For me, perhaps the most beautiful thing about the Arts, whether they be dramatic, musical, sculpted, or painted on the ceiling of a place regarded as supremely holy, is that they have the might to penetrate to the very essence of our being; our very souls. They cause us to question ourselves, the meaning of our lives, our ultimate mortality, and what exactly is the experience of being human? They have the capacity to transcend the exiguous barriers of race, culture, and nationality which, in our fear, we have constructed to divide ourselves from the beautiful spirit of our fellow creatures. And in the world of the motion picture arts, the genre which challenges me personally to ask the deepest and most profound questions about my existence, is Science-Fiction. For it is here, above all other genres, that our imagination can take us to the final frontier, and touch the extremes of experience from our greatest dreams, to our darkest nightmares. From the city on the edge of forever, to monsters from the id.
On the news recently I heard how NASA, the space agency, had announced that the Kepler Space Telescope had identified an ‘Earth-type planet’ in the ‘habitable zone’ of its solar system. In simple English this means it's not so close to its sun as to be ‘well done’; and not so far away as to be ‘medium rare’! Which means it could have liquid water and possibly have evolved life. It also opens up the great Sci-Fi scenario of humans perhaps migrating one day to another planet; (although given the mess we've made of this one, I personally hope we evolve a little more before we make the journey). What I found so striking in the report is that this supposed planet is orbiting Proxima Centauri, the sun which is closest to our own, and at just 4.25 light years away it is actually on our cosmic doorstep. A doorstep which, with our current technology, it will take 81,000 years to reach in light traffic. That is to our closest neighbour sun, in a galaxy of over 200 billion suns. And beyond that, Andromeda, the nearest galaxy to ours, is 2.537 million light years from Earth; and there are some 10,000 galaxies that we know of. It was this meditation which reminded me of an old and truly iconic Science Fiction film, and the profound and wonderful soliloquy with which it was ended...
“I was continuing to shrink, to become... what? The infinitesimal? What was I? Still a human being? Or was I the man of the future? If there were other bursts of radiation, other clouds drifting across seas and continents, would other beings follow me into this vast new world? So close - the infinitesimal and the infinite. But suddenly, I knew they were really the two ends of the same concept. The unbelievably small and the unbelievably vast eventually meet - like the closing of a gigantic circle. I looked up, as if somehow I would grasp the heavens. The universe, worlds beyond number, God's silver tapestry spread across the night. And in that moment, I knew the answer to the riddle of the infinite. I had thought in terms of man's own limited dimension. I had presumed upon nature. That existence begins and ends in man's conception, not nature's. And I felt my body dwindling, melting, becoming nothing. My fears melted away. And in their place came acceptance. All this vast majesty of creation, it had to mean something. And then I meant something, too. Yes, smaller than the smallest, I meant something, too. To God, there is no zero. I still exist!”
Made in 1957, ‘The Incredible Shrinking Man’ has an immortal place in Sci-Fi history, and whilst the special effects show their age, the strange cloud, the doll’s house and the family cat live long in my memory. And I shall never forget the pounding in my chest as, watching it for the first time as a boy, I saw the scene where Grant Williams first encounters the spider!
As I heard and read about the discovery of the new planet on the news, I was once again left in awe at the unbelievable size of God’s Creation, left with the questions of where it ends, where it begins, and left with the humility of appreciating just how small I am, and how my human lifespan is but the blink of an eye in the timescale of cosmic history. But like the incredible shrinking man, I'm here, and however small or brief my moment in the universal story, I mean something…
To God there is no zero. I still exist!
On the news recently I heard how NASA, the space agency, had announced that the Kepler Space Telescope had identified an ‘Earth-type planet’ in the ‘habitable zone’ of its solar system. In simple English this means it's not so close to its sun as to be ‘well done’; and not so far away as to be ‘medium rare’! Which means it could have liquid water and possibly have evolved life. It also opens up the great Sci-Fi scenario of humans perhaps migrating one day to another planet; (although given the mess we've made of this one, I personally hope we evolve a little more before we make the journey). What I found so striking in the report is that this supposed planet is orbiting Proxima Centauri, the sun which is closest to our own, and at just 4.25 light years away it is actually on our cosmic doorstep. A doorstep which, with our current technology, it will take 81,000 years to reach in light traffic. That is to our closest neighbour sun, in a galaxy of over 200 billion suns. And beyond that, Andromeda, the nearest galaxy to ours, is 2.537 million light years from Earth; and there are some 10,000 galaxies that we know of. It was this meditation which reminded me of an old and truly iconic Science Fiction film, and the profound and wonderful soliloquy with which it was ended...
“I was continuing to shrink, to become... what? The infinitesimal? What was I? Still a human being? Or was I the man of the future? If there were other bursts of radiation, other clouds drifting across seas and continents, would other beings follow me into this vast new world? So close - the infinitesimal and the infinite. But suddenly, I knew they were really the two ends of the same concept. The unbelievably small and the unbelievably vast eventually meet - like the closing of a gigantic circle. I looked up, as if somehow I would grasp the heavens. The universe, worlds beyond number, God's silver tapestry spread across the night. And in that moment, I knew the answer to the riddle of the infinite. I had thought in terms of man's own limited dimension. I had presumed upon nature. That existence begins and ends in man's conception, not nature's. And I felt my body dwindling, melting, becoming nothing. My fears melted away. And in their place came acceptance. All this vast majesty of creation, it had to mean something. And then I meant something, too. Yes, smaller than the smallest, I meant something, too. To God, there is no zero. I still exist!”
Made in 1957, ‘The Incredible Shrinking Man’ has an immortal place in Sci-Fi history, and whilst the special effects show their age, the strange cloud, the doll’s house and the family cat live long in my memory. And I shall never forget the pounding in my chest as, watching it for the first time as a boy, I saw the scene where Grant Williams first encounters the spider!
As I heard and read about the discovery of the new planet on the news, I was once again left in awe at the unbelievable size of God’s Creation, left with the questions of where it ends, where it begins, and left with the humility of appreciating just how small I am, and how my human lifespan is but the blink of an eye in the timescale of cosmic history. But like the incredible shrinking man, I'm here, and however small or brief my moment in the universal story, I mean something…
To God there is no zero. I still exist!
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