That's one way to put it, but a negative way. The other might be more humbling: how significant are we? Or, as a statement instead of a question, we are the only significant thing of which we know.
We can theorize about life elsewhere, and we can write space-opera fiction about life on other worlds, but, to the best of our knowledge, we are the only ones who can. We know there is other life on our world, but not as rational as we. We do not know for a fact that there is any equivalent, rational species in all that vast universe that we can see, let alone any more advanced than we are.
Asking the question that way makes me, at least, wonder if we comport ourselves in accordance with our knowledge of our exceptionalism. If we are the most advanced form of life that we know and can prove to exist, do we behave like it?
"Some people become depressed at the scale of the universe, because it makes them feel insignificant. Other people are relieved to feel insignificant, which is even worse. But, in any case, those are mistakes. Feeling insignificant because the universe is large has exactly the same logic as feeling inadequate for not being a cow. Or a herd of cows. The universe is not there to overwhelm us; it is our home, and our resource. The bigger the better." -- David Deutsch
I wouldn't attack people's emotions like that, the approach of 'my opinion is better than yours and your emotions are wrong' ain't the best.
Its just one of those concepts or facts of life like our (im)mortality that each of us has to handle on their own terms since each of us is wired in pretty unique ways. Its perfectly fine to be in awe or even stunned by it, it means one actually started to grasp vastness of that topic and the fact we don't have it all figured out and during our lifetime this won't change.
Every time I look at starry night sky and realize those distances, thermonuclear furnaces glowing across vast distances in absolute cold (or their massive groups looking similarly yet being vastly further), I am in awe. It puts my efforts and happiness in my life in a good perspective, in similar fashion spending my time with my kids does. And I look at stars every night I can, its a beautiful calming sight for me.
Emotions are like waves; we can’t choose which ones appear, but we can choose which one to surf. The person you’re replying to (well, really, the person they quoted) didn’t really seem to be “attacking” anyone’s emotions to me. It seemed pretty gently advising the reader not to spend all their time riding the emotional waves that lead to depression or nihilism.
I do believe we all must face these emotions to become aware. But the depression/nihilism trap is very real for many people (myself included), and learning to walk that line and stay curious is part of our emotional/psychological development.
Who said anything about being depressed? It’s a fact, we are insignificant in the universe. Less than a rounding error. I am simply acknowledging it.
It doesn’t make me feel like anything, other than trying to imagine the universes’ vastness - in an attempt at futility. I don’t think my mind (or any human mind) can ever truly fathom it.
The image in question is likely a blow up of a point in the sky that’s 1mmx1mm, about the size of a grain of sand, and it is rich with many many galaxies, way more than we can see - if you account for the vast and infinite depth. The Milky Way is said to have 400 billion stars. So if there are a 1000 galaxies present in the image, that’s trillions of stars in a square mm of the sky.
I think it’s pretty darn empowering to think your life’s problems mean that less, one part in numbers so large I can’t even pronounce. Don’t you think?
I completely agree with you, yet this morning I was looking at pictures of Lingchi execution, and now I'm picturing the victim thinking to themselves "you know, my problems really aren't that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things."
I cannot see it as a "feat", as I literally did nothing to make that happen. So, it's not dissimilar to the wonders of other animals: cool but not thanks to me.
That is just a massive ego trip, no? Very similar to scientists of old who posited that humans were special amongst the other animals in having intelligence. Well turns out all animals are intelligent just the same way, we simply lack the communication skills to understand one another much. Every time someone makes an argument like this I can't help but feel it's like a child saying they're the best at something because they haven't seen anyone else better.
I actually feel like it goes to say whether we are significant or not is irrelevant - your life is the only life you’ll ever experience, and it is of penultimate significance to the universe you will ever experience.
I'm with you on this. Until proven otherwise I'm going to assume that we're very, very special, maybe even the point of the whole thing, that all of it is necessary just so we can be here. More of an excuse to not mess up what little we do have control over.
I can't see how one can come to such conclusion. We know that there are trillions of stars, and an even greater number of planets, in the universe. We know that life can start relatively easily on some planets, as we know it happened at least once. Out of trillions, there must be at least millions of planets that "look like" ours out there. How can one conclude "we are very very special" given that information? It's illogical to me.
> The other might be more humbling: how significant are we? Or, as a statement instead of a question, we are the only significant thing of which we know.
We may assume that we are the only intelligent life in the universe and that life on our planet is highly significant. Humanity itself faces a great challenge in finding its way. We are currently in a dark period of our evolution—one where we have mastered a great deal of technology to make our lives materially comfortable, yet we have not mastered the "demons" within our minds. We fail to control them as individuals, and even less so as societies. These demons were instilled in us by natural evolution, serving us well until the Neolithic age. But in the modern era, they have become our greatest enemy. At this point, the biggest problem facing humanity is human nature itself. We stand on the brink of destroying our planet in numerous ways. Humans have already caused one of the greatest mass extinctions of large animals in Earth's history.
One argument supporting the theory that Earth is the only planet with advanced life is the growing realization of how many rare conditions must be met for life to emerge. In the past, scientists believed it was enough for a planet to be located within the habitable zone of its star. We are now beginning to understand that this is merely one of the most basic requirements among many others.
Earth itself has come close to losing all its life on multiple occasions—such as during the Snowball Earth period—despite the Sun remaining stable and the planet still being within the habitable zone.
One crucial factor for sustaining life is a planet’s internal magmatic activity, which must be powerful enough to generate a stable magnetic field. This field protects the atmosphere from being stripped away by solar winds. Additionally, it seems that magmatic activity played a key role in warming the planet during its early years when the Sun’s radiation was weaker. In fact, the gradual increase in solar radiation over billions of years appears to have offset the decrease in Earth's internal heat, maintaining the planet’s temperature within a range suitable for life to thrive.
However, Earth's prolonged and vigorous magmatic activity appears exceptional, likely because a colossal collision with a rogue protoplanet—the event known as the Giant Impact Hypothesis—not only formed the Moon but also injected an enormous amount of thermal energy into the young Earth. This impact created a long-lasting magma ocean phase, effectively resetting the planet's internal heat and driving rapid mantle convection and differentiation. Such enhanced magmatic activity contributed to the early formation of a stable geodynamo, which has sustained Earth's magnetic field and, consequently, its atmosphere over geological time.
For all we know, Earth may be unique in the universe, but we are far from certain enough to make such a claim.
The other possibility is that intelligent life exists elsewhere, but the barriers imposed by the speed of light—combined with the unimaginable vastness of the universe—may render it impossible for advanced civilizations to find or communicate with one another. Who knows? Perhaps the universe was created by some form of intelligence that ensured life could develop, but only in such rare and distant pockets that no two civilizations could ever reach each other, or even communicate.
EDIT: expanded the paragraph about the big impact hypothesis.
That's one way to put it, but a negative way. The other might be more humbling: how significant are we? Or, as a statement instead of a question, we are the only significant thing of which we know.
We can theorize about life elsewhere, and we can write space-opera fiction about life on other worlds, but, to the best of our knowledge, we are the only ones who can. We know there is other life on our world, but not as rational as we. We do not know for a fact that there is any equivalent, rational species in all that vast universe that we can see, let alone any more advanced than we are.
Asking the question that way makes me, at least, wonder if we comport ourselves in accordance with our knowledge of our exceptionalism. If we are the most advanced form of life that we know and can prove to exist, do we behave like it?