Captain’s Blog: Stardate 12092021.4

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As I explore the moon (nearby field) by Starbase 321 (work), I find myself thinking about the commonality I share with the objects around me.

There’s a false distinction between that which we are and our surroundings. We see the things around us as distinctively different when in fact most things have so much more in common with us than our eyes and other senses would indicate. Scientists have found that we are mostly empty space, like the objects which surround us. We also inhabit much the same atoms and molecules, especially when it comes to carbon based life. We’re just a slightly different configuration of essentially the same thing.

As humans, we are so similar it’s kinda funny how we emphasize the miniscule differences. We have different philosophies on what the main problems with each other and the world are but underneath it all we essentially want to feel the same things though some solutions are empirically better than others. Though empiricism is important when it comes to achieving goals in this realm, I’ve begun to truly appreciate subjective experiences. If my biology was different, if I were raised by different parents in a different place and time, I wouldn’t be me. The classical definition of psychology is the study of the human mind and behavior. I like to think of psychology as the study of alternate versions of me.

Thinking of people as different versions of myself makes me more empathetic to the struggles that people go through. It also makes me interested in their various views on reality and different experiences. As far as I know I’m only going to be able to live once but through the experience of others it’s almost like I get to live 1000s of times. I wish I could meet individuals from other time periods to see how that era’s paradigm shaped thier self concept and how they viewed the world. I guess the closest I could get to that is reading historical texts.

I wonder how developments in the future will shape how we view ourselves, others and the world around us. I hope we have a fundamental shift in how we relate to one another and the world around us. One day, most of our atoms will blend into that future world after we draw our last breath. Thinking about how some of the world around me now is composed of the dead makes me view the inert items around me in a different light