Discovery
Humanity has forever had a curiosity ingrained into each and every member of its species. A quintessential part of the psyche, curiosity has been the spark responsible for our progressive inferno of discovery and endeavours. We are the challengers of fate with the courage, or rather recklessness, to dare step foot in the unknown and be witness to the potential consequences the abyss of uncertainty holds. However, it’s this recklessness — this flame of risk — that fuels us creatures, manifesting as adrenaline, and has given us as a collective, the rapid success that we hold dearly to our hearts. Whilst evolution has taken millions of years to bring us forth, we have taken only a few thousand to pave our own paths and manipulate the world to our desires. That being said, the world is small.
Everyday our world becomes less of a home and more of a prison. Once upon a time this realm was filled with uncharted lands and distant civilisations devoid of contact with one another. Explorers reached out and conquered these continents motivated by their need for resources, lust for adventure, and sometimes selfish malevolence. The Vikings once wrote of a distant territory so far and unobtainable that a man would be foolish to dare challenge the seas that separated Norway and that land, but if he should survive the maelstrom of merciless storms and salvos of towering waves, he would be granted a land of prosperity. A land of endless natural wealth and security. A land no longer at risk of war or famine; the constant here was peace. They wrote about indigenous people that lived in harmony with their surroundings having mastered the art of cohabitation over centuries. That land was America. A land of hopes and dreams.
Perhaps America was once our greatest discovery; an entire continent that ignited a new age of creation and intellectual flourishment. Perhaps once it was enough for humanity to look West and boast that this, this land of prairies and lush forests, is where our hope lies. Today, that is very different. Hope itself has become a resource, akin to the black ambrosia that is yearned for, deep beneath the oil fields of Texas and Alaska. And just like those pockets of wealth, hope is diminishing. America is just an example of one greater idea; we as people look towards the unknown for hope. We reach out into the void and hope to grasp a glint of something new that could help us. The Age of Exploration was fueled by this idea as the puritans and missionaries of Europe embarked in search of this treasure of ideology and with that came their salvation. Our salvation has now expired. Earth is no longer suitable as a stage for our pantomimes as we begin to drain it of hope. No longer are there Americas for settlers to reach out to. No longer are there great voyages to be made to distant lands. No longer is there the delightful mystery of exploration for us to indulge in. At least that is on Earth.
In the year 1990CE, a manmade construct of metal and polymers carefully assembled by the will of mathematical equations and computer models lurched into the icy-cold of space. The Discovery space shuttle carried with it a delicate instrument, though this would not be one to partake in an orchestra. From its womb of aluminium came forth Hubble; a telescope much like the ones on Earth, but bigger and much more advanced. Centuries ago, scientists like Galileo would use much more primitive telescopes to peer into the stars and observe the tenebrosity of space and all it encompassed. Hubble did the same, but instead of spotting the faint signature of local planets and tendrils of frozen comets, Hubble looked further into the abyss.
From Earth, space is merely the sky. If you’re fortunate enough to live away from the dazzle of city lights, you might see the distant twinkle of stars, planets, and meteors. Tiny objects we occasionally look up to and marvel at their beauty. Hubble took this further. If looking at the sky is like stepping into the shore of a warm ocean, Hubble is akin to plunging headfirst into the Mariana Trench. Space is so incomprehensibly dark and devoid of features to our naked eyes that to thrust one’s arm into it and expect anything is madness, yet Hubble put aside its sanity and in the eternal blackness it found that delicate glimmer of hope. The very same hope that led to the birth of the world as we know it. Hubble saw many things, like nebulae. Magnificent arrangements of primal elements that toss and turn in a vibrant turmoil, coalescing under immense forces to form whole stars born within pillars of cosmic creation. Stars that will eventually, over time we humans simply cannot understand in any way that matters, come to a stable state as planets form to battle one another for dominance of gravity and orbit. Planets that will then proceed to birth their own offspring of moons and become veiled in an atmosphere. An atmosphere that could see the creation of oceans, landmasses, and life. Our hope.
Humans once looked to the West as a distant land of mythos written to be an idealistic paragon of hope. Our age of exploration turned myth into reality and our reality became exponentially more delightful. Once again we are faced with an opportunity. We know what’s out there beyond earth. We know that Earth cannot be our grave. It’s time for us to set sail once again and venture into the abyss in search of those lights. It’s time for humanity to discover the nuances of discovery again.
