On Being Human: To Confess Not Knowing Everything, and Never Will.
There are so many extraordinary discoveries created by humans. There are so many innovations in the fields of science and technology. It is the Internet, electricity, penicillin, atomic clocks, periodic table, fiber optics, and so on. We humans go to the moon, we humans find steam engines, we find binary codes for computers, and then we plan to create civilization on Mars. Many great discoveries have changed the way we behave and look at the world and the universe. What previously seemed impossible became a reality. Give us self reflection whether we really have a limit of intelligence or is it just a myth. These things challenge us that maybe everything out there must have an answer, maybe it's only a matter of time.
Humans have essentially existed on this earth for millions of years, exactly 2.8 million years ago the first human being has existed on earth known as Homo Habilis. On the other hand, modern human physically only appeared 200,000 years ago. The interesting fact is, of the 4.51 billion years of the earth's age, 2.8 million years of human age, and 200,000 years of physical modern human age, the significant process of the development of the intelligence of new human civilization was truly striking when humans discovered and developed agriculture 12,000 years ago. As a result of changes in the pattern of life of people who switch to agriculture, the less physical abilities and working time needed. This prompted humans at that time to switch to developing other specialties which eventually led humans at that time to the first human civilization. The development of human knowledge as a group that is so rapid, brings human to what and who we are today that began 500 years ago, it is the generation of the scientific revolution. This is the time when scientists emerge. They are mathematicians, astronomers, physicists, technicians, and chemists, who are gradually changing our understanding of the world and also bring us to an industrial revolution that shapes modern society that we live in today.
Now, here we are. Modern Human, Homo Sapiens who will turn into Homo Deus as Yuval Noah Harari said. For this moment we live in the most futuristic era that humans have ever experienced. We seem so unbelievably smart. Scholars throughout the world contribute countless scientific publications each year, in fact 2.5 million new scientific papers are published each year. 21st century science is overload and we are so optimistic about everything.
To consider this, it is selfish to say that perhaps the questions that we cannot answer right now will not be able to be answered forever. Look at the computer for example, no one will ever believe that there will be a device where you will be able to do everything, and now we have it in our pocket.
Here's a surprising fact, what humans have been discovered is just the use of the concepts that have existed before in nature. And what is in nature itself, the basic law of the concept that is in there, is a mystery that humans may, or even are facts, will never know.
For a simple start, think this! Look at objects around you, and focus on one object. Think about what constitutes that object? The object is matter. The matter is an arrangement of molecules made of atoms, and atoms are something that is created from basic molecules we known as subatomic particles, namely: protons, neutrons, and electrons. This protons, neutrons, and electrons, also made of smaller things we known as quarks. Think about this, if these smallest particles are the smallest things that have ever existed, then what are they made of? And if someday humans will find a way to divide and find particles making up the basic particles, then what constitutes the constituent of these basic particles? Isn't that probably the way it is in the universe? Isn't that proof that humans are created to have capacity limits?
To make it even more confusing, why does "matter" do so? Why are protons and neutrons are packed together? Who mobilized and programed them like that? And how can such an absurd set of "things" gather together and form "matter" which has the awareness and ability to feel the world, namely life, thing that have consciousness. Then, what is life? Why atoms in the body somehow form formed as it is. Why is eyes shape eyes, and lips, and liver? Why do we humans look like the way we do? Perhaps you would say this is the result of a long evolutionary process, and this random process somehow leads us to the best features of all living things that have ever lived on earth. Natural selection is no longer a 'working hypothesis of Evolution". It is the single verified truth. Although evolution is an indisputable truth, because we are currently evolving and will continue to evolve, and there is a lot of physical evidence out there that can prove the evolutionary process, there is still one unanswered question from all of this, "If we are living beings, who are conscious and able to think, why do we realize that we are living? Even though we are only a collection of dead objects which in time replace themselves?" All this "matter" that shapes us, they are just inanimate objects that somehow create life. And at some point in life, every 7 to 10 years we have become new people in a biological process, because in that time, every cell in your body has been replaced by a new cell. But somehow you is still you, and we are aware of that. Nobody knows what consciousness is, it it just there and we doesn't know what and why. For centuries scientists and philosopher tried to answer this question. We believe that consciousness is an activity that originates in the brain. Neurobiologists and scientists map the brain and try to find out the activity in it. But in the end we don't know anything. This question is also a simple gate to become a more spiritual human being, because maybe out there, somewhere, there is something big, the creation of the universe.
Law of physics, or the way the universe is, will never change, but our understanding. Even though we come up with lots of ideas about the universe, In the end many of these ideas questioned his own success. It is not because we have no other way to solve it, but it seems that the universe has other ways to make it unanswered. We don't know what is the true nature of everything. To discuss and study this universe deeper, is an endless tiring activity, but fortunately, humans are attracted to it, as if it were a puzzle game waiting to be solved. If humans find ideas or theories that are not right, then humans will come up with new stories amd ideas. The more we learn, the more complex everything becomes. For example, to find out the true nature of reality, we humans came up with String Theory, but in the end mathematicians discovered many theories on String theory not working in the universe we live in, three-dimensional universe. So, in the end, even though this theory has given us a little idea of how the universe works, we cannot answer the answer because the universe has tried to frustrated our efforts.
Another case that is more questioning human ability is how we as individuals feel and perceive the world and how other individuals or other living things feel and perceive the world. Think about this, how do dogs see the world? Do ants talk about humans destroying their nature? How do dolphins see us humans? Do they see us as only predatory species living in different contexts? For centuries we humans have tried to solve this question. A simple example is color. The truth is, the colors that we can see in this world may be only a small part of the colors that exist in the universe. Our eyes are only capable of processing several visible electromagnetic waves which we call color. Try to imagine how many colors there are in the universe that we will never be able to see. Another astonishing question is how different individuals feel the color. Is the blue seen by one person the same as the blue experience seen by other people? Or if someone is partial color blind, does he see green as green? Or does he experience green at different intensities?
To summarize, there are many other things is this universe that have no answers. Maybe for now, or perhaps, if you really think, never will, because the limit is present along with the universe itself. Why do we dream? Do we have free will? What is time? What is on the other side of the Mobius Strip? Is time real? Why can we see the past, but not with the future? Then, if light waves that enter the eye take time in the process of reflecting light and processing light information in the brain, do we live in the past? What is the universe before the Big Bang? Does God exist? Where is the center of the universe? Where is the boundary of the universe? What happens after death? What is energy? All these questions, and millions of other questions, and a bunch of stuff thay we don’t know we don’t know. It is limitless, has no end. Leave the universe alone, whatever is on the earth, many of which we cannot reach. We humans are very fragile. There are lots of things out there, a very very unreachable big universe, countless stars, and we can’t even deal with our self emotion. We ask who we are, because we don’t know. Nobody knows everything. To be human is to confess that we will never know everything, and never will. And therefore, everything will mean nothing in the end, it must be a reflection for us, that life is too short, the meaning of life is individual creation. For that, we will understand, everything that will be of no use, all regrets mean nothing, all sins will be redeemed in the end. We exist too much in the minds of others, and even nobody have any idea, everyone is lost too. We must learn to celebrate the smallness of our lives in the face of something great, to accept that nothing will mean anything, except for yourself and your life experience.
