6/23/2006

Perspective

Sometimes, I think, it helps to keep things in perspective...



You see one thing, and that gives you one perspective. Then, you see another thing, and that makes you think a little harder yet.


And so it goes, right?

All is comfortable, and ordered as one expects. And then you add even more perspective:

At some point, it makes you start to wonder. What's it all about. How small is small? How big is big? And then...

Wow. It kind of makes you wonder what we're arguing about, doesn't it? Or why we build buildings, and societies, or basically do anything besides...well...that. And beaches, yeah, beaches.

But wait, there's more. Because even as large as all that...the human mind (well, mine at least) can't even comprehend the distances between these objects. If you think the sizes blow you away, do a little research on just how...spread out...it all is.

So, does all that make you think the religious among us are more likely right? Or less?

And here's some more. Imagine a pile of phone books adding up to 8,000 pages. That would be a pile roughly 3 feet high. Think of this as an example of the diameter of the earth: about 8,000 miles. Each thin page represents a mile. From sea level to Mt Everest is a mere 5 pages. Most of us have never been more than a few hundred feet underground. How much control do we really have over all those pages under us. The temperature of this planet has an awful lot to do with the whole ball in addition to what little we contribute.

Imagine the life of the earth, 4.5 billion years. At one ice age every 25,000 years, that means we would have had 180,000 of them.

I am not trying to pick a fight with Wulfgar about global warming. In fact, at 11:30 on a Friday night, I don't even want to talk about global warming. But let's just keep things in perspective, ok? Can we at least agree that, to at least some degree, things might be happening that we can't control, and that have nothing to do with our (exceptionally) puny and (amazingly) insignificant lives?

7 comments:

The Viceroy's Fuguestate said...

Cut and Paste this http://jamesphogan.com/bb/content/062203.shtml into your browser. It kind of dovetails or compliments your post....it's all about Mr. Sun, that big bright ball in the sky that dries out the lawn in August.Please don't yell at me...

a-fire-fly said...

Are you trying to say that the last several thousand years of slow but steady increase in the earths temp has nothing to do with a few hundred (at most) years of human influence on the earths climate? For shame, don't you watch the news? They decide this stuff for you!

Anonymous said...

Interesting essay, "Gorgeous Propaganda, Frightening Truth", is by Joseph Bast, president of The Heartland Institute, who discusses -- actually he dissects each and every error, exaggeration and outright lie in -- Al Gore's new movie, "An Inconvenient Truth."

Anonymous said...

We got more: In "Gorey Truths: 25 Inconvenient Truths for Al Gore", Iain Murray, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, has written a devastating critique of the new movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," featuring Al Gore, and its companion book. Murray says Gore "leaves out many truths that are inconvenient for his argument," and goes on to list and document 25 facts that contradict Gore's alarmist depiction of future climate change.

Anonymous said...

Nice post Geeguy... here's a link about global warming I found interesting...

http://www.canadafreepress.com/2006/harris061206.htm

Especially like this part; "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years."

GeeGuy said...

Jim,

You need to read more regularly!

http://ecityblog.blogspot.com/2006/06/more.html

Anonymous said...

Sorry. Missed that.