THE MENTAL MAELSTROM
Because our power to damage it has escalated, the earth now is regarded as far more fragile than Second Wave civilization suspected. At the same time, it is seen as a diminishing dot in a universe that grows larger and more complex with every passing moment.
Since the Third Wave began some 25 years ago, scientists have developed a whole battery of new tools for probing nature’s most distant reaches. In turn these lasers, rockets, accelerators, plasmas, fantastic photographic capabilities, computers, and colliding-beam devices have burst our conception of what surrounds us.
We are now looking at phenomena that are bigger, smaller, and faster by orders of magnitude than any we examined during the Second Wave past. Today we are probing phenomena that are as tiny as l/l,000,COO,000,000,OOOth of a centimeter in an explorable universe whose edge lies at least 100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles away. We are studying phenomena so short-lived that they occur in I/10,000,000,-000,000,000,000,000th of a second. By contrast, our astronomers and cosmologists tell us the universe is some 20,000,000,000 years old. The sheer scale of explorable nature has burst beyond yesterday’s wildest assumptions.
Moreover, in this swirling vastness, we are told, the earth may not be the only inhabited sphere. Says astronomer Otto Struve, “the vast number of stars that must possess planets, the conclusions of many biologists that life is an inherent property of certain types of complicated molecules or aggregates of molecules, the uniformity throughout the universe of the chemical elements, the light and heat emitted by solar-type stars, and the occurrence of water not only on the earth but on Mars and Venus, compel us to revise our thinking” and consider the possibility of extraterrestrial life.
This doesn’t mean little green humanoids. And it doesn’t mean (or not mean) UFOs. But by suggesting that life is not unique to the earth, it further alters our perception of nature and our place in it. Since 1960, scientists have been listening in the dark, hoping to detect signals from some distant intelligence. The United States Congress has held hearings on “The Possibility, of Intelligent Life Elsewhere in the Universe.” And the Pioneer 10 spacecraft, as it streaked into interstellar space carried with it a pictorial greeting to extraterrestrials.
292
Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320 321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360 361 362 363 364 365 366 367 368 369 370 371 372 373 374 375 376 377 378 379 380 381 382 383 384 385 386 387 388 389 390 391 392 393 394 395 396 397 398 399 400 401 402 403 404 405 406 407 408 409 410 411 412 413 414 415 416 417 418 419 420 421 422 423 424 425 426 427 428 429 430