 Bertrand Russell Quotes 366 |
To be happy in this world, especially when youth is past, it is necessary to feel oneself not merely an isolated individual whose day will soon be over, but part of the stream of life flowing on from the first germ to the remote and unknown future.
Source: Bertrand Russell: The Conquest of Happiness, 1930, chap.13: The family.
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The Earth is thought to be about 4.6 billion years old and life on Earth is thought to have originated (as amoeba-like single-celled organisms) in the oceans about 3.5 billion years ago. In this way, life on Earth is expected to eventually become extinct. Of course, space exploration will allow it to survive further by migrating to other planets, but a major explosion of the galaxy should send us back into a lifeless universe.
But that is a distant future that does not concern us with our short lifespan, so it seems better for our mental health to think of ourselves as ‘part of the flow of life from the first embryonic species into the distant unknown future’.
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