All Things End

I think we struggle our whole lives to come to terms with this seemingly devastating truth. The scale at which we think of this fact varies as we age through understanding; first we think, "This cup of milk is empty", and later, "This relationship is over." Eventually as the complexity of our lives seeps into our consciousness, it sets in that we, too, come to an end.

Although our universe is over 13 billion years old, we still live in an incredibly early stage of it. We understand that all of the points of light in the sky are balls of matter that expand, shrink, explode and eventually fizzle out. We can predict that eventually all of the stars in the sky will cease to emit light -- the white dwarves will cool off, transform into black dwarves, and the last matter inside of those almost lightless forms in space will eventually evaporate into radiation. One day, too, the only remaining bits of matter inside of black holes will turn into energy, and all of this heat will tend towards the same temperature. Eventually there will be no more time -- no changes between the past, present and future. The universe, like all things, will end.

But what about the things that are eternal? If we can't change the past, then is it not something that is eternal? Do the things in the past exist forever -- exist forever in the sense that they will always be in the past? Or is existence only defined by the things that are in the now, and those things that are abstract constructs of our past are merely figments of our imagination?

Can anything other than energy be eternal if our entire universe is moving towards a lightless, matter-less state?

Haha, I don't know for sure, but I do like to think about the energy that flows within me, within my brain and my heart, my body and my senses, as being something that has always existed and always will exist as it moves out of me and throughout the universe. But maybe I'm just comforting myself.

I think that humanity's grip on ideas of eternal love, the soul, cyclical stories of life, death, rebirth, etc. are all proof of our tendency to shy away from the idea that all things end. Why are we afraid of this concept? Isn't the idea that we've got one shot, a single, teeny, tiny, seemingly infinitely minute amount of time in this universe a reason to appreciate every single moment of it? Is it not a reason to wake up every day aware of our societal constructs, of our beautiful diversity, of the miracle of our lives, our advancements, our knowledge, and feel pure joy?

A lot of the inspiration for this post came from Brian Cox and his BBC special "Wonders of the Universe" where he discusses the heat death of the universe. While it is only a theory, it is one that resonates with me as I struggle to come to terms with the answers I find to some of "life's most enduring questions". Give it a watch if you'd like to get goosebumps by the amazing cinematography, beautiful music, and awe-inspiring cosmological topics in the show.

Life Forms

I watched the first episode of "Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking" titled Aliens tonight (before painting my nails and electrocuting the enemies of my Sith Sorcerer in SWTOR), and it brought up an important point that I think scientists commonly forget and often misconstrue. Hawking presented the idea that there may be life forms out there that do not operate similarly to us in any way -- they don't need water, carbon, or perhaps various other things we humans cannot exist without. (We know that these types of life forms exist or can be created on Earth now, which is pretty amazing). He posited the idea that perhaps life exists in one of the most seemingly unlikely places: inside the heart of a star. Maybe if we saw this life, it would be completely unrecognizable to us; we would look upon it and think "well, that is clearly inanimate and therefore not alive".

More and more I'm finding articles about newly discovered life forms created or found in nature that go against our previously held understanding and definition of life, and these sorts of discoveries excite me. Stephen Hawking could be absolutely right, and it may change the way we search for extra terrestrial life in the future.

But here's what bothers me: often times people think negatively about the idea of an alien life form coming to earth. "They'll destroy our planet for resources", they say. They justify this hypothesis by comparing these aliens to us, claiming that if we went to another planet that we would use it for its resources before moving elsewhere in the universe. Now, I think it's fair to make hypotheses about our actions when visiting other planets and planets with life, and if we want to think about these aliens as being similar to us in any way, I can understand why people jump to negative conclusions -- but if we found another Earth, would we really destroy the life on it for personal gain? As far as we know now, life, the scientifically accepted definition of it, is relatively rare. (Statistically we believe that there must be other life that exists in the universe, but we haven't found any yet). If we ever found a planet anything like Earth, I doubt so much that we would strip it of its resources and move on. The life on Earth is absolutely amazing, and I can only imagine that the life on other Goldilocks planets must, too, be amazing. I even think that we would make sacrifices in order to preserve that life. I like to think that if aliens came to Earth, and if they were anything like us, that they would see the beauty of this planet and value its preservation. They would study the life and try to understand it scientifically to expand their knowledge and intelligence, just like I think we would do.

While I enjoy hypothesizing about the nature and behavior of E.T.s, I have a hard time accepting the sensationalism that surrounds doomsday theories that involve them. How can we even begin to claim that intelligent extraterrestrial life that has the capability to travel across galaxies would ever think, feel, or function in any way like us? If they were similar to us, then why would we assume that they would do us harm? Why would we assume that they would do good to us?

We don't know, and like many of the larger questions in life (is there a God? Is there a soul? What is our purpose? Why are we here?), we really don't know the answer. And instead of clinging onto a hypothesis that has no proof, I want to spend my life being okay with the Question Mark. I want to spend my life working towards understanding and accepting the fact that I don't know, and even though I will spend my life looking for the answers, I may never know -- and that's OK.

The Bigger Picture

"You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you have."

I think the first half of Daniel Goldstein's talk about the struggle between the future self and the present self poses some interesting questions. He explains about the losing battle of the future self. This future version of us isn't around all of the time to tell us about what they value and how my actions now directly affect them and their happiness, health, and well-being. I had never thought about my future as it's own version of me. Putting my present goals, values and beliefs into a version of me now + the sum of my actions has made me feel much more self aware. I usually think about the future from various points of view, through specific and narrow lenses that separate my career self from my family self from my social self. But when I realize that it's me with all my complexities and facets and feelings and hopes and dreams, I am reminded that I care for that person.

I was inspired to continue to think about Goldstein's initial points and further develop questions of my own: How many future self constructs do we have? Are we bound by a singular understanding of a future self or can we begin to comprehend ourselves as a truly, larger, whole self -- as a humanity? And finally, looping back into Goldstein's main question, are we capable of feeling motivated to work towards positive or ideal future selves without a commitment device? He thinks so, but I'm not entirely convinced.

A common commitment device I think we easily forget about is regret. I had a conversation with a friend today that reminded me of this difficult feeling. Why do people do things that they put subject to this self affliction? Or to be more specific -- why do people do things that they know they will regret later? I've always been amazed at how we can all think of something we've done in the past that we knew damn well that we would regret later; we thought to ourselves, either consciously or subconsciously, "well, I know I'll regret this later but I'll do it anyway." It's easy to see why people do things they regret in general -- I mean, things are always different with 20/20 hindsight, right? But to be able to turn off that empathy with your future self that you know you'll have to live with (at least until you forget what you did) is different entirely. I think Goldstein's example of the Donut is a good one to ponder on.

Am I the only one who is slightly more concerned for humanity when I consider how shitty we treat our own, singular future selves? The fear of regret just sometimes isn't enough of a commitment device to think about our future selves' well being, and to me that is frightening when I think about how our decisions today impact the future of humanity. If we can't even empathize with ourselves enough to change our actions, how are we capable of doing it for people we don't even know or that don't exist yet?

I put the quote about strength at the beginning of this post because I think strength is related. Like Goldstein mentions, the concern for the future self is really a test of will. Do we have the strength of will to keep to our goals and think about the betterment of our future selves? Frankly, while I think the rest of his talk is a bit less interesting, I commend his work for attempting to get people to empathize with that future self and change their behavior based upon that empathy, I just wonder if it can work. Like I mention earlier, if commitment devices like regret don't really work all of the time, well then it sounds like strength is our only option, right? "You never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you have." -- Unknown

Think about it for yourself -- Do you have the strength to prevent your future self from feeling regret towards the things you knew you had the power avoid?

Are you being a person today that your future you will regret?