The Overview Effect: A Constant State of Vertigo.

Neil deGrasse Tyson is the host of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey I was a big fan of the original version of this show with Neil's mentor, Carl Sagan. I have always found the mechanics of the universe fascinating, so much so that I think I might have experienced a vicarious 'Overview Effect' at a very early age. Astronomy helped to shape my world view. I have always held the conviction that all matter is illusion, that I am energy hurtling through a suspension of energies, trapped by my own limited perceptions. I don't claim to know what's beyond the illusion, although it's fun to speculate. But the mystery fascinates me. I remember laying on the grass, looking at the stars when I was 11 or 12 years old, having learned that the Earth spins on it's axis at about 1000 mph, and being able with a little imagination to feel the tenousness of gravity's grip on me. A sense that at any moment I might fly off into deep space. A thrilling sense of vertigo. Then learning that the speed of our orbit is about 108,000km/hr around the sun. It's my morning habit to have a coffee in the first sunshine of the day. There's a part of me that believes I am stardust, and communing with stardust is somehow spiritually nourishing or something like that. "Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter!" to quote Master Yoda. I have a symbiotic relationship with the stars. I glanced up at the sun, 150 million clicks away and that sensation of being stuck on a ball spinning wildly through space hit me with a wave of vertigo again. I never want to lose that sense of wonder