Oh sure, some Asians wandered across a bridge to Alaska. Maybe some Polynesians sailed all the way across the Pacific (quite a feat!). Vikings settled all over the place. And of course that dope thought he was in Asia.
Yet he was an Explorer. An explorer doesn't need to find something first. They merely need to find it, themselves, without a map telling them it is there. To suggest otherwise would mean that it is impossible to explore, or at least to know we are doing so. Much of the Earth has been seen before, by someone. Maybe aliens have seen it all, and the rest of the universe. There may be nothing that has never been seen before by conscious minds.
New is relative. New is new to a person. Columbus found a land that was new to him. It was new to Portugal. Of course he didn't quite know it yet, but someone else figured out what it was, and for that person it was new.
On the flip side, you can't explore something if someone just handed you a detailed map of it. That's tourism. Throw out the map and wander, see what you find, and then you are an explorer. Maybe it's not the most exciting exploration ever, but it is exploration, for it is discovery done by you.
Yet he was an Explorer. An explorer doesn't need to find something first. They merely need to find it, themselves, without a map telling them it is there. To suggest otherwise would mean that it is impossible to explore, or at least to know we are doing so. Much of the Earth has been seen before, by someone. Maybe aliens have seen it all, and the rest of the universe. There may be nothing that has never been seen before by conscious minds.
New is relative. New is new to a person. Columbus found a land that was new to him. It was new to Portugal. Of course he didn't quite know it yet, but someone else figured out what it was, and for that person it was new.
On the flip side, you can't explore something if someone just handed you a detailed map of it. That's tourism. Throw out the map and wander, see what you find, and then you are an explorer. Maybe it's not the most exciting exploration ever, but it is exploration, for it is discovery done by you.
3 comments:
This is one of the most subtle, brilliant take-downs of an MMO feature I've ever seen.
If you want to explore, How much more fun would it be to make your own map, rather than just revealing parts of a pre-completed map.
Oh, and by the way, St Brendan the Navigator was the first documented person to reach America. Long after all those undocumented Asians. St Brendan was looking for Paradise. They since put up a parking lot.
@Azuriel: Thanks!
@Dàchéng: I'll add that to the resume of the Irish, right after saving civilization. Some people might regard paradise as convenient parking.
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