We like to assimilate all data and to categorize things according
to what we term "possible" and "impossible".
This has been going on for several hundred years as we gradually learn
more and more things about our condition.
We like to think of ourselves as something unique and special in the
universal cosmological order of things, and yet we remain ignorant of
so many things.
The things which we term as "possible" are things that we recognise as
fitting into the preconceived notions that we establish from time to time.
Everytime that we find an answer, an entire new set of conditions evolve
(such as with the progress concerning DNA)
We fight and squander our lives away, and allow ourselves to be dictated
to by those think they have a better answer to life, when there is none.
The only thing that we know (or think we know) is that we are here. That
we exist as a statement that life in our form is a natural development
and a special devined order of things special for us.
The realms of other planes of existence and reality we shrug off as being
unreasonable and unfounded suppositions.
It is no wonder that any intelligence arriving here from the reaches of
the space which surrounds us in infinite perplexity, would think of us
as being infants and recent arrivals in this arena of complexity.
But, that we as even infants, would have made the first mature step
towards our enlightenment in the realization that we are unique and
special only in that we are different than they.
As we establish our own set of awarenesses, we begin to respect that
other awarenesses exist in this universe, sometimes beyond our comprehension.
As we look around the nursery, we see that the room is bigger than we
thought. It is filled with things which we do not understand, but gradually
we will adapt and attain the ability to be able to crawl close enough
to get a better look at these things which are puzzling from a distance.
I guess that this new century is the dawn and the awakening of man's
curiosity beyond the nursery. His greatest challenge will be his ability
to be able to accept that he will not possibly be able to understand all
things, and through this realization he will attain his maturity.
As the pictures from Hubble flow back and we stare at those complex
pertubations of spirals and galaxies far flung, some possibly containing
life and a set of eyes staring out with the same questions and seeking
the same answers as we, then the universe is not such an empty lonely
place to be in after all.
Just to imagine that they are there, is enough to dispell that feeling of
emptiness which has been cultivated by those who thought that they knew
everything. When first contact does come, it should be a humbling
and magnificent thing! How then this small planet will change!
I feel jealous of those still to be born into this new brave world.
The serious contemplation of the gathering of facts which possibly
indicate that we have been, or are being visited by more technologically
cultivated beings, is probably one of the most serious and technically
challenging events which the human race will have to deal with in the
comming century.
A radio source would have the greatest repercussions
upon the sensibilities of our minds. We must be prepared for that
inevitability, otherwise we will suffer the consequences of alienation
from others which has been demonstrated time and time again throughout our
history. Those have been costly and wasteful practices.
Man's greatest fear, and the thing which has cost him the greatest loss
of energy and resources, is the fear that he is not special. It is good
to foster those things which are beneficial to all, but we must not
lose sight of the ultimate truths which we must face in the future.
The first encounter may come on equal ground, somewhere in the reaches
of space when we come across another lonely ship searching for the same
answers that we do. With this same curiosity we shall then establish
a compassionate tie and bond with them. Then a mysterious chronical entry
will be made somewhere in a distant galaxy that it has happened for us?
We have become adults. In the year 3003.
James Root
... A professor is one who talks in someone else's sleep.
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12
--- Maximus 3.01
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