I am standing by a large lake under the midnight sky, with no moon, I can see vast clouds of stars down to the horizon. The well known constellations are a little harder to find, due to the enormous number of visible stars. The universe beyond the Earth is palpable - I feel as if I can almost reach out and touch it out to vast distances. It is obvious that we are a minor planet floating in a fathomless sea - that we are vulnerable - and that the vast bulk of creation is indifferent to our fate. That vast creation could at any moment completely extinguish us, and there would be no visible effect of that extinction, almost anywhere else. We are truly nothing - our lives meager, meaningless. The entire history of the human race - of our planet - makes not the slightest impression on this vast landscape.