Tentative Certainty Doubles as Doubt

At some point in the extremely distant past, planet Earth was entirely whole—an original fireball slowly cooling and transforming energy into mass. During the intervening millennia, though, the character of the spinning sphere changed dramatically. But we can only make educated guesses about the appearance of the surface of Earth during much of that enormous stretch of time. Today, though, we can watch the ongoing metamorphosis as it happens. Powerful storms erode river channels and seacoasts. Earthquakes and volcanoes alter the crust. Sea currents modify the temperature of the atmosphere as they squirm through all the planet’s vast oceans; which, in turn, alter both marine life habitat and climate’s impacts on surface-dwellers. The list goes on and one. If we pay close attention, we can watch it happen.

On a local and more personal scale, we can watch smaller changes take place as people around us grow old and as those we know die. And as families and friends disperse around the surface of the globe in pursuit of…something different, something better. Our personal lives change with those directly impactful and more rapid transformations. The planet itself mutates on a far greater scale, though, on an almost unimaginably long scale of time. But during the last few centuries, the pace of planetary change has increased and accelerates with each passing day. Thanks in large part to the presence of humans and their activities, many of the actions undertaken without first exploring how profound and how permanent those activities irreversibly affect the planet.

Ultimately, though, change is inevitable. Our only home planet eventually will “wear out” and every human being and all other creatures living on it will die. While those unavoidable changes may cause regret and pain, there’s nothing we can do at this stage to change the final course of cosmic evolution. Neither on a universal scale nor on a personal level.  We might be capable of prolonging lives, but not Life. We might be able to slow the dissolution of Earth, but we cannot stop it. Although thinking of those realities may cause deep sadness, once accepted a sense of peaceful acceptance replaces the sorrow.

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I sometimes wonder whether, when I write, I make assertions about “how the world works” in an attempt to inform others or to convince myself. Some of the statements I make suggest my level of certainty is somewhat higher than I present. In reality, some go far beyond “somewhat” to “massively.” So much of our collective so-called understanding of every aspect of the universe—from the tiniest, most mundane pieces to the all-encompassing parts—is based on hopeful (and possibly reasonable) interpretations of scientific data or belief in supernatural forces, no matter how utterly outlandish. But even those supposedly supernatural forces that I mock could conceivably be real. I might be the sucker; but I think not. The older I get, the more “slack” I seem to give to some people who hold fantastical beliefs and adherence to ideas that I find silly and completely implausible. It’s not their beliefs that I tolerate (but do not accept). Instead, it’s the people I both tolerate and accept. Even so, I too often find myself laughing inwardly at otherwise intelligent people embracing beliefs I believe are ridiculous. To be fair, though, people who hold steadfastly to those beliefs probably think the same about my position. We’re all free-thinkers; but both schools of thought carry the price of, possibly, being wrong.

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Perhaps the only true dignity of man is his capacity to despise himself.

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My atheism, like that of Spinoza, is true piety towards the universe and denies only gods fashioned by men in their own image, to be servants of their human interests.

~ George Santayana ~