The web is truly in a great place right now. Every day you can see dozens of new applications launched that required countless man hours to make. The nuances and specificity of them is beginning to boggle the mind. The sheer quantity of people on Earth capable of writing a web application is amazing.

In fact, as a web developer it’s somewhat daunting. You can have a thought like “what if I made a tool to keep track of when my next oil change comes due?” and a few seconds later realize that dozens of apps have beat you to the punch.

Sure, you could maybe improve the interface, make it prettier, promote it better, integrate it with Twitter, etc. But it seems like there’s nothing left in big chunks that isn’t a minute improvement on a small facet of something else.

Let’s skip to another subject for a second.

In 1997 NASA, in conjunction with the European and Italian Space Agencies, launched the Cassini-Huygens space probe. It had a far-reaching set of goals, most of which seemed more optimistic than legitimate. It’s track was outward from Earth- taking a layman’s tour of our solar system as it became accessible by coincidentally calculated orbit.

After near-space tours of Earth’s moon, Venus, and Jupiter, Cassini was en-route to one of Saturn’s moons named Enceladus. By this time it was 2005, and Cassini had already discovered three new moons of Saturn, tested General Relativity and made countless other minor discoveries leading to better understandings of our close corner of the universe.

As Cassini neared Enceladus for it’s second trip, nearby a faint glow was picked up around the moon. Just 310 miles in diameter, this moon is barely a chunk of rock in cosmic terms, but Enceladus clearly had an atmosphere. What’s more, it’s irregular halo clearly showed something more exciting. Something called cryovolcanism, which is essentially ice-spewing volcanoes. Amazing.

By analyzing the light given off by the halo around the moon, its effect on nearby Saturn’s rings, and it’s pockmarked surface, scientists were able to say with near certainty that the tiny moon had a salty sea beneath all that ice and rock.

It’s a seemingly minor finding, but in terrestrial terms, literally every time we find liquid water on the Earth there is some sort of living eco-system thriving within. Always.

So here we have a hopeful expedition, a collaboration of many minds, and many goals. Countless thousands of things could go wrong; many did. Despite the odds, the cost, and the time elapsed, real discovery happened that moved humanity forward.

I don’t believe you can calculate its worth in dollars. At least not today. But I don’t believe anyone rational would discount the worth of the eye-widening endeavor.

Sometimes we don’t know where a journey is going to lead. Often times (every time?) we need to set aside our ego, and turn our focus toward curiosity and wonder. What if? It may seem grandiose to compare an oil change web app to astrophysics and rocket science.

I suspect the analogy is more accurate than we realize. Somewhere in NASA, someone is designing a piece of a latch that goes on an instrument that goes on a satellite that fits in a rocket that hundreds of people have slaved over for years. Some day that latch needs to do its job, making sure that snap happens at the right time so the little lens can see that brilliant corona that lets us understand the tiny moon floating in the dusty ring around the huge planet that just might contain a few living microbes that are the very first discovered outside of our home planet Earth.

I think the problem with discovery is that it’s nearly purposeless in its beginning. But I don’t think you can discount it because of that. That tiny web app may never make you rich, it may never improve more than a few people’s lives, but it was your job to follow your curiosity and make it happen. There are many greater things than monetary reward in this short life, on this tiny planet. We all owe it to ourselves, and each other to put aside our egos, and do our small part to make the big picture move forward.

If you want more on science and inspiration, follow this article up with this video.