The Terrors of Outer Space and Deep Time
Consciousness is the root of cosmic horror
Each of the familiar dimensions of physicality is a source of terror when taken to its extremes, from the unimaginable gulf of outer space to the primordial and futuristic depths of time.
But when we imagine these cosmic horrors, we’re often tantalized by visions of inhumanity transpiring far away or in the distant past or future. We draw up a dichotomy between the comforts of home and the alienness of what’s potentially distant and unknown.
All that exists we used to mistake for our home, because in our naïve self-assurance we had no concept of that which fully outstrips our comprehension. What there was to know was encompassed by what we sensed and intuited, as in the animistic and polytheistic personifications of nature, and the earth beneath us was deemed cosmically central because of an illusion of perspective.
Thus, there was no cosmic horror because there was no humiliating conception of outer space or deep time. Then we discovered that ours is just one of many star systems, and that our time to shine in history is only one sliver of a vast evolutionary history of life.
