Two in the morning

...is the best time to wax philosophical. Quite.

Tonight I watched a History Channel documentary about what the earth would—or will—be like after people. If everyone on earth vanished...if all at once, humans ceased to exist. (Why might this happen? Er—here we are called upon to use our imaginations.) Within a few days, every artificial light would go out. Within a few years, vegetation would smother all man-made structures. Animals would roam through the cities, except for those of the poodle variety, which would be extinct before the end of the first week.

What I noticed most about it was the theme of "once humans are gone, the earth will return to the blissful state it enjoyed in the centuries before we appeared." Because, of course, the rest of the world would be far better off without our interference. Naturally.

It's ironic how, though humanism places man as the ultimate power while Christianity does the opposite, the very act of erasing the possibility of God diminishes our worth rather than increasing it. If there is no God—if there is nothing more advanced than ourselves, and nothing exists that we cannot see or touch—then we are lucky accidents who happen to be a little farther along than the animals we eat. We live and die and fade away. The human race lives and dies and fades away, ending an existence that's pointless and abbreviated when compared with the efficiency of nature.

Life has inherent value when it's a gift from someone greater. Not when it happens by chance. Not if Man is the supreme authority.