Carl Sagan, an American astronomer, astrophysicist and astro-biologist, compares the whole process of evolution since the time of Big Bang, about 13 billion years, to a calendar year. Accordingly, a ‘cosmic’ month is equal to about one billion years; a ‘cosmic’ day is about 40 million years; a ‘cosmic’ second is about 500 years and our human life of 70 – 80 years is equal to 0.16 ‘cosmic’ second! Let us imagine that on January 1^st the Big Bang occurs; then, January 10 – the formation of Stars takes place; March 15 – the formation of Galaxies occurs; August 31 – Creation of the Sun (5 billion years ago) – about 4.5 billion years ago, the earth comes out of the sun and goes around the sun; and after 0.25 billion years, the moon comes out of the earth; September 21 – Life emerges; November 9 – Life starts moving, eating, having sex etc.; December 17 – Life moving from Sea to Land; December 28 – complicated plants’ life, with flowers emerge; December 30 – Dinosaurs appear; December 31 – 11 PM, 59 minutes, 46th sec – human beings emerge; 7th Second – Moses appears; 5th Second – Jesus appears; only in the last fraction of a second, SCIENCE appears!!! Because we and our science are very young compared to the natural history of about 13 long billion years, we need to be very careful and responsible in our dealing with nature, which has its own wisdom. We cannot manipulate nature too much in a destructive manner; if nature loses its tolerance and limit it has to react according to its own laws. As we are the only conscious beings (at least as far as we now know!) in the universe, we have the responsibility to recognize the intrinsic value of nature. Though we are cosmically insignificant, as we are living only for 0.16 cosmic second, what we do with nature becomes very crucial, at least to our cosmic home, that is, our planet earth! Let us therefore become collectively wise before it is too late.

Prof. S. Stephen Jayard
Jnana-Deepa Vidyapeeth, Pune