From Obama to Alpha Centauri

Filed Under anecdotes, capitalism, politics, religion, science

My youngest brother started it. He prompted a conversation between me and the husband about imperialism, liberal interventionism, and the concept of universal human rights. From this, somehow we got to talking about the privileged position of faith and the contradictions that creates, how it’s strange to accept the “miracles” of Jesus based on the word people who didn’t understand much about how the natural world worked, and then magicians …. On to the God of Gaps, and the popular idea that when we die our “energy” lives on as a personal spirit, how long would it take to travel to Alpha Centauri, intelligent life on other planets wouldn’t need to be “humanoid,” and finally, the Prime Directive. Which led us right back to non interventionist vs interventionist politics.

This all began when my brother told me he’d send me his copy of Obama’s Audacity of Hope (he’s read both of Obama’s books), and wanted me to pay special attention to the chapter “Beyond Our Borders” (or something along those lines). “And then tell me if you think Obama is an imperialist.”

Two hours later I was sitting here thinking about the fact that when I look into the Milky Way I’m looking years into the past. Even the sun is always ten minutes old to my eyes. And many “primitive” people saw themselves as “the people” in the same way that some religions advocate humans as special to God. We are thriving and striving in a narrow and delicate slip of our planet. I want the primacy of a ripe orange in my hand and an understanding of magnitude.

Taken one by one, we are minor things repetitively criss-crossing the streets of the towns we live in, but as a whole we’ve constructed elaborate universes of knowledge, some real, some imagined.

Comments

One Response to “From Obama to Alpha Centauri”

Comrade Kevin on March 1st, 2008 7:40 pm

And whose universe gets the right to exist?

If a universe exists in the present and has no support from its seers, does it really exist?

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