James Webb Space Telescope Revealing the Wonders of the Universe…and of Evolving Life Itself?? Stay Tuned…

William Seavey

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Journal of Journeys

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4 min read

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Jul 13, 2022

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by William Seavey

The first images from the James Webb Space Telescope, sent into orbit around the sun last Christmas, reveal the astounding complexities of a universe we can now see 13.8 billion years into the past.

It is humbling to say the least.

The images demonstrate mankind’s seemingly almost unlimited abilities to construct technologies that can physically leave the earth’s surface and perform capably, remotely and possibly even indefinitely millions of miles from us.

But they also demonstrate that as a species there are simply limits to our understanding of the origins of all natural phenomena (even the BIg Bang is still just a theory) and the origins of life itself.

As a species humans have evolved on a benevolent planet after millions of years into the most advanced life form capable of dominating all other life forms (and potentially causing their extinction if we are not extremely cautious).

In all likelihood there is not another species anywhere within the known universe — and certainly not within our solar system — like us. But the telescope’s capabilities reveal a universe with unlimited possibilities and that our solar system is but a very small island amidst the vast cosmos.

(If there were intelligent and advanced species elsewhere, many speculate that “e.t.” would have attempted to contact us if for no other reason than to confirm that intelligent life exists besides THEM. Yet any off-earth species, were it to be advanced enough to travel to us — or at least observe us — would probably have little incentive to— especially knowing our warring capabilities and nuclear proclivities.

And the Webb telescope images reveal how vast the known universe is and one could easily conclude that no intelligent life form would likely survive the journey to our solar system much less to our life harboring planet.

(Yet, the possibilities continue to be debated — see Wall Street Journal April 16–17, 2022, “Should Earth Ask ET to Call?”)

As evolved as humans are, we are not evolved enough at this point to be able to assure our perpetuation as a species due, primarily, to ancient and contemporary beliefs and superstitions that divide us.

Political and religious beliefs have been the source of wars and conflicts that continue to threaten our very existence. (As a current example, we have a democratic, independent country, Ukraine, being outrageously invaded by a neighbor country, Russia — all at the hands of one misguided, evil and adversarial human , Vladimir Putin).

And then threatening our very existence is the very real possibility that due to our prolific reproductive capabilities we will outstrip the earth’s ability to supply us with the natural resources we need to sustain ourselves (water, timber, minerals etc.)

We don’t know when, but there is little question this could happen one day.

And as environmentalist Greta Thornberg has said, there is no “planet b.”

We are deluding ourselves to think that there is.

The earth, even among the possibilities of an unlimited number of similarly life generating planets in untold numbers of solar systems throughout the universe, remains a remarkable “accident” of creation. If liquid water is a prerequisite to life, we have it in abundance like no other planet in the solar system. And earth has been in the “perfect” alignment to our sun (a star) to provide enough warmth to trigger a plethora of life forms that have evolved to breathe gases oxygen and nitrogen, also in abundance. (Our proclivites to poison our atmosphere with pollutants is not a good sign of our commitment to a sustainable future).

It is possible other civilizations on other planets within the universe have faced the same or similar challenges we have. But, realistically, we can never know, and it is simply up to us to perpetuate our existence, realizing that we may be truly running out of time.

We look at the Webb Space Telescopes images with awe, wonder and fascination. To be able see so many galaxies and star systems so vividly is such a privilege of living in our times. In my lifetime alone of 75 years we have gone from inventing rather primitive telecopes with lenses to giant mirror reflecting observatories — and now to a huge computer controlled observatory carefully launched from earth into an orbit around the sun.

I am sure scientists are focusing as much time and energy onto this remarkable achievement with the potential to change humans’ ways of thinking for the better about themselves and nature in general.