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In reply to the discussion: Right-Wing Zealots Are Already Freaking Out About The Return Of Cosmos! [View all]hatrack
(59,583 posts)Science, no matter how beautiful and revelatory and (above all) no matter how grounded in reality isn't enough. It's just not emotionally appealing enough. Hallmark Moments in geology or evolutionary ecology are in notably short supply.
Science doesn't reassure you that you get to see Grandma and Grandpa again, or that you'll never die, or that you get a second chance to make up for all the things you fucked up in your life, or that you get to spend eternity eating cotton candy with Pro-Wrestling Jesus at the Pearly Gates Midway & Gun Show, or that you're really, really important in the grand scheme of things.
If what you're really after in life is among the items listed in the preceding paragraph, are you going to be receptive to or interested in a way of viewing reality that hammers home the inescapable fact that you, and I and all of us and everything we treasure are specks of dust in a realm bigger than we can even can understand? Not just no, but fuck no.
For my part, I always found the thought of our own insignificance both awe-inspiring and liberating. Once you realize how tiny you are and how short your life is, you kind of realize that life's much better spent learning about and trying to understand and enjoy this amazing place than following the chimpanzee part of your brain in a quest for power or an illusion of immortality. But then, I've never spent much time in the majority . . .