Yair Mor's Blog!

This is just a small rendering test I did today. About 30 minutes work.

I’ve been working on this piece for several days, or rather several nights. I like working during graveyard shift.

For an even larger image (this one is 4960px wide, the largest image I’ve ever created!) visit the dA page here.

I’m writing this after reading this Bad Astronomy post. This is a photo of the Earth and Jupiter taken by the Mars Global Surveyor in 2003. The MGS was a spacecraft that used to operate around Mars for 9 years, up until 2007. This is how Earth and Jupiter look from Mars:

This is a crop of the original image. I borrowed it from Phil Plait’s post mentioned above. I hope he doesn’t mind.

But viewing the original image gave me one of those curious shivers I usually get when thinking of the vastness of space. Ever had that feeling? It happens when the brain tries to comprehend the size of the universe and realizes it’s really unable to. It’s like your mind gets a buffer overflow.

Pictures like that make me think of how cool it’d be if one day we could travel among the stars like they were the nearest town. Recent talks of water on the moon and plans of colonizing it have rekindled my imagination about living in space. Although cheerful images of growing up on a space colony that look like the suburb next door just on a different planet or setting out to explore new territories for the better of mankind are quickly being replaced by the dark and twisted brain of mine into something more bleak and desolate…

Imagine mankind finally breaks the boundaries of space and a whole new age of advanced commercialized space travel develops. It’s the new age when prospectors set out to explore the darkest corners of the galaxy in search of new resources. Thousands of promising mining colonies are being established wherever men can set their greedy claws upon. Sky is no longer the limit. Resources are abundant. Climate catastrophes no longer pose a threat to human existence. The future never looked more bright for mankind, which takes another giant step. But the plunge into the dark space foretells only a single morbid outcome.

Wealth corrupts once again the heart of man. Large sinister corporations become the only real authority. Men are worn off by hard work. Humanity is drawn back into the dark ages. The dark ages of space. And indifference.

Not a bright future.

In the future of the space age, there is no evil alien race that threatens to wipe out humanity and bring the people’s hearts close together in the process, bringing forth a grand adventure and a happy end. In the future space sets people apart. Families and friendships become a remnant of an obscure past. Art, books and entertainment disappear into the bleak void. Society as we know it disintegrates into the gloominess of space and machines now replace a mother’s love and a lover’s caress. Physical and mental diseases are being treated by the machines and the new man, the great man of the space age, grows into an isolated, misanthrope and egoist creature. Dreary indifference fills the men’s hearts, and the human kind becomes a prisoner in a dungeon that is the infinite freedom of space.

The only sound people hear is the hum of the engines and the beeps of the monitors. The only smell is that of damp and chilly corridors people pass day after day. The only taste is the sourness of dry blood after a hard day’s work. The only feel is of rusty metal bars that barely hold together a decadent space station.

The human kind does not need a natural catastrophe to bring on its demise. It has brought it upon itself, by setting out to space and disintegrating it’s very essence: the human spirit. The human spirit that can bring individual people together in harmony, can sparkle hope in our hearts, can balm our aching bodies and bring a smile upon our faces. But that spirit dwindles in space.

The human race is dead. Physically, it is alive, yes, but in any other perspective it has long perished. And if the illusion of meaning, once devised by great men, has waned a long time ago, what makes a man now more significant than a crater or a rock, even in its own eyes?

Yesterday, my friend Ben and I, have checked what’s going on in Icon, a science fiction and fantasy convention held here at the Tel Aviv’s Cinematheque. There was the usual cosplay activity, books and role playing games stands and all sorts of geeks wandering about. Great atmosphere. I should have taken my camera with me…

We then attended a lecture, which was part of the convention, called “Intelligence Design: the oldest science fiction” hosted by Professor of astronomy Elia Leibowitz from Tel Aviv University and also a member of the Sackler Institute of Astronomy.

Prof. Leibowitz started with an overview of how we gather information we consider to be true and how, based on that information alone, we sometimes make false assumptions about our surroundings. Based on this alone, we’re likely to interpret the world wrong. In order to understand our world as accurately as possible, we must base our conclusions on common sense and experimentations as well as the knowledge we gather.

It seems obvious, of course, but it isn’t. And that’s where intelligent design comes in. Basically, ID proponents say our universe is too complex and unique to be the result of mere random events. Evolution and science can’t explain the uniqueness of the creation of the universe, so there must be a creator behind it. It’s a false dichotomy: if not evolution, then has to be a god. Leibowitz gave the example of the watch and the shell: If the watch was made by an intelligent creator, so must have been the shell, because both of them are complex designs.

The main problem with the IDers’ reasoning is that they ignore the fact that any importance we imply on the world strictly comes from our own interpretation. It’s very easy to be impressed by the sheer beauty of a view from the cliffs and the complexity of a bacterial flagellum. Well, these are quite amazing. Nature IS amazing. But it’s not unique. Not beyond what we make of it. There is no universal uniqueness in our world. And if there is non, randomness is a plausible explanation. The universe developed the way it was, but it could have easily developed in any other way If there is no uniqueness, there is no need for an intelligent creator.

I’m not implying there is no possibility for the existence of an intelligent designer of some sort (although I don’t believe that possibility), I don’t think the arguments presented by ID proponents are good enough to support this claim. According to modern knowledge and all the evidence we have, this simply just doesn’t add up.

This has been a great evening. I got to meet a few very interesting people along the way, including a very talented illustrator pursuing a career in animation! I hope next Icon I’ll be able to participate in more events and have a lot more to write about!