But for us, it’s different. Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of the dot on scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner of the dot. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. It’s been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.
-Carl Sagan
CISPA Update of the Day: CISPA, the Cyber Information Sharing and Protection Act that passed the House in April, likely is headed for a Senate vote in early June.
To drum up opposition to the legislation, which would create “a ‘cybersecurity’ exemption to all existing laws,” Fight for the Future, Democrats.com, The Liberty Coalition, and the Entertainment Consumers Association have created a new website called Privacy Is Awesome. The site outlines the top five ways to help defeat CISPA:
- Call your senators and tell them to oppose the Lieberman-Collins bill (CISPA), and ask for a constituent meeting during the Memorial Day recess to help change their mind.
- Email senators offices about CISPA, expressing your opposition.
- Keep calling senators until they plan a constituent meeting.
- Donate to anti-CISPA organizers — the same teams that helped defeat SOPA/PIPA.
- Share your opposition online — Facebook, Twitter, etc.
Meanwhile, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., is spearheading opposition to the legislation, concluding a recent Senate floor speech with:
I believe these bills will encourage the development of a cyber security industry that profits from fear and whose currency is Americans private data. These bills create a Cyber Industrial Complex that has an interest in preserving the problem to which it is the solution.
Watch the full video here. It’s terrific.
(Source: militarypenguin)
Take lord of the Rings for example, there’s a lot of truth to be found within it’s pages. Can anyone honestly tell me that there is history be be found in Tolkien’s work? Just look at the maps in the back of the books, NO ONE can make that up!
(Source: ozneo)
