I talked about this topic in this column once before, but I was thinking about it again this morning so I decided to revise and extend my commentary. If you want to read the earlier column, do a search for my column entitled “Immortality.”
Anyway, for today…
If we were immortal, speed and distance would have no real meaning. Take it from a time traveler. A wise man named Jose Ortega y Gasset, a profound philosopher and thinker who warned Europe about World War II and the dangers of totalitarianism, said: “It is precisely because man’s vital time is limited, precisely because he is mortal, that he needs to triumph over distance and delay. For an immortal being, the motor-car would have no meaning.” – Jose Ortega y Gasset
In 2017 I wrote this poem about it:
All of it…
speed, automation, efficiency, industrialism, mechanization, rapid transit, force,
competition, special interests, highways,
agencies, bureaus, fighting,
traffic…
…derive their meaning from mortality.
Only because something ends
does it need to move faster, to be somewhere
faster.
If someone knew
they would live forever
that they were really immortal
there would be no rush.
They could walk.
The more the mass-man moves away from God, the faster he has to move. Time and distance and speed are fascinating topics. Science Fiction is mostly predicated on the idea that we will outrun our ancient myths and become… legends? Gods like the Greeks and Romans and Norse had? We can, they think, abolish God and become “gods” if only we can master the science and defeat the worse angels of our nature. The Science cult likes to bash any concept of God, but they are still trying to outrun Him and become Him. All of them are. In 2014 or so I was asked to be an advisor (or member, or consultant, or something) to a kind of secret society. Only it isn’t that secret. You can find them online. Follow them on Twitter (now called X,) and you will find it interesting. It is an outfit called The Lifeboat Foundation. Basically, their raison d’être (their purpose or reason for existing) is to find a way to save humanity (thus the word Lifeboat,) primarily by researching and pursuing these goals:
1. Building an ark (a spaceship, space colony, underground bunker, lifeboat, finding another habitable planet, something, anything) that will allow humanity to save itself if things go sideways.
2. Pursuing science as a means of preventing and abolishing death (at least their own.)
These goals are the pillars that undergird modern science. Breathlessly they will tell you that the math alone makes it a certainty that there are other harbors of life OUT THERE. But we are limited by another kind of math. Because of death and life expectancy, we can’t get far enough away. Distance is too distant. Maybe we can move faster? They spend a lot of money on that, too. If we can just move faster, they suppose, we can outrun it. We can find someplace where death doesn’t reign.
The real goals are these: Outrun death, abolish human selfishness (make people obedient enough that they don’t destroy themselves,) have fun (do what thou wilt.) It’s like a mashup of Marx, Aleister Crowley, Bill Gates, and Neil deGrasse Tyson. The spirit that motivates this movement is an ancient one, and their death toll is astronomical (pun intended.)
I’m not trying to be a downer, I’m just saying that the mass-man and his handlers really, really, really want to find immortality without that pesky idea of “God,” and they are willing to kill as many people as necessary to accomplish the task.
They have even now committed themselves to the proposition that we might all live in a created simulation – God lite – but that’s as far as they’re willing to go. Don’t get me talking about wave-particle duality, “spooky” action at a distance, or any of those things… unless you want me to.
Back to the point… only the immortal can slow down and see clearly. We’re not in a hurry. We’ll see it all eventually. Now if only my wife could succeed in getting me to stop yelling in traffic.
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Michael Bunker is a local columnist for BrownwoodNews.com whose columns appear on Wednesdays and Sundays on the website.