4 things that amaze me (1)
This may become a series since there are around 40000 things that amaze me. But here’s what it is for this post.
1. The fact that I, you, all the people you know and ever lived, mountains, chocolate, hair, socks, stars, cows and everything else is made up of the same structures. Tiny structures we call atoms. Or even more exact, a proton and an electron. This is purely mad, it is a trillion times more mind blowing than the movie Matrix.
Here’s a real picture of an atom:
2. Is been only 20 years since the first exoplanet was discovered. Can you digest the fact that until 1992 there was no real proof that an exoplanet existed ? We take this for granted now and seems like people are not even excited at all if they hear about a new exoplanet being discovered, but till ’92 there was NONE.
Here’s an amazing picture of such a distant solar system. These small dots you see are planets….wow:
3. The fact that around us there are movies, photos, private conversations and lots of other thoughts, but we cannot feel that. Internet and radio are all around us basically, but you need special tools to interpret them. Just imagine as you are reading this post there are melodies “singing” all around you but you cannot detect them. Just pick an old radio or your smartphone and listen to them to see that they are really there. And when you use a WiFi and send a message, that message goes through “thin air”….what if someone catches it and read it ? :). Well that’s a hacker actually 😉
More than that, think about the fact that you can “instantly” transmit a message/photo/video to someone on the other part of the Earth….quite hard to believe and we take it all for granted.
This is an amazing experiment that shows how the WiFi actually looks like:
4. I am amazed by the fact that one day I will not be anymore. I am really amazed by this fact because is hard to believe. We all seem to be very busy with our daily life never realizing we will not be here for long and is no way to “get back” to the game.
That’s a pretty hard thing to swallow. But there were many other billions of people who are not anymore. You and I will be one of them. Is damn scary, but even is we will be able to extend human life and even “digitize” ourselves and therefore live “forever”, it is still very likely that we will not be at all at one point. The Sun will expand and destroy the Earth as we know it today, and also the Universe is expanding so much it will have an “end” eventually.
Is such a frustrating thought…..sad, hard to believe, complex, interesting, real…..
12 Replies to “4 things that amaze me (1)”
I enjoyed this! These thing amaze me as well. I love TROM by the way it really did help change my life. You do important work my friend and I would love to meet you one day and help in anyway I could. 🙂
Thank you Joshua!!
Regarding your 4th point, about what we call death: firstly, I mentioon that you are not the only one puzzled by the fact the your existence is finite. The funniest thing is exactly what you mention, that we don’t even notice how changes in the body’s physiology somehow get the body closer to that ”finite point”. Secondly, I am amazed by the fact that yes we may fear somehow that we are finite, but I never understood why would we fear it? Since at least according to science the body desintegrates…there’s nothing to be scared of. I’ve been curious for quite a while to know if this ”fear” of death is not somehow conditioned by current values/culture? This fear of death may also come from the insufficiency of understanding how the body works? I remember that Fresco said in one of his talks that ”Life is hard because we don’t know many things”-I asume it could apply to all the processes tha the body implies which gets us closer to death and finally die. This were just some mere personal thoughts that sprang to my mind while reading your post. The conclusion is that it feels very good to come across people like you(I’ve have known your work for TVP and TROM for a while now-read it/watched it) who have similar concearns about these subjects. I salute you from Romania, congrats on the huge amount of effort you put in the magazine and websites and although I have no technical skils(for the moment) in the technical domains, as the gentleman Joshua says below, if you need help somehow,I would help you gladly. 🙂
I once passed out when I was 11-12 or so, because of a gas leak in the house. I was alone with my grandma. The only thing that I remember was that I got sleepy and then I remember some neighbors (that my grandma called) trying to bring me back to life. Between these moments a half hour has passed of me not remembering anything at all. If I would have not been take out of the house, and I would have been exposed for a couple of minutes more to the gas leak, I would have not awaken ever again.
That moment stood with me as when I got older I thought of it so intensively and I was wondering what happened in the world while I was missing for half an hour or so (the time the neighbors tried to bring me back to life)….I realized that I missed 30 minutes of the world, complete darkness, nothing like you wake up after you go to sleep.
I thought that what if I would have never woken up…the world would just go on without me. The evolution of Internet, discovering new exoplanets, new gadgets, new understandings, all without I ever being able to taste them.
Sure, it is conditioning, but think of death the other way: think what if the world would end up in 50 years from now. Let’s say that no one can do anything about that and it will just end. That would suck big time, but the thing is, from the one that dies’ perspective, that’s exactly what happens: the world ends for him/her.
It is not about the body, it is about the mind. 😉
The way we interpret all this is, for sure, learned. I can learn to feel comfortable with all this or get scared. Right now I don’t like the thought of dying 🙂 but it is something I rarely think about as I am busy with TVPM or other projects or just learning about the world adn living.
Hmm…iti raspundeam citind mesaju’ si abea acum vad ca esti din Romania. Daca stiam nu ma chinuiam sa iti scriu in engleza :). Si io’ sunt din romania, da’ stau in Spania de ceva ani. Ma foarte-bucur sa vad ca TROM s-a raspandit asa de mult. Ma bucur si mai mult ca exista oameni care sunt mai mult ca mine decat diferiti, pt ca pana acum, pe calea offline, am dat numai peste oameni complet opusi de cum sunt io’. Da-mi un mail ca sa iti stiu adresa ta de mail si o sa te contactez daca am nevoie de ajutor cu vreun proiect ;). Daca lasi adresa de mail in comentariu o sa primesti numai spamuri. Ma bucur ca ai dat de mine ca sa dau de tine 🙂
Gata, s-a rezolvat cu e-mail-ul. Am mers la sectiunea ”Contact”. Ma gandesc ca vei primi. Am mai ”batut campii” acolo vizavi de niste aspecte ce le-ai mentionat in msj tau. Te salut, Tio. 🙂
Sa stii ca nu am primit niciun email…am verificat sa ma sigur ca merge contact-formu’ si merge. Nu stiu de ce nu s-a trimis…poti sa mai trimiti o data? De data asta salveaza-l pt ca nu am habar de ce nu a mers si poate iar nu merge. Scuze. O sa ii cert pe baietii de au facut formularu’ de contact daca e din vina lui 🙂
Scuze ca raspund dupa 5 zile, prinsa cu facultatea. Ii ”certi” pe baieti”? :))) Eh, lasa, nu e problema. Am sa mai trimit o data si eventual pot trm si pe e-mail-ul ce il ai postat pe pagina ta de FB, TioTrom. E valid e-mail-ul ala, nu? ^_^
Bun, spune ”sent e-mail”. 😉
E o conspiratie pe la mijloc pt ca iar nu l-am primit…da’ doar ce am trimis un test email acum si merge. Cred ca are ceva cu tine formularu de contact. Da, poti sa folosesti mailu’ dp facebook. Scuze. O sa imi bat capu zilele astea sa vad dc nu a mers formularu de contact ca poate ma mai contacteaza si altii si au aceleasi probleme. Asta e al 5-lea lucru ce ma uimeste la postu asta, faptu ca nu se trimite mailu’ 🙂
Rezolvat. Succes in a gasi problema. 🙂
Iti reamintesc’ca nu am primit niciun mesaj 🙁 . E posibil ca formularu’ de contact sa nu fi mers, asa ca te rog daca poti sa mai trimit o data. Scuze…
Da, se rezolva exact acum printr-un e-mail ce il scriu acum. 🙂 Nu e problema, nu ma deranjeaza sa mai dau cateva click-uri.