(no subject)
I remember reading a book a few months ago that dealt with what humanity does -after- the end of everything. I can't remember the name though--so I was digging through my LJ to find it. I do remember writing about it, so. ;P
In any case, I found this old LJ post, figured I'd repost it 'cause I find it so much fun.
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So, Susan and I are watching Hellboy.
Whenever I watch a movie whose antagonist is bent on bringing about the end of the world through some form of ultimate evil, I can't help but wonder, "What kind of motivation does someone need to doom all of humanity to hell on Earth?"
I've always found it very two-dimensional. I mean, short of the person being demented (with the dementia, at the very least, allowing some some of character flaw/tragic past to shine), it takes a very boring character to do something like that.
So, yeah. I'm staring at Hellboy lording over the broken skeleton of humanity--
And then it hit me.
Short of Earth existing as not only the center of existence, but also the sum of existence, the end of -everything- in some sort of Biblical context doesn't make much sense on a cosmological scale. That is, Earth--and, by extension, all of humanity--is to the universe as a speck of sand is to the Sahara.
Yet, despite our infinitesimally small presence in this otherwise staggeringly huge universe, people insist -our planet- is destined for an angry visit by God one of these days.
Will Earth simply be swallowed up by nothing while the rest of the universe--all its stars, all its galaxies, all its everythings?--continue to indifferently churn?
Or will God decide to take -everything else- with him when he decides to destroy this speck of sand?
I'm failing horribly in verbalizing the disconnect in rational thought here.
At current estimates, our universe stretches 93 billion light years across.
At current estimates, there are somewhere around 500 billion galaxies in the stretch of our universe.
At current estimates, there are -roughly- 7*10^24 stars in the universe. I think this is called a septillion.
At current estimates, our galaxy alone contains around two-to-four-hundred billion stars.
We orbit one of those stars.
And, while watching Hellboy lord it up over the broken shell of humanity, it came to me that thinking this one star in this cosmic ocean has any importance at all is fucking stupid, and that pretending that the sky is going to open up and destroy us all--this one little planet orbiting this one star out of 7*10^24 is...
... dur-staggering.
In any case, I found this old LJ post, figured I'd repost it 'cause I find it so much fun.
---
So, Susan and I are watching Hellboy.
Whenever I watch a movie whose antagonist is bent on bringing about the end of the world through some form of ultimate evil, I can't help but wonder, "What kind of motivation does someone need to doom all of humanity to hell on Earth?"
I've always found it very two-dimensional. I mean, short of the person being demented (with the dementia, at the very least, allowing some some of character flaw/tragic past to shine), it takes a very boring character to do something like that.
So, yeah. I'm staring at Hellboy lording over the broken skeleton of humanity--
And then it hit me.
Short of Earth existing as not only the center of existence, but also the sum of existence, the end of -everything- in some sort of Biblical context doesn't make much sense on a cosmological scale. That is, Earth--and, by extension, all of humanity--is to the universe as a speck of sand is to the Sahara.
Yet, despite our infinitesimally small presence in this otherwise staggeringly huge universe, people insist -our planet- is destined for an angry visit by God one of these days.
Will Earth simply be swallowed up by nothing while the rest of the universe--all its stars, all its galaxies, all its everythings?--continue to indifferently churn?
Or will God decide to take -everything else- with him when he decides to destroy this speck of sand?
I'm failing horribly in verbalizing the disconnect in rational thought here.
At current estimates, our universe stretches 93 billion light years across.
At current estimates, there are somewhere around 500 billion galaxies in the stretch of our universe.
At current estimates, there are -roughly- 7*10^24 stars in the universe. I think this is called a septillion.
At current estimates, our galaxy alone contains around two-to-four-hundred billion stars.
We orbit one of those stars.
And, while watching Hellboy lord it up over the broken shell of humanity, it came to me that thinking this one star in this cosmic ocean has any importance at all is fucking stupid, and that pretending that the sky is going to open up and destroy us all--this one little planet orbiting this one star out of 7*10^24 is...
... dur-staggering.