November 2, 2007
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Seriously, how many times do I have to tell you, you don’t have to knock. Just walk right in.
The other day I had an intruiging revelation as I was driving. Here was the situation: I was driving north on a highway and was leaning over to find something in the passenger seat of the car (a CD case). That movement started a domino of thoughts within my mind. Now, as you read, keep each of these thoughts in mind so that when they all add up you can visualize the whole situation together. Not only was I traveling north, and leaning to my right, but because of the earth’s rotation I was also spinning counter-clockwise at 1200 mph. Plus, I was in the solar system, which is rotating at a speed of 155 miles/sec around the center of the milky way. And the milky way is shooting away from the point of the big bang at thousands of miles per second. So, picture yourself without all the surrounding physical matter, and see yourself hurtling simultaneously in all these directions at all these tremendous speeds through the universe. Your position is not quite as stable as it immediately appears.
Now add to this the fact there is no floor or ceiling to the universe. ’Up’ and ‘down’ hold no ultimate weight when imagining the universe; you can imagine it either way. If you picture yourself with all these directions and speeds, and traveling through space devoid of the physical matter that creates these speeds, in a universe with no absolute direction, you discover your absolute location is ineffably unimaginable.
Just think of how many thousands of miles away you are from the location in the universe where you started to read this post!
Hmmm. Maybe all sickness is motion sickness…
Farewell everyone!
Comments (9)
Rubbish! The world is saucer shaped. An upsidedown saucer admittedly. I’m not mad after all.
RYC: I know they’re for minis, but I’m sure the xanga team will come up with other stuff to use them for.
Sorry it took me so long to reply. I had trouble with your comment, and had to mull over it a little (with the help of a friend to ask me the right questions, but don’t think that these aren’t my own thoughts!).
I don’t know if everyone apprehends a spiritual dimension to life. On top of that, we don’t really experience all those things up to our death, nor at birth. Don’t you find it at all interesting that when we are born, we are atheist, and when we are incapable of a normal thought process as we are old and dying, we are atheist? I also wonder how people with certain severe mental disorders experience a spiritual life, especially if they are incapable of taking care of themselves.
That’s my response. =) And by the way, I love looking at the stars for that very reason (as if you couldn’t tell by my xanga site!).
I also wanted to tell you that I really like your picture. It’s so mysterious!
I’ve never been motion sick! If all sickness is motion sickness, though, then it has as yet been strongly correlated with the presence of bacteria, the lack of nutrients, or bad genes. It’s diffucult to completely discount such a thing when you consider that infinitely close to zero is still possible, no matter how unlikely it is.
You totally gave me motion sickness…impressive.
It sounds like the swirling of stars are just one big bowel movement
I enjoyed your response greatly. Now, having said that, I will be completely honest with you. I haven’t completely declared myself an atheist. I tell people I have (for certain reasons not relevant to my response), but I haven’t. Why? Because for some reason I can’t understand how we came to be. I definitely don’t believe in a creation like the Bible describes. That’s just silly and highly improbable because of it’s inconsistencies. However, I can’t begin to imagine how evolution could have worked. A belief in evolution is a must for a serious atheist, but I haven’t quite reached that point yet.
What you say makes sense, but I am highly doubtful of an afterlife. I see no evidence for it. And unfortunately, I see more evidence for evolution than the creation or anything else, so that’s what I’m leaning towards. I want there to be an afterlife. I want to live on and experience more and more, well, experiences. I just don’t have enough evidence to convince me of it.
Let’s just say I am terribly confused about life in general. I’ve actually scared myself a few times just thinking about how confused I am. I don’t know anything! I don’t know what happens… how can this be possible? It frightens me, but I absolutely REFUSE to turn to a invisible, indetectable god to make me feel better. I did that for longer than I should have.
Did you hear that?
That was my head exploding, as it was trying to fit around what you just said.
New perspective is amazing. And dizzying.