Galactic Exploration Quotes

“The reality, though, was that stars were seething cauldrons of superheated plasma, violent and explosive, flaring up in hellish outbursts, raging with fiery storms. Their benign appearance was a lie perpetuated only by distance. The harmony and order they portrayed hid the truth, that they would crush, burn and consume anything that drifted too close. The stars, it seemed, were as much a contradiction as life itself.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Maybe they’re worried about the fourteen tons of antimatter held in an electromagnetic field deep in our belly.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“It’s typical really,” he said. “The media is driven by sensationalism. They’re interested in outrage, not understanding. People always fear something they don’t understand.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Lion skins adorned the walls in the reception area, with their feline heads roaring in silence, their fangs forever bared, their manes resplendent. To Diana, though, their glass eyes were full of sorrow. She couldn’t understand how someone could admire the power and majesty of these beasts and then reduce them to just a shell while somehow thinking their regal pride had been retained.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Death was the only constant in her cruel world within the alien spacecraft. Either she died, or they died, and yet to kill one that no longer poses a threat seemed wrong. She’d defeated it. That was enough. If she was to escape, others would probably die in the fight, but not this thinker. Perhaps he’d see the importance of intelligence and the need for compassion.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Was it worth it? Is any of this worth it? We live. We die. And for what? For this?”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“I’m not afraid of dying, Bellatrix, my beautiful star. Everyone dies. Each star fades. At least I get to choose how. I get to choose to die protecting those I love.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Would anyone remember those five that died in the initial foray? Would anyone care? Anderson cared. Apart from the crew of the Rift Valley, no one else would ever see them as anything more than a byline in history. He’d sent them out alone. They’d died alone.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Humanity was ill-equipped to handle the vastness of space and the immense passages of time that transpired within even the simplest of interstellar interactions.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“They would all die anyway, sooner or later, and when they died, they’d be replaced like a burnt-out light bulb. They knew they were expendable, and they accepted that. They were ordered to accept that they were but mere clones. Any tears that were shed were a waste. It was like crying over a broken toy. At least, that’s the way it was supposed to be, but after a thousand years of isolation, separated from natural-born humans, that distinction had faded.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“It’s typical, really,” he continued. “We’ve always thought that creation was all about us, as though the universe revolved around humanity, but we’re latecomers. We’ve arrived to find the party’s already over.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Any beauty Andromeda had was beauty man bestowed upon her. Out of that raw chaos, humanity’s only interest was in whether life had arisen there as well, to see if intelligence could have been distilled from that seething cauldron.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“There are shades of gold, strands of purple, hints of green and splashes of blue. It looks like jewels scattered on a black velvet backdrop, diamonds, topaz, emeralds, rubies and pearls. Andromeda is fit for a princess.” Anderson felt uncomfortable with Diana’s lavish, emotive description. As pleasant as her analogy was, it was the comment of someone from a bygone age. Aesthetics aside, Andromeda was just a galaxy, the natural result of immense volumes of hydrogen forming a vast gravity well, swirling in chaotic eddies, compressing into pressure-induced fusion and igniting as hundreds of billions of individual stars. The shape, the motion, the blaze of light, the compressed core, the spiral arms and the birth of new stars—these were all the result of known laws of physics. There was nothing mystical or magical about Andromeda.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Yeah,” Anderson said, seeing the expression on her face. “A lot can change in two thousand years. In that time, humanity went from the Greek astronomer Seleucus staring at the moon, wondering about the tides, to Neil Armstrong walking upon the lunar surface.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“It took well over three billion years for intelligent life to develop on Earth, and yet it has been only ten thousand years since civilization emerged. It’s been just a few millennia since our self-aware, conscious intelligence emerged as an intellect in its own right. A flame that flares up so quickly can be snuffed out in an instant.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Fear is simply the recognition of how precious life really is. It means you value what you have and you want to preserve it. That’s natural. And you’re doing the right thing. You’re not ignoring it or pretending those feelings aren’t real. You’re facing that fear with courage.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“To be afraid is to be human. It means you think, you feel, you value life. I know it sounds strange, but don’t be afraid of fear.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Am I a spare part? Something that’s been pulled off the shelf for a biological repair rather than a metal cog or a rubber seal? Is that life? Is that all our lives really are?”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Life’s funny, isn’t it?” Anderson continued. “Here we are, surrounded by the majestic glory of billions of years of galactic evolution. We’re surrounded by an intricate cosmic ballet, and yet we appreciate its beauty for what, in comparison, is just a fraction of a second. Like a mayfly, we’re set free in the universe but for a day, we’re overwhelmed with the color and diversity of an ecosystem we can never fully comprehend. Like a mayfly, we see but one sunrise, one sunset.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“His eyes were drawn to the light of the stars, and he couldn’t help think about how this one simple act had driven civilization. The wonder and awe of the heavens had propelled humanity out of the Stone Age. The pyramids of Egypt, the sphinx, the zodiac, Stonehenge, the cave drawings throughout Asia, the ziggurats of Mesopotamia—they were all the result of humanity’s desire to reach the stars, and now here he was soaring among them.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Anderson hated conflict. As he sat there, bathed in the light of billions of suns stretched out across billions of different years, the stars put his petty arguments in perspective. They didn’t care. Regardless of the blood pumping through his veins and the shot of adrenalin wiring him like one too many espressos, the stars remained at peace.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Although Anderson knew how foolish it was to recycle such anguish with hypothetical replies, his mind was drawn to the argument like iron to a magnet.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Anderson reached out and touched her gently in the center of her chest, just above the sternum, tapping his finger softly as he said, “It’s right here.” His finger lingered for a second before his hand fell back to the soft bench they were sitting upon. She smiled. “You see,” he continued, “it is not the universe or our quest to find intelligent life that gives purpose and meaning to our lives. Rather the opposite is true. We give meaning to the universe. To be conscious, to be alive and self-aware, to appreciate the brilliance of this majestic universe, is to appreciate life itself. “There’s no central point from which the Big Bang emanated, rather it's true to say, it happened everywhere. “And yet, in your own way, you are the center of the universe. From your perspective, all of this, the trillions upon trillions of astonishingly massive stars that surround us, they all revolve around you, and that’s not just an illusion of perspective.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“People always fear something they don't understand.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Not everyone is quick to embrace change. Our natural tendency, particularly as we grow old, is to become conservative, to be averse to risk, to find reasons for not doing things.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“To be afraid is to be human. It means you think, you feel, you value life. I know it sounds strange, but don't be afraid of fear.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Life is not something to be feared, it is to be embraced.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“The Rare Earth Hypothesis assumes because nothing has been found, nothing will ever be found, but there's no reason to assume this proposition is correct.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“These lives we live,” Anderson began. “They are but fleeting shadows. Our years are as but a day, with the break of dawn leading to the exuberance of the morning. We bask in the noonday sun but, all too soon, a cool wind falls, the shadows grow long, and the sun begins to set. And all that we have done is for naught. All that we are is lost.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration

“Diana understood there was a pretense that went with death, where the living mourned not only their loss, but their own mortality.”
― Peter Cawdron, Galactic Exploration