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My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

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Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#141

Post by 8jef »

seydor wrote: post #134
pohl wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, there's no life without death, but you're kind of underselling the Anthropocene Mass Extinction a wee bit, aren't you?

Those are unscientific things. I didn't expect that what i said would be considered controversial. We live in extraordinary challenging times and people should steer away from sentimental fluff.

The fluff is the stuff only those who are aware of what's happening, of what happened (not just of the scientific things), can experience. Earth, we are trashing it, not up for debate, not anymore. Probably not trashing it as much as we could, but more than enough, which is obvious as a nose in a face. When confronted to the cold embrace of those who can't see and feel anything of the sort, some can only resort to their sentiments, the _sentimental stuff_ as you frame it, which can only follow the drama, never preceding it.

Just like arriving onto a crime scene and yelling at the crying survivors to shut up, without any consideration for the crime committed before, or any of its consequences.

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#142

Post by merely-unlikely »

mionhe wrote: post #65
saiya-jin wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

generally limited world views regardless of the facts are a mental shield of people afraid of something. the problem is, the fear is so deep beneath the crust of hatred and other negative emotions that getting to it and working with it is often practically impossible

What other world views are you referring to? (excluding the flat earth example)

Religion would be an obvious one. The geocentric model maybe as well (though I haven't heard this claimed).

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#143

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

seydor wrote: post #108
baxtr wrote: post #98

> It was among the strongest feelings of grief I have ever encountered. The contrast between the vicious coldness of space and the warm nurturing of Earth below filled me with overwhelming sadness. Every day, we are confronted with the knowledge of further destruction of Earth at our hands: the extinction of animal species, of flora and fauna . . . things that took five billion years to evolve, and suddenly we will n…

Also technically an impossibility, since evolution would not be possible without extinction

That's technically wrong. Evolution is possible via expansion into new biomes, or by being able to use/exploit as-yet unmetabolized compounds, or through shifting inter-species relationships (e.g. entering (or leaving) symbiosis).

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#144

Post by gwright »

bkirkby wrote: post #70

Fwiw I had something akin to the overview effect when I attended a full solar eclipse. I thought I was prepared. I had read up on what to expect because I wanted to make the most of the experience for the kids. I wanted to make sure we observed the "shadow bands" (snake like shadows traversing across single colored surfaces that aren't always visible). Everything did proceed as I expected (including the shadow bands)…

I had much the same feelings. It is very hard to describe to someone who hasn't witnessed it. In a moment, my perception of the earth-moon-sun system transformed into something much more tangible than it had been before. Sort of like a shift from a 2D image to a 3D model. The sense of scale also became more tangible for me.

I'm hoping to repeat this again in for 2024 eclipse crossing North America: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_eclipse_of_April_8,_2024

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#145

Post by sandworm101 »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #143
seydor wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also technically an impossibility, since evolution would not be possible without extinction

That's technically wrong. Evolution is possible via expansion into new biomes, or by being able to use/exploit as-yet unmetabolized compounds, or through shifting inter-species relationships (e.g. entering (or leaving) symbiosis).

Extinction is not limited to species. Species arent really a thing as one eventually transforms into another over near-infinite steps. Only genes/traits matter. Evolution is in fact impossible without the loss of traits between generations. Extinction of traits in favor of better ones is baked in to the very definition.

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#146

Post by dwaltrip »

seydor wrote: post #134
pohl wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, there's no life without death, but you're kind of underselling the Anthropocene Mass Extinction a wee bit, aren't you?

Those are unscientific things. I didn't expect that what i said would be considered controversial. We live in extraordinary challenging times and people should steer away from sentimental fluff.

Extinction rates can be measured and modeled. What’s unscientific about that?

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#147

Post by xwolfi »

baxtr wrote: post #98

> It was among the strongest feelings of grief I have ever encountered. The contrast between the vicious coldness of space and the warm nurturing of Earth below filled me with overwhelming sadness. Every day, we are confronted with the knowledge of further destruction of Earth at our hands: the extinction of animal species, of flora and fauna . . . things that took five billion years to evolve, and suddenly we will n…

But he must also accept that life comes from death and the evolution (we should really call it a competition) he speaks off extinguished a large numbers of species. We might be one of them, and we're also victim of our own nature. We can try to resist it, but what will arise from our extinction ? Maybe something better, we have no special purpose nor duty.

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#148

Post by AlwaysRock »

sandworm101 wrote: post #103

With all respect to Shatner (first canadian space tourist iirc) I dont take much from these narratives. A rich/famous/connected person does a thing that we all want to do but cannot afford, something that requires insane amounts of energy/pollution. Then they turn around and talk of the profound experience and how it has made them a better person. Big deal. The pubic good is limited to a few interviews and an article…

Shatner is an actor famously known for staring in star trek which famously uses many of Shakespeare, the most well known bard, themes or outright plots. Further, he's stared in Shakespeare live productions. Even more, so he's made several spoken word lyrical albums.

Some of his words immediately after landing are poetic, “I hope I never recover, that I can maintain what I feel now.”

They did send a poet.

Re: My Trip to Space Filled Me with Overwhelming Sadness

#149

Post by cmos »

osullip wrote: post #22

That nearly made me cry.

We should all be crying... Practically nothing has happened of any consequence, aside from this pandemic, to have any actual impact on climate change. We need a WW2 level of change in our lives. We need better public transportation and trains to reduce use of cars and airplanes, build nuclear plants, eat less meat and dairy..

Shatner went to space and was profoundly changed. What do we need to do for us all to be profoundly changed?

https://climate.nasa.gov/news/3129/emission-reductions-from-...

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