A Big History Holiday Credo

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I just happen to find this passage of Marcus Aurelius in MEDITATIONS Translated by Staniforth, (1964) where he talks about a kinship response to the understanding of wholeness;

No matter whether the universe is a confusion of atoms or a natural growth, let my first conviction be that I am part of a Whole which is under Nature's governance; and my second, that a bond of kinship exists between myself and all other similar parts. If I bear these two thoughts in mind, then in the first place, being a part, I shall not feel aggrieved by any dispensation assigned to me from the Whole; since nothing which is beneficial for any whole can ever be harmful to a part, and in this case there is nothing contained in this Whole which is not beneficial to itself. (The same, indeed, could be said of every natural organism; but the nature of the universe has the further distinction that there is no cause outside itself which could ever compel it to produce anything harmful to itself.)

In the remembrance, then, that I am a part of such a Whole, I shall cheerfully accept whatever may be my lot. In the second place, inasmuch as there is this bond of kinship between myself and my fellow-parts, I shall do nothing that might injure their common welfare, but keep those kindred parts always purposefully in view, directing every impulse towards their good and away from anything that runs counter to it

Sounds like a Big History Holiday credo to me. 

Our Goldilocks Moment

We live in the very special moment when our story is entering our story. This is the type of circular scenario I frequently use to try and explain the profound cultural significance of Big History. When I do, it is usually met with a blank stare. So I’ve been trying to come up with a new way of conveying what I mean.

We all know the old English fairy tale Goldilocks and the Three Bears.  Goldilocks comes upon the forest home of a family of bears who are out for a walk while their porridge cools. Assured that no one is home, Goldilocks tries out their chairs (breaks one), samples their porridge, and tests each bed until she finds the ‘just right’ size, temperature, and softness. She ends up falling asleep in the smallest bed and the climax of the tale is reached when the bears come home. Wee Bear finds the little girl in his bed and cries, "Somebody has been lying in my bed, – and here she is!" Awoken and startled, Goldilocks jumps from the window, and runs into the woods, never to be seen again.

The Goldilocks story is the namesake of an important concept in complexity theory and Big History known as the Goldilocks Principle. In Big History and the Future of Humanity, Fred Spier, makes good use of the idea that complexity only emerges under certain ‘just right’ circumstances (aka boundary conditions). But I propose a different use of the Goldilocks idea; as a metaphor that describes our current predicament/opportunity.

To make my point, the story would be modified just slightly. Imagine the plot twist if Goldilocks decided to do a little light reading before falling asleep. And what if the book she happened to grab off the nightstand was the story she was in? It's a moment captured on Goldi's face below.

"The Goldilocks Moment"
© Rich Blundell 2012 - original artwork commissioned to Jason May

This is what I mean when I say that “we live in the moment when the story is entering the story.” Big History is our story and this is our Goldilocks moment. Yeah, we were young, we experimented, we even broke a chair or two. But now, as the bears come up the path, the story is in our hands, what plot twist can we write...?

Translation: HEY SLEEPYHEAD, PICK UP THE DAMN BOOK!

Three clearly connected & beautiful things

"Tree of Life" film

"Life in a Day" film

Plastic bag scene from "American Beauty"

Cosmic evolution, humanity, and mundane beauty are all part of the same story. The challenge and question is how to connect and communicate them in personally meaningful ways...

Thanks Jack!

A scientist's Christmas

Last night I was walking through Harvard Square and noticed these awesome Christmas lights hanging above the street:

Here is a spiral galaxy, complete with blue "star-forming regions"

Here, a neutron star with its "cometary knots"

Ok, so maybe the cometary knots take a bit of imagination. But actually I see a lot more than that.

In those twinkling lights I see purely rational, purely natural reasons to love thy enemy, to do onto others, cherish life, teach peace, and practice compassion - you know, all those Christmassy ideas.

When I look up and see these lights I get a warm, fuzzy feeling... Because to me, these secular decorations are the expression of a community with something grander and more beautiful to celebrate than bronze-age myths. They recognize and respect our origins as tied to cosmic events much longer ago and further away than some immaculate conception of any single human here on earth. Most people walk through the square totally unaware that these decorations celebrate the whole of humanity's emergence as an evolving cosmos. We are all divine here and now.

I wonder if this what the so-called culture warriors are worried about? That people like me will see these non-religious displays and...well and what? Are these lights, these cosmic ideas, the "War on Christmas too?"

I see them as an acknowledgment that our natural heritage extends the story and values of Christmas with an additional 14 billion years of meaning. Christmas and all that, is embedded within this cosmos too. This gives Christmas meaning that even its namesake could appreciate given the knowledge of today.

These decorations tell a story that still allows a sacred covenant - a covenant with mystery. A scientist's Christmas has humility and dignity both. It is humble enough to admit that our knowledge of the sacred will always be incomplete, without the need to declare "war" on anything but ignorance. There is plenty of mystery to celebrate and plenty of ignorance to fear - Merry Christmas.

Reposted for Christmas

What Carl Sagan gave us

11th anniversary of Carl Sagan's death post

Whether you know it or not, everyday you use what Aristotle, Hypatia, Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Newton, Einstein, etc. gave us. They gave us knowledge.

Carl Sagan stood on the shoulders of these giants of science and saw further. He gave us much more than knowledge, coalescing their science into one inescapable result; love. Do you use it everyday?

Sagan’s legacy is a love unadulterated by dogma, superstition, authority, and fear. It is literally Universal; accessible to anyone who opens their eyes, heart, and mind.

If you think of the relentless advance of science as a “great human demotion,” please, think again. Through science, Sagan courageously revealed an overlooked but wonderful paradox of humility. One that turns the "demotion" upside down. By taking us out of the center of the universe, Sagan put us back in - for truer reasons. He showed that our value is intrinsic to the universe, and that our story, is the universe’s story.

Sagan lit the way to a love rooted in truth, even if some of those truths hurt at first (which is the reason some find it difficult to accept). But the reward for courage is a new way to love ourselves, our lot in life, our planet, our place in space and time, and perhaps most importantly, each other. Sagan showed us that love does not come from outside this universe, it comes from within - from within the youniverse.

As the battle between religion and science rages on, why isn't it clear that love without knowledge is lame, and that knowledge without love is dangerous? Alone they are equally meaningless. It's such a shame that science and love are divorced in the minds of most. As a scientist, I know how gushy and sentimental this sounds. So let me try to express it in a way you critical thinkers are accustomed to:

Knowledge is power.
Love of knowledge.
To know the power of love.

I’m not sure if this is a formally valid syllogism. But no matter your stripe, that’s what Carl Sagan gave all of us; truthful, transcendent, pure, poetic, powerful, love. I'd say he gave more, but how could anyone give more than that?

Another Andromeda moment

I have a moment to report. Unlike the bitter-sweet last time, this Andromeda moment is purely sweet.

As you might know, I’m in the process of establishing a community-class astronomical observatory down in the Caribbean. It is to be an observatory to enhance an existing eco-camp program for kids, and get the island public involved in amateur astronomy. So while I’m stateside, I’ve been doing a lot of research, visiting planetariums, observatories, astronomy classes, etc. Tonight I went to Boston University Observatory’s public viewing night. It’s held every Wednesday, clear skies permitting, and I go there just to get a sense for how a public program works. Folks head up to the roof of the science center, where a volunteer astronomer runs three 8” reflector telescopes. On this clear and very cold night, there was a chatty crowd of about 25 people. The volunteer was busy.

Long Exposure Photo: Andrea Baird, BU Parent magazine

One of the scopes was aimed at the Andromeda Galaxy. Through an 8” scope, Andromeda appears like a faint milky sphere. To someone unaware of what they are looking at, it’s decidedly unimpressive. It looks something like this.

After I had taken a peak at Andromeda, I stepped aside just to take in the scene; people huddled around on the cold steel catwalk, the skyline of Boston as backdrop. While I was standing there beside the scope, two women and 4 kids stepped up to have a look. First up was the littlest one. In the darkness, and all bundled up in a snowsuit, scarf, hat, and mittens, I couldn’t tell if it was a boy or a girl. All I could tell was that this kid wanted to see! As the child climbed up the little white plastic step stool, I could tell neither he or his mom knew where to put their eye. I stepped in to help.

As I repositioned the step stool, I began telling this kid about the Andromeda Galaxy; that it was a lot like our home galaxy, the Milky Way, and that it was the biggest thing we humans could see from earth. I told him how far away it was and showed him where to put his eye.

That’s when the moment happened.

As he pulled his scarf aside, and leaned forward to look through the eyepiece, a faint white light flooded though the lens and onto his face. Time stopped and the chatter fell silent as I realized that this ancient light had traversed two and a half million years of cold vacuous void, only to land on the warm, wide-eyed, rosy-cheeked, snotty-nosed face of this tiny child. I could feel a lump in my throat as everything I know about the cosmic story - from the big bang, nucleosynthesis, evolution, and the dawn of consciousness - distilled down to this one precious moment. It was clear and vivid. Here was the universe looking at itself in a two-way mirror. Kid and cosmos, saw each other and I heard them say in unison - wow!

I don't know where the kid might take this experience. I like to think he'll develop an appreciation for a universe that's vastly bigger, but at the same time intimately connected with himself. But I do know this; that Andromeda moment confirms that I’m on the right path.

We look at the stars with such awe and reverence. But, don’t you think that if they could, they would, be looking at us instead? But of course they don’t, they cant, and that is precisely my point.

When different paths cross

For as long as I can remember, I've had this nagging suspicion, or maybe it's a fear, that I might be... different.

It happens quite often that I find myself in the blissful grip of some leaf, or pebble, critter, phrase, or idea. I look around wondering why this mundane little nibble of nature isn't the celebrated center of everyone's attention.

It's just plain true. Being so awed by nature all the time, makes one a bit odd by nature some of the time. But now that I've come to terms with my disorder, the only thing left to worry about is being misunderstood and alone.

So when I stumble upon a kindred naturalist traveler, I feel compelled to call them out - sort of as a way of saying, see! I'm not crazy! or at least I'm not alone in being so.

Chet Raymo’s website www.ScienceMusings.com is exemplary.


Science Musings is like no other site I can find on the Internet. It is difficult to even describe. To try, I brainstormed the following list of descriptors:

nature, literature, philosophy, naturalism, secular values, religion, science, romance, narrative, meaning, empiricism, art, love, language, spirituality, and environmentalism.

The terrain of Raymo’s world spans a vast intellectual landscape. But he’s inspired. His science musings succeed in synthesizing a broad spectrum of thought eloquently under the single umbrella of scientific worldview. In Raymo’s reality, only rigorous empirical science could possibly serve as the driving force for such flowing poetic reverence.

The author’s stated purpose of the blog is to cultivate the Noosphere.

“By cementing virtual relationships around the globe we make it less likely that we will kill each other over real or perceived differences. By celebrating the universality of science, we diminish differences rooted in accidents of place or time.”

Whatever his reasons, Chet Raymo is a man who has listened closely to what nature and culture have to say. His observations are woven into words that allow us to share in a simple blissful wisdom.

What the site forfeits in flash, it makes for up in intellectual inspiration. A master essayist, Raymo moulds something he’s read, observed, or experienced, into much more than mere entertaining or provocative narrative. Knowledge without perspective is meaningless, and meaning is what we need more than ever. He understands that science, rigorously practiced and thoughtfully communicated, can guide us toward personal moral epiphanies.

Science Musings realizes the most fulfilling version of science – that is, science as worldview. I am also most impressed because it upholds my personal belief that, in addition to providing valid knowledge, science must also endeavor to inspire. Without an iota of compromise in scientific integrity, Raymo shows science educators a whole new horizon to set sail for. I see his dogma-free philosophy and public platform as a model to strive for. Science Musings offers a pragmatic and spiritually satisfying worldview. If there is to be a human future, our understanding of the world will probably need to look something like Raymo's.