Weird, I was just having the same kinds of thoughts a few minutes ago while reading a piece in the NYTimes titled "Cosmic Connections in the Deep Sea" about the author's experience diving. It mentions the issue only in passing, but it triggered a "Wait a minnit" sort of response.
It occurred to me that it seems equally unlikely that we are an utterly insignificant accident in a tiny corner of the unimaginably vast universe, or that we are, in fact, the reason the universe was created in the first place. I've always accepted that the former is the case, so finding myself entertaining the latter for even just a few seconds--on that "equally unlikely" basis--was disorienting. I certainly didn't change my mind. But I have no idea what to make of that momentary flash. The other day, on the radio, they had a piece about "something you changed your mind about". And they interviewed a guy, I forget who he was, who said he changed his mind about whether we, as humans, are really as insignificant in the cosmic scheme of things as is sometimes said to be the case. It just happened to be something I had been thinking about as well. Maybe we're not. His point was that, in at least our little corner of the universe, immense as it is, we can seem to raise anyone else. Anyway, it doesn't mean it needs to translate into some egotistical notion about our importance. It's just an observation. Pretty ugly graphic, I'd have to say though. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <turquoiseb@...> wrote : For those who feel the need to post every so often about how important TMers are, or how important the butt-bouncers of Fairfield are, or even how important to the universe human beings on planet Earth are, here's a graphic to put things into somewhat more accurate perspective. It's a visualization of every human being on the planet -- all 7.2 billion of us -- piled up in the Grand Canyon. The video below the photo explains things -- literally -- a bit more... How Many Things Are There? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6eOcd06kdk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6eOcd06kdk How Many Things Are There? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6eOcd06kdk View on www.youtube.com https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6eOcd06kdk Preview by Yahoo
