There is no "temporary" because "unknown" is a permanent fixture in our lives.  Even the most learned people have to face the unknown, perhaps even more so than the rest of us: the more you know, the more you realize you don't know, as the saying goes.  This is what Winston Churchill didn't tell you.  Perhaps there is nothing but fear itself, but there is also nothing but the constant unknown in our lives.

To overcome fear of any kind, we need courage.

We think of "courage" as something firefighters, service men and women, first responders, etc., possess, but regular folk like us also need "courage" to live our lives: put food on the table when economy is uncertain, raise kids till they grow up and protect them from all the horros of the world, face illnesses, hospitalization, medical bills, etc.

Very wise observations, Kevin. I was just quoting Captain Kirk from one of my favorite episodes, but your examination is spot on. There will always be something unknown.

It's like the ever-moving boundary between superstition and science. Thousands of years ago, we didn't understand where the sun went at night, what causes disease, or what lightning was. As science progressed, that line kept getting pushed back (violently at times). But like you said, the more we learn, the more we realize we DON'T know.

And yes, it takes courage to get out of bed in the morning some days. Been there many times myself.

It also takes contentment. I find that contentment the key to happiness and acceptance of the unknown

One of the biggest lessons I had to learn as an adult is to be ok with saying "I don't know".

I'm with Michael. Seems like every day I tell one (or all) of my grandson, "I don't know! Go ask Alexa!" They can come up with some of the strangest questions for a 7 and 9 year old. My 15 and 16 year old grandsons have learned to just skip me and either say "Hey Google" or "Alexa"!

Yes, Michael... exactly! When I was younger, this used to drive me insane. I don't like NOT knowing the answer to a question - especially if I'm TEACHING a topic! I hated admitting I didn't know something. I wouldn't say that I made up answers, but I would sometimes "take my best educated guess." LOL. Heck, back then I got away with it because people didn't have Google with them everywhere (we're talking the 90s here).

But... the older I got, the more I realized it's OK to say "I don't know." It still drives me nuts... but now I have Google in my pocket and it's easy to find out the answer. Even sometimes when we're watching TV and something comes up like "isn't that actor dead?" Don't know? Hang on. Google it.

I firmly believe that's how most myths started. "Wise men" couldn't STAND not knowing things like I mentioned earlier: what causes lightning, disease, eclipses... so they made some stories up.

"For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." - Carl Sagan

Combining the concepts of "fear" and "not knowing," Neil deGrasse Tyson was once asked what he feared the most, and he said something to the effect of, "What I fear most is not even knowing what I don't know."

I love NdT. I watched an interview once where he was talking about alien life, and he said something to the effect of: if aliens do exist, and they have the technology to travel the stars, their intelligence compared to us would be as our intelligence compared to an ant colony. Do we stop and take note of most ant colonies? Nope. Neither would they.

That plus the whole Prime Directive thing. I tend to believe that a civilization advanced enough to develop interstellar travel (whether FTL or generational ships) has to be advanced enough ethically to not interfere with developing worlds. Stories like Independence Day and V where they come looking for resources are good stories, but water is abundant all over the universe and they don't need us for food. Protein is easy to synthesize.

Call me an optimist.

They're still waiting to see if we reach the intellectual and ethical capacity to not blow ourselves up and stop killing each other over OUR resources.

Another of Tyson's great quotes on "knowing" and "not knowing" is (paraphrasing): "Sometimes we know enough about a subject to know we are right, but other times we don't know the subject enough to know we are wrong."

In other words, it is a *higher bar* to be able to know you are wrong than it is to know you are right, because it takes often EXTRA knowledge to know you are wrong.