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There's a quote from a commencement speech by scientist and astronomer Carl Sagan (one of my many idols), just a hair on the outside of 7 months before his death in 1996 wherein he famously referred to the Earth as a "Pale Blue Dot", with a composite photograph taken by the space craft Voyager1 in 1990 from 3.7 billion (with a B!) miles away for context. From time to time I re-read this portion of his speech and every time it evokes some powerful emotion inside me. It still makes me feel tiny; and along with me, it makes my problems, and in a way, my joys, feel tiny too.

Tonight I ran across a youtube video that emulates something similar, but on a much grander scale. I dare not embed it here, because the size and quality wouldn't do it justice. Go watch the video here: The Known Universe by AMNH.

The first difference is that this is a simulation, of course. By the time we could send a video camera that far out (or close to it — I guess you probably can't send a video camera outside the known boundaries of space and time) and back, our world could have been created and lived out its entire existence several times over.

But the other thing that struck me was just how much more there is than I was even considering in the context of Sagan's remarks. So yeah, we're a bunch of mites on "a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam." But even that seems big when you think that the sunbeam in question is a tiny fraction of our galaxy — more than 100,000 light-years across, which is a tiny fraction of our universe — about a million light-years across, which is a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of current known limitations of space and time (which I don't claim to even begin to understand!) — more than 13 billion light years away from us.

Ok, ok, 13 billion light years away from us is a long, long time. How long, really, though? That means that light we see coming from the farthest edges of space and time started its journey more than 13 billion "years" ago. I quoted "years" because in this scale, it seems silly to me to use a unit of measure somewhat arbitrarily defined by us dust-mote-dwellers.

So there you go. Happy Friday. You're tiny. Maybe your problems don't seem so significant now, eh?

Inspired by an email from Megan's grandfather, we decided to take a little devious twist with our Christmas lights this year…

This morning around 10:15 on the Preston and Steve radio show, they read portions of an email I sent in asking them to publicize a Facebook group encouraging people to donate money to the Matthew Shepard Foundation as an economic counter-protest to the Westboro Baptist Church's protest outside of Cherry Hill East High School in New Jersey (technically considered to be in the Philadelphia area).

I'm working on getting the audio clip from the show, but in the meantime, here's the email that I sent in.

Monday (December 7th), the Westboro Baptist Church — the "God Hates Fags" people — protested at different events and locations all over the Philadelphia area; including outside of Cherry Hill East High School in NJ.

This location is of particular interest because an alumnus of the high school — Melody Kramer — took it upon herself to set up a Facebook group asking people to pledge $1 per minute that the WBC protesters stood outside her alma mater to the Matthew Shepard Foundation (http://www.matthewshepard.org/), instead of protesting back and giving these people the attention they crave. In a matter of days, the group had over 1,400 members, pledging well over $43,000.

The protest has come and gone and happened without much incident. Fortunately, it's never too late to give!

I only hope a few of my fellow WMMR and PnS listeners can find it in their hearts to donate a few dollars to a good cause. I've included some information below.

The facebook group is here: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=214656452473

To donate specifically in recognition of WBC:

• Go to this link
• Click on, "Honor Giving"
• Enter "CHERRY HILL" under the honoree
• Fill out the rest of the form as you otherwise normally would
• If you want to send a polite thank-you note to the folks at WBC, their address is:
  3701 SW 12th St
  Topeka, KS 66604

 

I suggest you keep your messages annoyingly polite, as these people thrive on retaliation and violence. Mine was: "Thank you for helping to raise $35,000 for the Matthew Shepard Foundation through your demonstration at Cherry Hill East High School in New Jersey."

I'm told that they should be able to send me an MP3 of just that portion of the show, and I've requested it. If I don't receive it, I'll check their daily podcast to see if it's included in that, and can isolate it myself. Hopefully I'll be able to get it for you one way or another.

I'm intentionally not linking to the Westboro Baptist Church's website, as they make money from advertising, and that would indirectly fund their efforts. Instead, if you're looking for information on them, I encourage you to check the news instead. (Or search for "Westboro Baptist Church" on Google News).