Nicolas Copernicus, for fear of being excommunicated by the Church, kept secret his discovery that not Earth but the sun stood in the center of our planetary system (it only became known after he died). I believe he stiffened somewhat more in his grave recently. Because science now knows: there is not one Earth, there are billions of earths in space. With this estimate (that is just what it is: an extrapolated estimate based on a sample count, the geographical scope of her research for extraterrestrial (is this still a valid word?) life expanded with a factor followed by several zeroes.
Nothing is so beneficial for the human mind as the broadening of perspective, the placing of the self in the whole. How small we are, in that whole. We àre also that whole. We’re just too busy quarreling on this tiny piece of rock to notice.
