"What are they doing!" "What have they done?!" "Why?"
We all know the answer although we don't really want to acknowledge the reasons why. Acknowledging that would be close to suicide, at least mentally, if not physically, if not both. Maybe in non-western cultures looking at the cause and effect is different, but in this case we are looking at the west and so that is one less rock to hide under. Anyway it is. We all ask, "Why are we at war?" or, "Why did the Russians usher in the space age?" or, "Why are the ice caps melting?". The truth is that these are all consequences of the human spirit. The part of that spirit which embraces procrastination and denial. The part that loves to reaffirm its worth and shun its inadequacies. It is just too hard to not do these things because they are so neat and anyway who cares about the future consequences? Its not like the future is now, or now, or now, or now, or now or....
So let me impress upon you the full futility of time travel, being someone who has experienced it. You think you can change things, make the world better, be a time cop, make things worse, control things. Well, man, that is all just delusion. "Time" is a force, maybe a force that doesn't really exist, and a force dictated by the edicts of nature and nature looks at you and says that you are a part of it, not a master of it, man. It lays its firm, tendriled organic hand on you shoulder and says, "No matter what you do, I'm going to steam roll you. I'm going to keep you in your place. You may loose a little weight and feel great for a few months, but you're going to put the pounds back on. You may think you can rule the forces of time and space, and hell, maybe you can, but I'll find a way to beat you. Your buildings will be dust, your lives will yield to their ultimate fragility, you may think you're clever, but listen here, pay heed, I've got stuff that you can't even begin to fathom, so give it up dudes. Just live, like I tell you to, yeah." Nature will put it to you like that, in a condescending tone, pat you on the back, leave some sort of poo based ooze on your t-shirt, and lope along somewhere else and say the same thing to some alien or another that has grand ideas or ambitions.
So when we laud and retrospect over the launch of Sputnik into orbit, as we pick that event to shreds, think to yourself: "What's the point." Basically it just gave us all something to talk about, to regret, to idolize, to send us drunkenly through all the machinations of drama and emotion that is the ultimate natural purpose and technology of our human race. It is all so superficial.
Editorial: Grant Matthews
Dear Earth-bounded,
