Just how far have we come as a species? (rhetorical)

The following is my favorite animation of our solar system... think of everything in the known universe from the largest objects to the smallest particles doing the same thing in all directions, including black holes.



The next time you catch a glimpse of dust in a sun beam; I urge you to think of this, and the vastness and interactions... then think of some intelligence behind this or a creator picking out a uber tiny insignificant spec in all of that, talking to only certain humans, and then incarnating itself on this little spec; among an infinitude of specs... hog wash.

Forces and interactions over an infinite amount of time. We are not special, we are not a made up gods children, we are an animal and not even a very civilized one; we live fight and die over nonsensical things we've been fabricating out of adaptation to adversity; since we first bore self awareness and it evolved into consciousness over millions and millions of years adapting to our environment nothing more... we have so much potential with this consciousness, but waste it fighting among each other... war isn't the solution to world hunger planting seeds are... laying on a blanket with a swollen belly waiting for someone to feed you isn't either. Adapting by walking to a river or sea getting fish, knowing uses of plants, using tools to adapt to our environment. Hey laying on a blanket waiting on someone to feed you is an adaptation too...

We really haven't come all that far; we fight the same wars and same battles as millions of years ago; only the forms and concepts in our minds and environment have changed due to our manipulation of them. The river is now the grocery store, the herb now a pill... the more things change the more they stay the same. Maybe our feeble minds will eventually unravel the exact forces at work, what will we do with it? Manipulate it and keep on keeping on; doing the same old thing... til that spec of light we drift around runs out of fuel or we kill each other first, or the things we have made up in our minds and shaped out of the things around us... with our opposable thumb pilfering.

Not to worry though, I am pretty sure there's millions and billions of other self conscious beings in the universe, that will keep the legacy alive... on millions and billions of other insignificant little specs; doing the same environmental manipulation; thinking they know something worth knowing, then arguing and killing each other over it... until they are no more.

Way to go humanity

I like the animation. Sometimes I feel that our interpretation of the speed of asteroids is flawed. We are moving so fast that from our point of perspective we could evaluate an asteroid as going fast even though technically it not moving at all, we are the one that is moving fast. I guess that life is living in the fast lane.

Humans haven't changed much in the last two thousand years, our ancestors were intelligent back then. If anything we have learned to destroy the earth we live on faster and gotten more reliant on technology to do our thinking.

Actually I believe that humanity has grown quite a bit since our early days.

There are still wars, probably always will be, but can you imagine some of the people in history having access to nuclear weapons?

No doubt they would have used them, we don't.

And if you look at just the technology side, we have grown by leaps and bounds in a relatively very short period. Can you imagine where we will be in another short 1000 years?

I don't think there are many species in the universe that could match our advancement. No race, whether human or anything else, is ever going to be perfect but humanity is marching along a course that never loses the good side. Sure we walk close to the line sometimes but we never lose our "humanity".

The world works together today far better than it has in the past, wars are dying down, racism is no longer the norm, countries are setting up universal programs for their people like healthcare, flawed sometimes, but it shows an overall caring mentality.

I think we are humming along just fine. Still plenty more kinks to work out but we will get there.

reply to post by BigBrotherDarkness


"This" only seems bad because you are comparing "this" which exists to "that" which does not exist. Do not compare reality to your fantasy and then you won't feel like "this" is bad or wrong.

We do not know what other life forms are like in the universe, nor do we know how humans "should" be or "should have" been.

reply to post by arpgme


What is this nonsense? It is what it is, stop the rote repetition of Buddhist concepts... instead try understanding them with experience. If you cannot see the reality of the statements in the op then tis your fantasy. Since you enjoy Buddhism... feel free to look at any realm found in the cosmological wheel of life that does not have what I describe... if it has life it is in the same 12 link chain of causality, and subject to the same suffering. Here or anywhere else life may happen to be in the universe.

No living being in this whole vast universe is free from that chain of causality that is the wheel of life. Yes you can see it clearly for a moment then work to break the chain by understanding you create all the suffering in your life... but until death in final nirvana no one is free; there is still karmic accumulation just from being alive... so my suggestion is stop trying to teach when you only appear to understand the concepts; and take to more practice. You are doing way more damage to yourself than you currently realize, with your assumptions of those around you and answering things as if you're the wikipedia of Buddhism.

Perhaps this is the whack that snaps you out of the delusion that you have achieved something; for all I see is someone putting on a costume of concepts dancing in front of a mirror. There comes a point on the path when you lay the path aside because eventually it deceives, the person builds a house of illusion; and it's built on the foundation of self and other, differentiation of paths when all is the path and no one is ever off of it. We build these concepts in our minds leading to hidden superiority and spout about a better path which is not being in the moment.

I made a logical and rational observation of human nature; did I say I didn't like it? Did I say I did like it? Way to go humanity at the end can be taken either way; it's logical to think you assumed it to be from a position of irony... from your post. When in fact; I meant it as hey it's human nature; what else is to be expected? Right on track with what samsara is. Greed has gone nowhere, hate has gone nowhere, nor has ignorance... it's exactly what life is. No matter what form or shape it happens to take or be in... there is only one escape from the wheel of life and only a tiny glimpse of it before then.

Humanity has gone no where; because there is nowhere to go to. There is no leaving and no arriving; the chain of existence and wheel of life' will forever turn no matter if... we were throwing rocks a billion years ago, pressing missile buttons now, or mentally evaporating others a billion years from now... the forms may have changed but the nature of it and the nature of humanity as a whole never will either. We adapted to caves from trees, from caves to houses... what has really changed? The trees were home, then the caves were home, then houses were home... still it was home. The root that is home remains unchanged, only the blossoms of the mind warping function out of form has changed. Tree? no tree is not home... but it was. Cave? what cave is not home but it was. Home has never changed just our concept of what home is... this is what I was pointing too.

Sure we've become more efficient from manipulating and understanding some things around us... but only more efficient at doing the same thing we have always done... hunt, gather, reproduce, fight, kill, share concepts based on our experience, warp nature into a tool and die. Nothing more nothing less, so again the rhetorical... how far? how far? how far?

Look at your iphone. That's the best picture of how far we've come scientifically.

Morally, we're no further along than at the time of Hammurabi. And perhaps we've regressed.

Originally posted by rickymouse
I like the animation.

Me too! It reminds me of a corkscrew. Is the solar system screwing its way through the galaxy?

reply to post by jiggerj


When you think of all known matter doing this in every conceivable direction it turns into awe.