Us

"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." -- Carl Sagan, astronomer of some note (1934-1996)

I tried using the above image as my desktop background for a short while last year, but it proved to be too damaging to my ego--if that blue dot is all we are, then who am I? How much of a difference can I really make in the world? How much will my Derek Jeter rookie card really be worth, when I'm gone? I'm cosmic bacteria!

These questions proved too lofty for my tastes, and I changed my wallpaper promptly.

Still, to quote a close friend of mine upon viewing "A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," "Space is fucking insane!" It's true! In fact, you don't even need to be an astronomer to verify the truth of this statement. Space is fucking insane and all you need is a computer to experience its wonders.

This blog will explore the cosmos not from the perspective of a scientist or astronomer, but that of the plebeian--the little guy, suspended on a moat of dust, just lookin' around.