There’s a saying about how Earth becomes smaller every passing year. There is an element of literal truth to that. Each day, several hundred tons of hydrogen, helium, and oxygen leak out of our atmosphere, more than offsetting the 40-some tons of asteroid debris and other space dust that enters. But the saying is really about how technology makes our world feel smaller.
With the internet, information travels across the planet at light speed. Commercial jetliners allow us to get virtually anywhere in under a day. But as the world feels smaller, we may feel smaller still. While the shrinking world puts more within reach, our influence seems to be shrinking, too. There are plenty of factors that make us feel personally insignificant.
