Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Jumping the Hurdle

A thanks to my friend Snaildarter for slapping some sense back into me. He said all we have to do is rise above our animalism. Here is his quote:
I agree mostly, but we have become technologically advanced enough to step out of the animal mode and move toward achieving our mis-named name homo sapien "wise man" or "thinking man."
I'm really feeling like an ATHEIST tonight because I'm realizing that life is not such a miracle after all. As the Earth was forming there were trillions of little experiments going on at once. And these trillions of experiments took place for a couple of billion years, so it's no surprise that eventually mass would form into complex formations and make that leap into "life." And once that one little spark was finally created there was no turning back - life began to explode, develop, and become more complex. Humans are the inevitable result of evolution. It was only a matter of time before one creature would evolve to the point where it could begin controlling the world around it.

I mean, it's really amazing to think that things like eyes and memory could evolve from a pool of primordial stew. Evolution inevitably creates more and more complex life formations. This process continues until a formation is so complex that it has the ability to destroy its surrounding life support systems. No, not intentionally, but the destruction is simply the result of the increased complexity.

Out of the trillions of planets that are likely in the Universe, I'm guessing there are only a handful of worlds that could support life, for carbon-based life is a fragile and sensitive. Life is a force that can only exist within narrow parameters -- you need water, warmth, light, stability, protection from radiation, etc...

Of the few worlds that can support life, life may never happen because of absent minerals, unfavorable climate, or other factors. So, I'm betting that life is very, very rare in the Universe. But, somewhere out there I'm guessing that some life form has been able to get pass its self-destruction stage and flourish. And yes, I don't doubt for a moment that space travel is possible -- but right now it seems extremely difficult.

The odds of the human creatures on Earth being the lucky ones to surpass the Age of Self Destruct is highly unlikely, but it is possible. I keep hoping that both humans and the Earth will survive, and even if humans fail there is a good chance that Earth will recover from the relatively brief era of humanity.

God bless all of you, my children.

Goosey

2 comments:

Thinkspeak said...

ya, carl sagan said it... if we were to encounter 'aliens' they would be peaceful for any species, in its evolution, will discover WMD... only those who commit to non-violent conflict resolution will survive. implied of course is that violence against the life system must be part of that commitment. HOW do we come to that commitment? I am entertaining eckhart tolle's idea that by stepping out of the dysfunctional ego trap of mind chatter, becoming present and thus connected to the intelligence out of which evolution arises, we shall find an answer to HOW? and it will be self-evident rather than imposed by lists of 'good' behavior.

Todd the Toad said...

When I first got into environmentalism I thought the work would be easy -- that you would just need to raise awareness about an obvious issue. But just trying to get everyone to move forward and work as a team on global warming, for example, has been extremely difficult. The latest thing now is all the conspiracy theories floating around global warming. People prefer to believe in some far-fetched conspiracy theory rather than peer-reviewed studies.