Who is an Aethelin?

By Nicholas Burk

Who is an Aethelin (pronounced, “Eth-ell-een”)? You are!

An Aethelin is a child of the cosmos, a being with an innate potential for brilliant understanding, far-reaching compassion, and boundless creativity.

This is a new term forged to represent our unique philosophical movement. When our founders crafted it, they were looking for a word similar to “Atheist” and “Ethics” and terms that invoke the vastness of the cosmos, such as “Ethereal.” It has roots shared with historical terms like the Old English “Aethling,” meaning “one of royal, noble, or distinguished heritage.” The Greek verb “Aithein” also means "to burn," "to shine," or "to ignite". Etymologically, this is the same root that gave rise to words like “Ether,” meaning “the pure, bright upper air of the heavens,” and “Ethereal,” a term meaning “celestial, airy, or light.” When combined, these suggested meanings paint the picture of a truly special person, a shining being of cosmic origns with a divine spark. Someone akin, even, to the angels and gods, so intensely feared and revered by our ancestors.

Children of the Stars

As one of the founders of Aethelinism, I can think of no better term to describe what it really means to be a Human Being. It’s true, we do all share a remarkable origin, far more noble than the line of any king or imagined deity. Beyond our parents and ancestors, beyond even LUCA, one of the first complex forms of life, we can trace the energy burning inside us to the Big Bang itself, the birth of our universe. Every atom and molecule within us can likewise be traced back to a time before the formation of our planet. As famously stated by Carl Sagan, "The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff."

Put another way, we are children of the stars. We share the same essence as every spinning galaxy and wandering planet. Thanks to our growing understanding of the origins of life and evolution, we now also know that we are likewise connected to all known forms of life. Can there be a more extraordinary lineage?

A Mind Like No Other

While our origins make every human being special, our minds make each of us uniquely so. When we consider how rare life itself is in the universe, we better understand how precious it is. The only life we know of is on Earth, just one of hundreds of billions of planets in our galaxy. And our galaxy is just one of about two trillion in the observable universe. Life, as we know it, is rare and precious indeed.

Now consider every living thing: single-celled organisms, plants, fungi, insects, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals, on and on. How many of our distant cousins in the animal kingdom are capable of deep intelligence? How many can imagine the vastness of the cosmos? How many can calculate the distance of stars? How many can spot the similarities between the strands of DNA from different species? How many can write a symphony, design a city, or build a rocket capable of interplanetary travel? While several highly-intelligent animals exist, they share a very short list that includes us, Human Beings.

Consider, further, how many Human Beings have experienced your personal lived experiences? How many have learned all the painful lessons that you have learned? How many people on the planet share all of your most brilliant insights, your most honest realizations, or your most sincere questions? The truth is that your mind, your perspective, in the context of the entire cosmos and all history, is special, precious, and unique, beyond all possible comparison. When we understand this, we begin to understand our own cosmic worth and the cosmic worth of every Human Being.

A Divine Spark

Based on the best information and evidence available to them, most of our ancestors concluded that powerful and invisible beings existed and had much control over their lives. As a result, our world’s mythologies, religions, philosophies, and fictions are rich with stories about Gods, Goddesses, Angles, Demons, Spirits, Ghosts, Goblins, Fairies, and other fictional beings. We imagined and invented divine beings of stunning creative power, capable of shaping worlds, controlling the elements, and knowing all things. Some of these beings even had perfect compassion and love for the people of the world. By comparison, we looked pitiful, unclean, and perhaps even disgusting. Could we ever live up to such ideals?

I believe that our creation of divine beings of incredible power, kindness, and wisdom says much about us as a species. I believe that it shows something about us beyond simple superstition and ignorance. We conceived of people better than us in every way and subjected ourselves to those ideals. We begged for forgiveness for our flaws. We admitted that we fall short of our own expectations. We confided in these beings and confessed our greatest fears and weaknesses. We begged for assurances that everything would be alright.

I don’t believe that we should be ashamed of the spirituality and religious beliefs of our ancestors, because it points to something profound and positive about being Human. I call it our “Divine Spark.” It is our sense to create, design, forge, and build. It is that drive within us to strive to be better and more. It is that instinct to go beyond what we think is possible. Our love and fear of the gods led us to build temples and monuments, statues and song. And isn’t it interesting that most of these gods and goddesses were created in our own image, as if we knew all along that these were mere projections of our highest ideals and potential as a species.

The gods may be impressive, but who created them? Who, through imagination, belief, and craftsmanship, breathed life into them? It was none other than the humble Human Being. We created the gods. The wisdom of all ancient holy texts is nothing more or less than Human Wisdom. And our genious and creativity did not end there. We have created worlds of our own in countless stories and simulations. We have molded and changed our planet in ways both terrible and impressive. We have changed the genetics of the food we eat. We have created artificial systems capable of billions of complex calculations within the blink of an eye. All this to say that we, as a species, have grown quite powerful. Now, if only we can make progress to emulate the wisdom and compassion of the gods as well.

Is the “Divine Spark” inside of you mystical, magical, or even a manifestation of a supernatural presence? No. It is something real and special within every Human Being. It is connected to one’s sense of wonder, love, grief, and moral compass. It is that push we all feel to be a better person. It is the source of our creativity, our hope, our optimism, and our ability to imagine beyond all limitations. All of these are wonderful aspects of our humanity. And all these things are very real. Therefore, it would be unfortunate to confuse the issue with talk of the mystal, the magical, or the supernatural.