contained within each speck of light.

And yet, when we consider this, we conclude that we have accomplished nothing. The International Space Station orbits a mere 200 miles above the earth, the moon within three days' reach. Our radio signals, speeding away from us at the speed of light, have barely rippled through the fabric of space. We point a telescope at an empty patch of sky and find hundreds upon hundreds of galaxies reaching back to the creation of the very universe itself. We often write off these distances, claiming we can't comprehend them - and we can't. But take a moment to try and wrap your mind around such unimaginable distances. Take a moment to feel the incomprehensible vastness of the universe we find ourselves in.

It's an overwhelming and humbling feeling.

Earth as seen from the Voyager 1 spacecraft.

Images of the "pale blue dot" beneath the rings of Saturn or suspended in a sunbeam show us how truly insignificantly small and fragile our world is. This forgettable lump of rock is where every man, woman, child, or any other living thing you've ever heard of, read about, or knew has existed. It throws our self-aggrandizing perspective into jeopardy. Our petty wars and political strife seem so childish, fighting for control for such a small piece of a particle floating through the vacuum of space.

But we are, somehow, significant in some way. Perhaps we are only significant to ourselves and our immediate surroundings. But perhaps we are greater than that. Perhaps we are important enough that an omnipotent God spends His valuable time and energy on our own needs. Perhaps an individual human brain is the most complex and astounding machine that has ever arisen within the universe. Perhaps we mere humans have created civilizations that demonstrate the significance of our species. Perhaps our eradication of entire diseases from our planet is something that has rarely, if ever, been accomplished anywhere where we can point our telescopes.

This is what hydrogen becomes after
13.7 billion years of cosmic evolution.

Regardless, I really like those chicken wraps from Taco Bell.

~Fernando the Zombie Slayer