Too Little Time

My inspiration for this blog is a few clips from the documentary I saw called "Planet Earth," which was aired on BBC.  I highly recommend checking out clips on YouTube or possibly the documentary itself.

When I was young, probably around the age of eight, I became interested in the world around us.  That includes the universe, but unlike my recent post, this will be concerning our home, the Earth.  Since the time I was young, I have seen dozens and dozens of unbelievable natural landmarks and engineering/architectural masterpieces.  It is astonishing to see some of these works of art, whether it be created by the Earth's natural process itself or mankind.

Problem is, I do not think I will be around long enough to see everything that I wish to see.  Right now, during my adolescence, I am much more able to make the trip than I will be when I retire.  I am willing to save my money and wait, however, I just feel as if I will not be able to accomplish nearly as much as I want to.  It is very common to hear people claim that they want to travel, but I feel as if they want to travel for different reasons.  Personally, I have an appreciation for this Earth that many people just do not understand.  I value the science behind such landmarks, whether the science be by human procedure or nature's "dumb luck."  I do not want to visit places around the world because they "look cool," I want to witness landmarks that are only here on this Earth because of the luck of the draw and I want to view human creations that took immense creativity, thought, effort, money, will, and energy to build.  I realize all that goes into these creations.  I become overwhelmed by all of this, to be honest.

Here, I will be discussing a few of the places I want to visit throughout my life.

Christ the Redeemer (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)

From the moment I saw this landmark, I knew that I wanted visit it.  It is not the fact that it is a religious statue, but it is the symbol behind it (and yeah, I guess the view is pretty cool too).  The open arms overlooking Rio de Janeiro welcomes the public and asks for each and every person to join together in solidarity.  Granted, the city is polluted with crime, but I still believe that is the intent of the statue.  The height, the view, and the position of the statue are indescribable.  The statue itself is huge, but its placement on top of a mountain-like hill cannot be matched.  The view opposite of the statue consists of more magnificent mountains, water, and greenery.  The view and symbolism of this man-made landmark could not be any more perfect.

Machu Picchu (Peru)

This is a picture that many of us have seen, but not thought much about.  Machu Picchu is a more recent discovery of ancient history, and I find it wonderful.  The ancient civilization of the Incas inhabited this estate (it is believed to be an estate for a king), and I find it extremely fascinating that this was built on top of a mountain, isolated from modern and, in-general, other societies.  That is just a cool concept in itself.  For this landmark, it is not so much the view that impresses me, but the history here.  An ancient civilization actually lived on this mountain.  People once walked here, lived here,  ran businesses here; Thinking about the differences between our way of life today and their way of life back hundreds of years ago is astounding.  I love the possibilities.  I want to visit this ancient town so that I may walk the paths that many others once walked, many years ago.  I imagine cultures, such as the Incas, and wonder what it would be like to live in one of Earth's extinct civilizations.  I admire their achievements and I respect the impact they left on this planet.



Angel Falls (Venezuela)

If anybody tries to tell me that this is not an amazing natural landmark, they are lying without a doubt.  Angel Falls is the tallest waterfall in the world.  In fact, it is so tall that the water begins to evaporate before it even reaches the ground.

I have a bit of disclaimer though, Angel Falls is not my number one natural wonder that I wish to visit.  The number of places I want to visit are innumerable, but I felt as if Angel Falls is more of a stretch.  This waterfall is located in the heart of the Venezuelan jungle, which leads me to believe it is a bit more unsafe than the previous landmarks.  However, I imagine the look on the explorers face when he first discovered the waterfall (I did not put the name because the explorer who first found it is debated upon).  Imagine going on an adventure to uncharted lands, winding your way through a jungle filled with wildlife in every single possible direction, searching and searching for something, anything.  Imagine taking a step out from the trees, and looking up at an unbelievable and uncharted work of nature.  I imagine the explorer would have dropped all of his belongings and just gazed.  Gazed up at the 3200+ feet of water falling towards the Earth from this immensely tall plateau-like structure.  What I also find interesting is how the mountain encases the water as it falls.  This picture may not show that well, but the mountain is actually curved around the water a bit.  From a few different angles this can be viewed.  I may not get to see this waterfall during my lifetime, but I would not give up the chance to.  I doubt I could trudge my way through the jungle to visit it, but maybe I could.  But hey, there's a thing called helicopters.  I could try one.

OK, so back to business.  Why did I title this "Too Little Time?"  Well, I feel a little pressured that I will never fulfill my dream of visiting as many places on Earth as I possibly can.  Yeah, yeah, I realize that it is a bit far-fetched to think that I will see so many various places, but think about it: Our world is so small that I could wake up one morning, have an itch to visit somewhere, buy a ticket, and go.  It has become that simple.  I could be anywhere in the world by the next morning.  In my opinion, I think that's a pretty cool concept.  It is almost as if the world is teasing me with how advanced our technology is, yet I cannot visit any place I dream of because of constraints like school, my eventual jobs, family, etc.  I wish I could drop everything and explore what this planet truly is: beauty, wonder, culture, and adventure.  I want to admire everything the world has to offer, but I feel as if my time on this planet is slowly ticking away.  They say that as soon as you are born you being to die, and my slowly winding down clock is looking me straight in the eye taunting me, but there is nothing I can do about it.  Let's just hope it doesn't stop me.

I am excited to see what my future holds for me.  I just hope it's what I wish for.

Our Existence

Over the long weekend we had (thanks Sandy!), I spent a night watching George Carlin on YouTube.  Now, I have seen many a George Carlin video, but I came across one that I have not see.  It was his rant about how people are so obsessed with saving the planet.  You know... stopping global warming, end all this pollution, etc.

But he brought up one point that completely changed my view on the world.  Probably changed it forever.
He, in short, called the human race a phase.

A phase?

I examined my ideologies and realized, I think he's right.

Carlin mentions that 90% of species that have ever lived on this Earth are gone.  He states that we lose up to twenty-five (that number has probably risen since the video was created) species a day, even without human interference.  That is astounding.  That's twenty-five animals that will never walk the face of the Earth again just... just gone.  That is not what changed my way of thought, though.  Carlin mentions that it is the Earth's natural process to repair itself, to allow life to once again evolve from simple forms once we humans destroy ourselves through war.

Think about it.

The Earth formed approximately 4.5 billion years ago.  Just realize how long of a time that is.  Next, after these billions of years, life slowly emerged through evolution.  It took billions of years of course, but eventually came the dinosaurs.  But as unintelligent we consider dinosaurs when compared to humans, consider this.  Dinosaurs developed slowly over time, the way we did.  They did NOT devolve and slowly turn into primates.  Their evolution was cut short by some natural disaster that ended the species, with very simple forms of life still existing.  These remaining animals slowly but surely evolved into the human race.  The dinosaur's natural process came to an immediate halt, allowing the Earth to attempt its process of evolution a second time.

Now, what if these creatures that lived millions of years ago did not end up getting wiped out by some disaster?  They could possibly be living here today.  That would completely change the way life evolved.  What would dinosaurs look like today?  Would they, could they be intelligent?  Would we humans even cease to exist?  Probably not.  Could a dinosaur talk in a way in which we do now?  Develop theories of how they themselves came about? Develop mathematical equations?  Become a Shakespeare?  Go to the moon?  We will never know.

The dinosaurs were nothing but a phase on this Earth.  They had their time, they are gone.

We, the humans, are the second phase.  We have inhabited this Earth for a small fraction of time compared to the dinosaurs.  However, we are intelligent, or so we think.  Perhaps compared to some other galaxy, we are their unintelligent "dinosaurs."  Perhaps they do quantum physics behind their backs in preschool.  Maybe they read entire books in the blink of an eye.  Maybe they have technology that we have never even considered.  As ridiculous as it sounds, the universe has been around for billions of years.  Other forms of life could be millions of years ahead of us; maybe they have destroyed themselves, maybe they travel planet to planet, who knows?  These forms of life could be in an evolutionary period in which they still are just small mammals, that is, if mammals even exist on other planets.  Just imagine the difference between histories of planets.  Teachers on these planets are teaching their students about histories that we will never know about, wars or revolutions we will never know took place, discoveries we will never hear about.  What we teach in our classrooms is being taught differently around the entire universe.  The information we just cannot reach is upsetting, yet blows my mind.  For example, a couple years ago Isaac Newton discovered a few laws of physics, but that was for here on Earth.  Who actually discovered them first?  Was it some a blob of intelligent goo that lives four hundred thousand light years away?  Could be.  I have random thoughts like, What if an alien planet had a revolution against their "mother" planet, similar to our Revolutionary War?  They honestly could be fighting it in a similar fashion to "Star Wars."  I guarantee somewhere in this vast universe something similar to "Star Wars" has happened.  I strongly believe it has. We just will not be able to find out about it during my lifetime.

Sorry, I got off track.  Yes, we are the second phase.  Inevitably, our phase on Earth will eventually be gone.  Perhaps we colonize another planet, or maybe we suffer the same fate as the dinosaurs.  Either way, the Earth is not going to just die off.  Something, maybe deep in the rain forests (if they exist in the future), or deep in the ocean blue, will be alive.  Something will evolve over a large, mind-blowingly long time.  If they are intelligent beings, maybe they will find our fossils.  What the third phase will be, nobody knows.  But I believe there will be one.  The Earth will repair itself from the damage we have caused it, and life will begin its natural process from step one.

While we are living peacefully on Mars, what creature will be slowly evolving on Earth?  It saddens me that I will never live long enough to witness theses evolutions take place.

But...

Maybe that is the beauty of it.  My atoms and my body will eventually become a part of this earth.  I will be the fuel for this evolution, just as our ancestors were.

A thousand years from now, when humans are traveling the solar system, my atoms will be traveling with these humans.*  Just not in the way many people view it.  But I'll still be there.  Traveling the entire universe along side my fellow humans.  And so will you.

*Disclaimer: Unless we blow ourselves up... then it gets complicated.  We will have to wait for more intelligent life to evolve and learn to travel into space, blah blah blah, and then I will be traveling the solar system.

All this blog asks is to think.  Think about the possibilities.  Look up to the sky and realize that somewhere. millions upon millions of miles away, there is somebody looking back at you wondering the same exact thing.  It should bring a smile to your face, but at the same time, a tear to your eye.  You will never know who this "person" is, where they are, what they are, their past, their language, etc.  However, you know they are out there.  It is virtually implausible and even selfish to believe that we are the only life in the universe.

Now, factually speaking: dead remnants of microorganisms and such HAVE been found on extraterrestrial objects, so we know some form of life is out there.

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed a few of my many, many thoughts about the universe.  I could literally go on until my brain fries. If you want to watch the video that inspired me to write this post here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw