Monday, March 12, 2012

The Future of Humanity?

"is your writing clear here? Would an average understand what you're trying to say here?"

The evolution of human beings is a highly debatable topic among historians, archaeologist, scientist, etc. Many people choose to observe the evolution of man or the changes occurring over time from a finite perspective. Overlooking the way in which humans think, noting all of the technological and social advancements that man has come to in thousands of years. Compared to life on Earth human beings are extremely young and yet populate most land masses on the planet. To think of the progress of humanity as evolution is in fact wrong; we have devolved since the times of the ancient empires of Sumer and Egypt, and before that the greatest human beings to walk the Earth. Complex is the word that many people would use to describe the current society present among humans. In this society humans are defined by what they want to do, and what they want to do should contribute to humanity. But saying that what humans do should contribute to humanity is almost exactly like arguing between good versus evil. There will be opinions for days. One movie that could epitomize the way humanity could operate from behind the scene is “The Matrix.” In the movie most human beings exist in an artificial world living an artificial life, controlled by machines. The real world consist of the cliche post apocalyptic black sky, with few human cities spread around Earth. The main antagonist Mr. Smith says something that closely approximates the mass population of human beings currently living. “ Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. . .” A simple systematic society will prevail in longevity in comparison to a society like that of the 21st century proved by the course of humanity and its history.

In the song Marathon Man by K the I featuring Thavius Beck, Beck says the following “ It's the opposition of the ominous who lust for dominance And the definition of cognition mixed with confidence Common sense incompetence composed within this document A message for the audience with a mass of multiple major monuments.” This statement can easily be translated as a reflection of the human race today. With so many technology advances in the 21st century alone, future progression of technology (and humanities manipulation of it) will only lead itself into destruction. “ It’s the opposition of the ominous who lust for dominance,” expresses Beck’s resilience of how the world is run today. In many countries seen across the world today a small percentage of the total population owns more than 50% of the wealth. Depending on the situations of the citizens of the nation, this may mean a neutrality among most people. Capitalism is often referred to by some to define the United States, and while Capitalism is looked down upon, it is only the natural course humans have took due to their evolution. Private companies run the world in the way that anything that may become a “necessity” to people will be contorted in way that the “owners” (or people who just say they are in charge) will gain more than the laborers and consumers combined. Again, this can only be expected because of the evolution of the human. Without attaching any negative thoughts to this, one could say that Beck’s statement about the opposition of the ominous that lust for dominance is pretty much the way to combat the collectively small percent of the world who own most of the world’s wealth.

Thinking back to the most over-used saturated term a child from the 4th grade to the 8th grade will hear in a social studies class in the U.S, the “Hunters-Gathers” time period was probably the most bright and best way for human beings to live. The “indigenous people” people of the world before religion spread in the Eastern hemisphere, lived a life of content pleasure with abundant stimulation or at least that’s what we can imagine. The demand for protection from the Earth’s common elements was in demand (shelter,clothing,etc) while the necessities of food and water we pretty much abundant at times. In relation to the mostly capitalistic world of today, the Hunter Gathers time period was much more prosperous both for Earth and humanity. The connection and balance that humans had with the Earth opposed to the relationship they have now has dwindled into a somewhat lax attempt at saving the planet. What many humans fail to realize is that “Going Green” has nothing to do with the planet, but the preservation of the human race. Even during the periods of the great civilizations (Egypt ,Sumer,Rome,Greece, and all the civilizations of the Americas) humans knew how to accurately consume enough of the Earth and consume enough of life (might be hard to contemplate). Paraphrasing Plato, the philosopher once said that “Human beings will always be affected negatively by over stimulation through literature, music, and theatre.” Imagine if Plato was alive today, the stimulates that most humans choose to embrace are rather a waste of time. Many skeptics of these ideas would say that if these simplistic societies (compared to the 21st century) were so great, why don’t the customs and way of humanity resemble those of the past? Why evolution of course!

The Great Pyramid of Giza is undoubtedly one of the most amazing works of art that man kind has ever attributed to. Still now with current technology of the 21st century, humans could not construct a structure so marvelous in mystery. There are many theories of how the Great Pyramid came to be but most rely on what humans today would call impossible human features including the man power and strength to lift a ton (exactly 1 ton). This thought itself only solidifies the idea that humans have devolved in thought and in their role on Earth. For one to commonly think of the creation of the Great Pyramid next to impossible but witness it’s awesome power is quite insane, yet many humans do. The vast amount of knowledge that was available for humans to discover is what stimulated the minds of many, while others were content with harvesting grain for the preservation of themselves and others around them. The spread of a mass consensus in thought was not necessary for free will was natural law. Referring back to Agent Smith and Thavius Beck, humanity has consumed the Earth existing as a deteriorating virus suffering from in fighting. It would be the simplistic devolution of the devolution that will propel humanity to excel and evolve. Hopefully, the saying “History always repeats itself,” holds true.

Note to Reader:

In knowing that this can be seen as an extremely opinionated paper (what piece of literature in human existence isn’t opinionated for I do not think any example exist) with vague historical mentions, these words are simply my underlying truth for the world I co-exist. To say that these words are simply my underlying truth for the world I exist in would be false for I create my world where I exist.

Saturday, March 3, 2012

To the United States . . .

I often forget what I write about. It is funny because myself and a companion of mine have a project somewhat related to this piece do next this Friday. We haven't even started. . .

During the course of the United States history, the country has been able to make innovative advances, leading the world in many categories including space exploration. NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) was founded in 1958, with the purpose of competing with Soviet Russia in the space race. It is important for one to know that the main priority of the United States at the time (pertaining to space) was to occupy the realm of space for National Security, with exploration coming second. This day in age anything that can be associated with creation or discovery is looked about as trivial matters, while things that strongly focus around military are of the utmost importance. Government funding limits the scope of research, disregarding anything that isn’t associated with nuclear science. Somehow in the last 30 years, the money for advances in S.T.E.M research has gone missing, while funds for military action against countries that do not concern U.S citizens are most abundant. SETI (the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) was undoubtedly an influential institution that allowed citizens young and old, to propel into a S.T.E.M career, on the backbone that searching for life somewhere else in the universe will be ever important in humanity’s history. The government funding for what some would call “starry eyed dreams” has gone to the gallows, and it seems as if life for the average scientist has turned into leading the United States into the world’s first nuclear winter. The United States pours more money into destruction, embracing scientific discoveries that will ultimately lead humanity into it’s own destruction.

This Tuesday, February 7th, 2012, NASA plans to solicit commercial space taxi proposals, so that the private space flight industry can revive American space travel. With the cancellation of the Space Shuttle in 2011, commercial/private spaceflight was directly looked to as the solution to keep the United States fresh in its approach to astronomical events. The California space transportation company ,SpaceX, has built the “Dragon” capsule. It has been approved for sometime now to start making cargo trips to the International Space Station, and eventually SpaceX will make more space vehicles for the purpose of transporting astronauts to and from space. Since its existence NASA has contributed to much more than space exploration, which is seemingly fit in this time of crisis (climate change). However, “the final frontier” as many have come to know it in the 20th and 21st century, is something humanity can not disregard, at least certainly not Americans. Companies like SpaceX are solutions to the lack of support from the government as long as there are wealthy investors willing to dump money into the field of space exploration.

An extremely wealthy wall street tycoon in the 20th century, Alfred Loomis is exactly what the space industry needs today. Loomis was somewhat of Renaissance man who housed the grand “Tuxedo Park,” where many of the first plans of the Manhattan Project came to be. The first chemical properties of Uranium where actually tested under the supervision and support of Loomis himself. He held black tie affairs where some of the greatest minds came together to develop the process of nuclear fission, which led to the creation of the nuclear bomb. At the time himself and scientist among him felt that they were fighting for the preservation of life, sadly that preservation was certainly limited American life. It would be easy for anyone to credit Loomis with funding the eventual destruction of humanity, but he is a great example of how the American people can come together to literally rebel against the oppressive government. With nuclear weapons being all the rage today it is only natural for the union to feel a need to protect its people. If one were to think about taking lives among lives away from humanity in the process warfare, they would see the results would be cataclysmic. Through commercial/private space flight, the people of the United States can ensure their own safety, while the government tries to harvest a global nuclear winter.

Among the great civilizations of humanity, exploration has always been something that is seen as natural must during the time of humanity on Earth. The United States in all it’s glory, truly began the first leg of space exploration with Apollo 11, and ever since has regressed due to presence of military conflict. Last minute attempts to salvage humanity at the forefront of dystopia would not benefit , for it would be to late. If for any event were to strike the Earth, humanity would need a place to occupy, to ensure the progression of the human legacy. With so many technologies growing everyday and so many things left to be discovered, the United States of America could play a crucial role in what truly defines humanity.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Celestial Spheres

Here are a few pictures I took with a Canon EOS t2i of the suburban philadelphia night sky.


Tuesday, February 14, 2012

The Universe and It's Awesomeness: Infinite Time

few notes. . .

" This piece has been written in it's purest form without many revisions. Also, Vinny states that infinite time exist, infinite mass exist! Well done old chap! We'll have to explore the idea one day. . ."

To categorize everything fathomable in life, human beings could name every thing from physical to spiritual; often times never coming to a consensus of what life really is. The most universal unit of measuring life would be time, since it is initially described in everything (and can be used to describe everything). Most would say the universe itself is how one would describe everything around them, but is not the universe a measure of time itself? Theories like the Big Bang shrink the universe down to the smallest (infinitely small) subatomic form, claiming that the universe was extremely dense and hot in it’s nebulous stages. All of sudden out of nowhere the universe had a cosmic growth spurt expanding over billions of years into what we now know. One argument that can obviously be raised is how can humans accurately depict time in the universe if they were never there to record the initial start of time itself. Despite figuring out the age of the universe, it still wouldn’t tell one much about time compared to “cosmic time” (defining cosmic time as everything including earth’s time). Scientist have developed methods of analyzing how fast galaxies are moving away from each other claiming cosmic expansion. Others say that the universe could be apart of a system of multi-verses that go on forever endlessly. Regardless of what/how old the universe may be, humans will never be able to understand their manipulation of cosmic phenomena due to their perspective of time.

The renowned, now deceased astronomer, Carl Sagan once had a show called Cosmos. In one episode he stated that the Earth was nothing but “a pale blue dot” apart a small corner, in a small galaxy, in an infinite universe. Sagan had a point in comparing the Earth to the rest of the universe (this could bring up many points to the mentality of human beings and the things they deem important, but that is another 2fer) really putting the universe on the infinite scale. Look at the universe as a vessel of time. It is a ship that represents time in itself, and if the universe were infinite, would not time be infinite as well? When someone says they have all the time in the world, they do not only have all the time in the world, but in the universe as well. If time is then infinite, no precise measurement could ever be made of it. The record of time would only be fictitious misrepresentations of actions that only let the observer observe in one moment. It would be very difficult for beings of Earth to view time as infinite, since human beings (most of them anyway) live in the 3rd dimension creating perspective only for a moment. If humans possessed the ability to observe time infinitely then any and every action would still occur never ending, but only spawning new actions based on decisions of the participant of that moment.

Thinking of the universe as always and forever infinite makes it much easier to think about the fate of the universe, and what the universe actually is. Some scientist believes that humans are living in the golden age of the universe. A time where stars are in their prime, and there is enough decaying stars to spawn the life of new stars for a little more than a few billion years to come. They then believe that the universe will enter its second dark age; a period where all light is lost after the death of the last star. It is hard to fathom a time such like this considering the state of the universe being infinite. This would mean that the rate at which celestial objects are born would be infinite (even though most of the universe is comprised of dark matter/dark flow). If all of this is applicable and time and the universe are really infinite, the existence of parallel universes would never be brought up. One can look at infinite time and infinite universe equal to the theory parallel universes from a 3rd dimension perspective.

In conclusion, one could suppose that due a limited perspective human beings will never come to truly understand whether or not the universe is infinite. If not (meaning the universe is finite) humans should come to terms as to how to manipulate its wonders rather quickly in the next couple of centuries. For civilizations of Earth, and the overall mentality of human beings, the observation of infinite time would create a cosmic conscious. Although it may never be seen in the realm of the universe that Earth exist in, infinite time houses all factions of life.

Note: In the book I am reading “Foundation and Earth” by Isaac Asimov, a planet named Gaia is of great significance, you will know about it soon in my projects to come and why it relates to my ideas of infinite time/infinite universe.

Hello. . . anyone there?

I have spent a nice amount of time away from this electronic journal and I realize that it is almost imperative of me to keep writing. Life has been moving about as always and as of I now I am almost stationary on my path while it keeps moving from under me. I know I will catch up in due time. There is so much that I want to talk about. . . I've been wondering why don't more people in the United States travel by train? It makes so much sense. Anyways, I would like all to know that I will be attempting to post a relatively longer passage of words centered around a topic of general scientific interest. Commentary and feedback will be appreciated. A funny thing to let everyone know is I am doing quite well in my pre-calculus class. . . The wonders and simplicity of trigonometry is absolutely beautiful. Until then,

-
Winston Wellington Wright