I guess ill start it off, so where do you think...??

[zimabog]

But ... why???? Why fall in love then, if in the end, there is nothing? Might as well never fall in love, never get married.. just live and eat like wild animals and die off....

The simple fact that we are the ONLY species to harbor such emotions and intelligence, tells me that there has to be something else for us. If not, we are pretty much a big waste of space..... we do more harm than good to the planet anyway.....

Why would "God" or evolution or whatever give us the ability to love someone that we would DIE for.... live our entire life together with them, only to forever separate us in the end? Why then give us the ability to love our parents, our kids, our partners etc.? Animals don't really have this? I don't think they really cry when we give away one of their litter? Or if we eat one of their embryo's? (eggs). Why do WE have this then? That would just be too cruel, to torture us with the sorrow and knowledge of death with no hope for rekindling.

do you not know that many other animals pair for life and even go to extremes to protect their friends?

Many animals DO have "this". There has even been cross species friendship observed in some zoos that dont exactly separate the different animals.

Truth is, we, homo sapiens, are just as animal as they are. We are not special. We are more intelligent of course, we have more brain activity, more complex thinking, but we sir... are NOT divinely special.

Just like wood rots, grass dies, our cells get damaged by the world, and can't sustain themselves. we die, just like 300 year old trees, like squirrels, like dogs,like bugs.... just like a device... we turn off.



"Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves...."

That photo was taken IN the solar system. There is a lot more to the universe than homo sapiens, even if there was a god, we are not it's super special creation.

[ISAtlanta300]

do you not know that many other animals pair for life and even go to extremes to protect their friends?

Many animals DO have "this". There has even been cross species friendship observed in some zoos that dont exactly separate the different animals.

.

It's called instinct. I doubt an animal is aware WHY it does it.

[ISAtlanta300]

do you not know that many other animals pair for life and even go to extremes to protect their friends?

Many animals DO have "this". There has even been cross species friendship observed in some zoos that dont exactly separate the different animals.

Truth is, we, homo sapiens, are just as animal as they are. We are not special. We are more intelligent of course, we have more brain activity, more complex thinking, but we sir... are NOT divinely special. .[/QUOTE]


I would hate to disagree there. While we have some animal instincts, our advanced brain and higher intelligence does give us certain quality unique to us. We have emotions, rationale. We can tell differences between 'right' and 'wrong', where an animal can not. It is this emotion that usually drives a lot of our actions. I would dare say that we are the ONLY species that are able to THINK about our actions, their consequences, and what drives us to it. I would say that makes us, as a species, quite special.

A cat may show you affection that you may interpret as love, for example, but it's not a display of love on an emotional level like humans do; but more likely because it knows that you are the one that feeds it.

There is a lot more to the universe than homo sapiens, even if there was a god, we are not it's super special creation.

True, the universe is vast, but if there was a 'God' as you said, we ARE it's super special creation. That is what pretty much all religions (those with God) teach. And you are able to see that dot and write an entire paragraph, JUST BECAUSE you are special. You are 'aware', on a level no other species can match.

[zimabog]

True, the universe is vast, but if there was a 'God' as you said, we ARE it's super special creation. That is what pretty much all religions (those with God) teach. And you are able to see that dot and write an entire paragraph, JUST BECAUSE you are special. You are 'aware', on a level no other species can match.

by "we" do you mean homo sapeins or creatures in general?

[ISAtlanta300]

Humans.

[DrivenMind]

"Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves...."

"To live in the hearts we leave behind is to never die."


Carl Sagan is the man! I'm reading Pale Blue Dot right now, having just finished Cosmos.

I don't believe in heaven or hell. But I'd like my ashes to be shot into space.