“After all, what nobler thought can one cherish than that the universe lives within us all?”
―Neil deGrasse Tyson
One thing my system swallows readily today. One truth I can embrace; one scientific fact that still makes me feel as big as the entire world around me. One tidbit about what I am that is indisputable and makes me both the most insignificant speck in the universe and the biggest of all the galaxies I can ever contemplate.
Thank you, Neil deGrasse Tyson.
In case you haven't ever seen what he has to say (among other things like calming us down about all those end-of-the-world prophets and their seemingly alarming warnings based on things like the Mayans and their calendars), here is what he means by the universe inside us:
“The knowledge that the atoms that comprise life on earth - the atoms that make up the human body, are traceable to the crucibles that cooked light elements into heavy elements in their core under extreme temperatures and pressures.
These stars- the high mass ones among them- went unstable in their later years- they collapsed and then exploded- scattering their enriched guts across the galaxy- guts made of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and all the fundamental ingredients of life itself.
These ingredients become part of gas clouds that condense, collapse, form the next generation of solar systems- stars with orbiting planets.
And those planets now have the ingredients for life itself.
So that when I look up at the night sky, and I know that yes we are part of this universe, we are in this universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts is that the universe is in us.
When I reflect on that fact, I look up- many people feel small, cause they're small and the universe is big. But I feel big because my atoms came from those stars.”
One can really take comfort in that on a night like this---in this particular bout of voices that don't respond, where reprieve can only be won after gut-wrenching spirals and spinning pain in the universe that is my brain. These words shine through and bring me back because they are simple and unassuming. No ulterior motive. It's between the universe and your soul.
What's simple is true.
No trumpets, no "faith", no contribution, no alms, no nothing. In your head where there is only you and your pain, the simplest of all details can bring you back.
Brainiac-and-all-alone-in-the-universe-tonight, signing out.
―Neil deGrasse Tyson
One thing my system swallows readily today. One truth I can embrace; one scientific fact that still makes me feel as big as the entire world around me. One tidbit about what I am that is indisputable and makes me both the most insignificant speck in the universe and the biggest of all the galaxies I can ever contemplate.
Thank you, Neil deGrasse Tyson.
In case you haven't ever seen what he has to say (among other things like calming us down about all those end-of-the-world prophets and their seemingly alarming warnings based on things like the Mayans and their calendars), here is what he means by the universe inside us:
“The knowledge that the atoms that comprise life on earth - the atoms that make up the human body, are traceable to the crucibles that cooked light elements into heavy elements in their core under extreme temperatures and pressures.
These stars- the high mass ones among them- went unstable in their later years- they collapsed and then exploded- scattering their enriched guts across the galaxy- guts made of carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and all the fundamental ingredients of life itself.
These ingredients become part of gas clouds that condense, collapse, form the next generation of solar systems- stars with orbiting planets.
And those planets now have the ingredients for life itself.
So that when I look up at the night sky, and I know that yes we are part of this universe, we are in this universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts is that the universe is in us.
When I reflect on that fact, I look up- many people feel small, cause they're small and the universe is big. But I feel big because my atoms came from those stars.”
One can really take comfort in that on a night like this---in this particular bout of voices that don't respond, where reprieve can only be won after gut-wrenching spirals and spinning pain in the universe that is my brain. These words shine through and bring me back because they are simple and unassuming. No ulterior motive. It's between the universe and your soul.
What's simple is true.
No trumpets, no "faith", no contribution, no alms, no nothing. In your head where there is only you and your pain, the simplest of all details can bring you back.
Brainiac-and-all-alone-in-the-universe-tonight, signing out.
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