When we lost the dark, we lost a lot
We lost much more than we realize when we lose the night sky.
We lose the secrets to agriculture. We lose the cultural heritage of untold generations of our ancestors. We lose the indigenous knowledge of today. We lost inspiration. Stories, myths, heroes, and creation knowledge. We lost our bearings. We lose the power of navigation that steers us and the stars. We lose all the wisdom of migrating animals, their patterns and habitats, their connections to us. We lost the plants that those animals and we depend upon for food, and quality of life.
Most of all, we lost inspiration.
We moved indoors and into cities around 200 years ago. We are still moving. Migration, of animals, plants, and especially people is moving toward urban areas — and light pollution — as the world warms.
In time, a red giant will consume us all
No, it’s not just an angry red-faced tyrant this time.
Our middle age sun will envelop us someday.
It will get even hotter than this brief episode of global heating! I think the all-encompassing red giant phase is scheduled for about 500 billion years from now, so don’t worry. Just trouble yourself with those things you can affect — like your daily kindness, or consuming less of our priceless home planet. And among what you should be determined to protect is the sacred night sky.
Another way to look at our place in the universe is to observe all those suns, know there are other worlds and beings out there, indulge yourself in the star-stories that human beings have forever created. But we must remember we make up most of the stories, even as we admire the wonder, beauty, and inspiration.
We may obscure the stars with all our tech-bro pollution and satellites, but we cannot dim the actual stars. Day and night, they shine.
No matter what glare is blinding us from seeing it, the lights are on.
Just knowing that can be comforting in these troubled times. Consistency and certainty — for knowable things — can boost a sense of security.
Enlightenment, and the scientific revolution(s) and new discoveries, are named for light and orbiting for that reason. Knowing things lets us know better and do better.
Even the climate crisis let’s us know that we can learn to move in different spheres if we all make the effort.
Disconnection and reconnection
Lately, we disconnected from the stars. We separated from the sun, moon, and sky. It took our slow and timid forays into agriculture, industry, and urban arrogance to separate us. We moved indoors and invented waste. Light itself is a waste protect of our burning of fossil fuels. We dump it into waters, earth, and skies.
Now, watching what communication and technology brings us should inform us even more. We need a balance.
Once, we even chose rigid hierarchy in many situations, including the divine right of kings, or mandate of heaven. We looked to the heavens — the skies — and that is instructive to know something about our human nature.
An elite found racism, sexism, and faith easy to manipulate.
Now, there are genuine worries about our technology, but also our faith in that, too.
Inventing glowing screens and putting all our literal and figurative energy into them may prove our undoing, but we’ll likely persist until we know better. Maybe AI will be disastrous, but it’s more likely we’ll suffer from some other things we don’t see coming.
The skies are like wildlife. We used to know them. Follow their timing, rules, and moods.
We used to follow herds, read moons, cycle seasons with star and planetary positions, navigate, and see the sprawling swirls above us. It must have been beyond wondrous to share these as small bands of cohesive neighbors. Ever so slowly, Gods and Goddesses were suddenly set above us, rather than all around us in plains, rivers, forests, and snowfields.
But, now that we are separated, it is more vital than ever to keep realizing in our darkest times (ablaze with too many global lights on and far too much combustion burning) that the lights out there are still on and life is the greatest miracle of which we know.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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From The Good Men Project on Medium
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