Galaxies in the Milky Way
Given what we think we know about the age of the universe, planet earth and the myriad of creatures that have and are continuing to inhabit it since life first appeared, we have arrived only recently as a species uniquely capable of reflective thought and reasoning. With it – I suggest – came the potential to make something of ourselves beyond being just another species for which the need to survive and ensure the continuation of its genus appear to be its main objectives..
On that premise we find ourselves at the receiving end of the implicit obligation to go beyond these basic needs, and not only because we can envisage ourselves of being capable of accomplishing much more than that, but also, surely, because we would not want to see ourselves being limited by them.
But given the state of the world today, for many the potential to distinguish ourselves beyond being just another creature on this planet appears to have been reduced to some self-aggrandizing exercise in unlimited exploitation, boundless consumption and mindless procreation, and that at great cost to ourselves and our future. As a matter of fact, we seem to have taken the first steps towards our own extinction by continuing to undermine the very environment that spawned and nurtured us and allowed us to thrive as a species.
Alternatively – and yes, there is always an alternative, in particular to just being unimaginably shortsighted! – we could use our collective brain-trust to decide what kinds of uniquely human qualities we ought to prioritize in order to truly benefit us all and start acting accordingly.
I can think of a few: Imagine a world-wide society built on mutual trust and respect, featuring such things as a sustainable waste-free economy, free education, healthcare, equal opportunity regardless of race , age or gender, the pursuit of arts and sciences, and being free from famine, disease and crime. In other words, not much we are familiar with today, but something worth pursuing, don’t you think?
Easier said than done, without question; in fact some will say that such an utopian state of affairs will be impossible to achieve given what history has shown us to date about human nature. True, is difficult to see any such potential reflected in the daily course of our lives. Not only does it seems near impossible to quantify them beyond being either mundane – and at any rate less than profound – or positively evil, and that would include much of human kind’s murderous, bloodstained past and all of our self-destructive activities such as our relentless attacks on the earth’s critical life-sustaining biosphere.
The problem of course is that we seem to be lost and absolutely hapless when it comes to understanding our place in the world. In the mid 1600’s the Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza wrote that people find themselves with needs and desires without understanding the reasons why they want and act as they do. Lacking this knowledge about themselves and their place in the world creates the illusion that they can do as they please, and which is a source of much grief when they act against their own interest because they don’t seem know any better.
Nevertheless, it is the implicit promise of our cosmic DNA, our origins, that will continue to urge us along this uncertain path towards a future we might one day be able to imagine what that would look like if we develop the ambition, courage and intellectual wherewithal to conceive the realization of it. And why shouldn’t we be able to: are we not the descendants of a magnificent cosmic event and all the spectacular creative energy that lies within and is necessarily represented within every particle of our being?
I say “necessarily” because how could it not be? We aren’t some accidental and aberrant event over and above the phenomenon of the universe: we ARE the universe, nothing more and nothing less. Now, if we only knew what that meant, but that is what life is all about, isn’t it? And clearly, this is the larger context we should be taking our cues from when we plan our future – as little as we are able to grasp of it at the moment.
For this we need to be able to turn ourselves inside out, by prioritizing the spiritual over the physical and embracing those values that are clearly larger than the largely material ones we appear to be pursuing today. Instead we ought to be pursuing empathy, compassion, trust and a respect for life in recognition of the incredible accomplishment that life represents as a cosmic effort to redefine itself for whatever purpose it has in mind – as much as we cannot even begin to think what that purpose may be although I suspect it might have something to do with establishing order over entropy and light over darkness in pursuit of total harmony.
However – and as much as I hate to admit this – my greatest fear is that this kind of enlightened future is in fact not available to us as, when we may not have moved far enough up the evolutionary ladder to be able to visualize it – or event want it ! – and to start changing our ways collectively to make it a reality.
As such, life is likely to continue to be the absolute tragedy it is, for our life-giving planet and for so many of our species today.