This is a genuine question I have. It's been on my mind for quite some time, but I recently read the very well-written and intelligent post @roelandap created(A Guide to Tackle the Four Conflicts of Life) and thus decided that I needed to ask it.
I'd like to clear something up real quick: when I say "important", I mean "affecting the grand scheme of things in some way, shape or form", and I consider the "grand scheme" to be the entire universe. I won't be considering multiverses at all, as that's still more of a hypothesis than a testable theory, nor will I be considering the possibility of a "Big Crunch" ending to the universe, as it's one of three incompatible but quite likely theories and I'd rather not make any such assumptions.
I will, however, consider an impact to only be an impact if it affects a self-aware being, because what good is a change if there's nobody to notice it?
The way I see it, you are a speck on a speck(land mass) on a speck(planet) swirling around a speck(star) that is one of billions in another speck(the galaxy) inside of a speck conglomerate(galaxy superclusters), of which there are observably ten thousand at the very least.
And yet, somehow, the overweight teenager watching movie reviews is the focal point of the entire universe.
Here's a thought: I really don't want to matter in the long run. I don't want to affect large portions of reality through one simple decision. First of all, who's to say what decisions I make have some influence? Is it all of them? The ones with no apparent consequences? The ones I don't consciously make? The ones I do consciously make? All of those possibilities are absolutely terrifying.
We know that there's a chance that in a galaxy, there's some form of intelligent life. We're an example of that. Since there are approximately 100 billion galaxies in the observable universe, let's pretend that there are 100 billion planets that support a high population of intelligent life forms. Let's also pretend that they all have populations similar to our own, for the sake of simplicity. That means that in the observable universe alone, there are 700,000,000,000,000,000,000, or seven hundred quintillion intelligent beings alive.
How many would I have to affect for it to be significant? Ten percent? That's seventy quintillion. One percent? Seven quintillion. A thousandth of a percent? Seven quadrillion. I don't want to exert any form of control over that many people.
Maybe I don't affect living or self-aware creatures. If I don't, then I'm either A. screwing with the potential of having such creatures come about or B. still not affecting the universe in the long run.
I see being insignificant as a huge blessing: nothing I do really matters. Some of the things I do might matter to Earth, but not the universe. And honestly, Earth(and perhaps our own solar system) is the only thing we need to concern ourselves with right now. There's plenty to be concerned about.
My apologies if this is a jumbled mess. I should really consider being more careful about what I post on a site that doesn't have a delete button...