A piece of rock was formed 4.6 billion years ago from a collection of dust and gas known as solar nebula.
Gravity caused the dust and material in that cloud to collapse in on itself, which resulted in the formation of that rock and another, bigger, gaseous thing which is better known as The Sun.
The humans appeared on that rock 5 to 7 million years ago. They were not always like they are now. They used to be ape-like. These ape-like creatures probably began to walk on two legs in those 5 to 7 million years. As their needs grew, they started inventing and discovering new things that helped them to not only hunt but to also live. Around 3 million years ago, we were making crude stone tools. That's the stone age period. We discovered fire because we needed to stay warm and eat cooked meat. We developed different tools, language, and methods and techniques to survive.
Modern humans emerged about 200,000 years ago.
As humans have developed, they have also themselves developed a great number of things which include language, religion, tools and weapons. If there's one thing the human mind has ever needed, it's hope. We developed the creation myths, we looked up at the sky and saw the stars through which we took signs of the changing seasons. Astrology is pretty old, think 2nd millenium BCE old. It was pretty useful to humans as it told the direction, which way was north and which way was south.
It is pretty amazing to see that we have come this far. Bands of hunters and gatherers, sitting around a campfire, grunting and signing at each other, telling each others stories in their own "language". Helping each other out, and most importantly just surviving.
Necessity is the mother of Invention.
Whenever our needs have grown, we have developed countless ways of getting what we need. The biggest thing that we have developed is language. The growth of human intellect is strongly linked to that of human language. Through language, we share with each other our thoughts, feelings, and most importantly, ideas.
Ideas are something that have been the crucial element of the lives of humans. Ideas have set humans free, and ideas have enslaved them.
Religion, mythology, creation, and imagination all have developed through language. You could say that language has given humanity HOPE. These things have provided us an escape from our daily lives, lives we are not content with. They assure us that we are all part of a grand scheme, that there is, indeed, a plan ahead of us that will eventually fall into place. Those hunters and gatherers sitting around a campfire told these stories. They told stories of how a beautiful star was formed, stories of how the Sun was a God.
The humans, with time, developed and progressed as their needs grew. They wanted to have a constant supply of food and wanted to not hunt for food, so they developed agriculture. They developed writing as a companion to language. Science and the scientific method developed and we stopped looking inwards and started looking outwards into the universe. Questions were asked and answered, many remain unanswered. We even gave a name to that piece of rock. Earth.
Science has debunked a lot of things over the centuries. It has turned the so-called 'facts' into myths and still continues to do so today. That's how far we've come. Unfortunately,
For every action, there is always an equal and opposite reaction.
The third law is a bitch.
Our intellect and intelligence have indeed developed over thousands and hundreds of thousands of years, but that is not to say that stupidity has gone extinct. It has kind of "developed and progressed" along with intelligence and intellect. It's more widespread than ever before, to be honest. You could say that there was even more stupidity in the olden times, but one may argue that science and culture had just not developed enough at that time. Which is why people, being unaware of how things work, were stupid. But today is a whole new story. All the things that an individual should know about the world and how it works is pretty easily accessible, thanks to the internet and libraries. In short, there is not excuse for stupidity today.
FUN FACT: Modern humans appeared around 200,000 years ago, yet the timeline of the oldest civilization, ancient Mesopotamian Civilization, is around 3300 - 750 BCE. This is not to say that humans didn't exist before 3300 BCE, it means that the history before that period just isn't recorded.
We have come a pretty long way since being a band of hunters and gatherers. Technology has improved which means that our survival odds have significantly increased. The only thing that I look forward to now, is where will mankind go from here?
I have an idea! SPAAAACE!
It is the most probable thing that mankind will achieve in the upcoming decades, space-travel. Earth can't last us forever. With the rate at which the resources of the Earth such as fossil fuels are depleting, and with the impending shadow of global warming and climate change, I think that mankind will have to figure out a way to get the hell off of this rock in the next 100 years. Pollution is too much right now, we are releasing massive amounts of carbon dioxide in to the air each second which is causing global warming. We are in the age of evolution and advancement. In this day and age, there is a pit behind us and the stars in front of us. Now it is up to us whether we want to fall back into that pit from which we climbed out, or rise and make ourselves immortal.
Global Warming
Global warming is the worst enemy humans have ever faced. Ironically, the worst enemy humans have ever faced is made by humans themselves. Factories release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. This carbon dioxide allows the radiations coming from the Sun to pass through to reach the Earth, but it reflects the radiations coming from the earth back onto the earth, increasing it's temperature. This is known as the Greenhouse Effect.
Global warming is very, very, very dangerous for humans. And that is still an understatement. Global warming severely impacts the food production. It impacts the production of crops such as wheat and maize. It will also impact life due to extreme weather conditions and under-nutrition. Global warming increases sea-levels, which have been increasing since 1993. This results in widespread floodings and loss of life.
And all this is real. May, 2016 was the hottest month on the planet, according to scientists. It was the hottest month since we started keeping records. 2016 is on track to be the hottest year and I expect that 2017 will follow.
Global warming and pollution are the reasons why man has self-destructed his own habitat. He has destroyed his own home, Earth.
I don't think that when the crap hits the fan we will be able to recover. We are past the point of no-return and we know it. It seems unlikely that we will ever think for the environment, for others instead of ourselves which is why I am inclined to believe that Space Colonization is our last and only hope. The technology to colonize other planets is still beyond us at this moment but I think that it's safe to say that it's a lesser fantasy as compared to the Earth lasting mankind it's lifetime. Diamonds aren't forever. It may be possible that the human race is wiped out before it even aims for stars. Many threats are looming over us. Not just over you or me, but over the collective whole of humanity. It is the time that we come together, set our priorities straight and then work from there. It is only then that we may immortalize ourselves and find our true place among the cosmos.