poor polar bear
i just watched 'that al gore film' and 1) it was the most depressing thing ever, which is what i say about any film/book/atricle i come across on issues like that, but it's true, and 2) it brought up once again (as if 4527845828435787289852895807208180802103 times already were not enough) the age-age-age-old conflict that's been going on in my brain since i have been conscious. i tried to form it in a somewhat coherent way instead of just a series of feelings that tugs at my heart and makes my stomach feel funny. the best way i can manage to articulate it so far is: i care i care I CARE i want to do everything i possibly can to make the world a less tragic place i want people to be able to presevere and advance and learn and know all the things i will never know. but wait. even if we do find some way to turn the sad state of affairs around and we can manage to scrap together an extra million or billion years of life on this planet, the end will be the same. whether humans cease to exist tomorrow or in one hundred billion years, the end will be the same. the accumulation of advancement and knowledge and understanding will amount to absolutely nothing. our tiny speck of a world will end and everything that has ever happened and will ever happen, everything we will have ever learned, every word every person has ever said, will be completely obliterated, and moreover, it won't matter. there will be no record that anything we have ever felt or done ever existed or mattered. the universe doesn't pick favorites. we are so, so, so small. the explosion of one star is equivelant to 100 nuclear bombs exploding at once. at least one star explodes every day. the cessation of bodies vastly larger than the earth occurs on a daily basis. it's the universe's old uneventful daily routine. so what does it matter if i drive a more fuel-efficient car so my great-great-grandchildren can live a few years longer? it doesn't. so why do i care? out of hope and optimism. will hope and optimism change the ultimate end? no. will they make things better for everything up until that end? perhaps. so which makes more sense, accepting the solid inevitable truth or trying to make something better for something for some time? i don't know. and then, i'm back to where i started.