Significantly Insignificant

As far as scientists know:

  • The human species originated in Africa about 250,000 to 300,000 years ago.
  • Dinosaurs existed for over 180,000,000 years.
  • Dinosaurs went extinct about 66,000,000 years ago.

To put this into perspective, as a percentage, humans have been around 0.167% as long as dinosaurs were. Put another way, dinosaurs existed for 600 times longer than humans have so far. Beyond that, dinosaurs have been extinct for 200 times longer than humans have been around.

We are a species that has lived for an insignificant amount of time, on a tiny planet, not far from an insignificant sun, in an insignificant part of our galaxy, which lies in an insignificant part of our universe. We are insignificant specs of cosmic dust.

Yet we are conscious, thinking and dreaming entities, who are creative, inventive, and future focused. It’s unlikely that we are the only beings capable of this in the universe, but it is likely we will be extinct before we meet any other beings as capable of thinking and creating like us… or destroying like us. To the earth, our cities are like parasites. We have created weapons of mass destruction. We consume natural resources at an alarming rate. We have caused the extinction of countless species. We have had a significant impact on our planet.

We are showing our significance in the ugliest of ways. Perhaps we should think about being a little more insignificant, because at this rate, it’s unlikely that we’ll be around as a species for any significant amount of time.

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2 thoughts on “Significantly Insignificant”

  1. Aaron Davis

    David, this reminds me of a piece by Peter Brannen on the same topic. He states:

    If, in the final 7,000 years of their reign, dinosaurs became hyperintelligent, built a civilization, started asteroid mining, and did so for centuries before forgetting to carry the one on an orbital calculation, thereby sending that famous valedictory six-mile space rock hurtling senselessly toward the Earth themselves—it would be virtually impossible to tell. All we do know is that an asteroid did hit, and that the fossils in the millions of years afterward look very different than in the millions of years prior.

    1. datruss

      I love this idea Aaron,
      “So long and thanks for all the fish,” also comes to mind.
      Also, when you look at some of the science behind the alignment of pyramids around the world, and even the suggestion that some of these cities were powered (conjecture more than scientific fact)… There are many reasons to believe that there were advancements in understanding from over 4,000 years ago that far exceeded what humans of 2,000 years ago understood. How much knowledge has been gained and lost before our recorded histories of the last few thousand years?

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