One of your best, Jason. Thank you for this. I have always felt the awe of space, but what a thing it would be for all of us to balance that awe with the same for the living world we've evolved among.
Thanks, Nia. That's good to hear. I never really know how these will land.
Sometimes I think there's just a little switch somewhere we need to flick to get most of us to see what's right in front of us... And then I read the news. But some switches are being turned on. So on we go.
I have similar thought patterns. There’s a lot to despair over, and then I try to focus on the job of nudging the paradigms, trying to help more people expand their idea of what is possible. To paraphrase Ursula Le Guin, the current systems seem insurmountably powerful, but so, as she said, did the divine right of kings.
It is always such a compliment to be mentioned in one of your lovely pieces, Jason. I am as thrilled as the first time it happened. We are indeed not alone.
Several years ago, I read an essay critical of the notion that these photos of Earth from space are as generally inspiring for people to care for Nature as is routinely claimed---as opposed to immersing oneself in the midst of Nature itself. Personally, those photos feel abstract to me, as that essay argued.
Thank you, Erica. I'm okay with the abstract beauty of those images, but I do think it's a risky, indirect way of reminding us to care for what's at our feet and in our lungs. Sort of a "trickle-down" aesthetics of empathy.
Yeah, I'm with you on that. They're breathtaking images, but I kind of doubt that they'll carry much weight in, say, a situation where we have to forgo a development project in order to save the river habitat of a small endangered fish that nobody's heard of. People might feel a love for Nature at the moment they see those images, but, when it comes to interfering with business-as-usual, I don't think they'll be top-of-mind. I don't care for cynicism, but I do think that's the reality.
Exactly. The overview effect more likely generates love from a distance, which for most of us doesn't translate into protesting a badly-designed dam in the next county. But an experience-based love for a stream next door might get us moving to protect streams elsewhere.
Earth day one led to my 38 1/2 years as an environmental educator and center director. It has been the cause of 55 years of lecturing and teaching, writing and being an activist. The little Blue Ball image was one of the most inspiring images in history. I hope this new image can be as effective in creating another generation of Earth activists.
So good to hear this story, Mike. Thank you for a lifetime of doing the good work on behalf of all of us. I hope you're right about the new images inspiring another generation, but I worry that it's just another image in the sea of images that now surround us. We'll see.
Incredible piece. I don't even know where to start. In my best moments, I picture Earth as a mote suspended in a sunbeam, and feel the preciousness of life, so improbable as to be a literal miracle. We are awash in it every day, but never recognize its scarcity. You've brought that to us in this piece.
Thank you, Stef. "We are awash in it every day, but never recognize its scarcity." That's really nicely said. I'm glad my writing spoke to you and the insights you already have.
You’re probably aware that Christina Koch also spent a lot of time in Antarctica. That’s might be one of the reasons she said, “We’ll always choose Earth.” She’d already had the “under view effect” you mentioned, as well as the overview effect from her time on the space station.
Thank you, Jason. I really like how this post holds the complexities of ecological thinking by acknowledging the feelings of care stirred by viewing our planet/selves from afar and also drawing attention to the damaging mindset that this kind of thinking reinscribes. I am reminded of Timothy Morton's concept of the mesh, which is also critical of the sense that it is even possible to separate oneself from the planet, others, and so on. There's a sense of purity embedded in this idea of separation, the enticing possibility of stepping away from harm, which invites a denial of complicity. If we acknowledge the degree to which we are all entangled in systems that cause harm, perhaps this will serve as a call to take action to reduce this as much as possible.
Thanks very much for all of this, Suzanne. The reality of being entangled vs. our fictional sense of separation is very much it. I'm intrigued by "a sense of purity"; it immediately brings to mind the clerical collar and the false division between mind and body. And after a moment it reminds me of the tech gurus who somehow envision a merging with a machine/digital reality while abandoning the actual reality of flesh and feather. These abstractions are distractions that we grow so addicted to, despite the consequences all around us.
Oh yes, this is so interesting. Tech gurus peddling a version of transcendence that aspires to leave the body behind rather than develop a deeper sense of belonging to the rocky, woody, watery, fleshy world. I get the sense that they feel, or at least want their customers to feel, that the body and the world writ large are along the lines of the abject that Julia Kristeva writes about; something disturbing to the kind of order (and control) that they dream of. So sad, in so many ways.
Thanks for this posting Jason
One of your best, Jason. Thank you for this. I have always felt the awe of space, but what a thing it would be for all of us to balance that awe with the same for the living world we've evolved among.
Thanks, Nia. That's good to hear. I never really know how these will land.
Sometimes I think there's just a little switch somewhere we need to flick to get most of us to see what's right in front of us... And then I read the news. But some switches are being turned on. So on we go.
I have similar thought patterns. There’s a lot to despair over, and then I try to focus on the job of nudging the paradigms, trying to help more people expand their idea of what is possible. To paraphrase Ursula Le Guin, the current systems seem insurmountably powerful, but so, as she said, did the divine right of kings.
It is always such a compliment to be mentioned in one of your lovely pieces, Jason. I am as thrilled as the first time it happened. We are indeed not alone.
Happy to send people your way, Amanda. Your grasshopper childhood and affection for clouds of insects deserves plenty of readers...
Several years ago, I read an essay critical of the notion that these photos of Earth from space are as generally inspiring for people to care for Nature as is routinely claimed---as opposed to immersing oneself in the midst of Nature itself. Personally, those photos feel abstract to me, as that essay argued.
You've hit the nail on the head here, I think.
Thank you, Erica. I'm okay with the abstract beauty of those images, but I do think it's a risky, indirect way of reminding us to care for what's at our feet and in our lungs. Sort of a "trickle-down" aesthetics of empathy.
Yeah, I'm with you on that. They're breathtaking images, but I kind of doubt that they'll carry much weight in, say, a situation where we have to forgo a development project in order to save the river habitat of a small endangered fish that nobody's heard of. People might feel a love for Nature at the moment they see those images, but, when it comes to interfering with business-as-usual, I don't think they'll be top-of-mind. I don't care for cynicism, but I do think that's the reality.
Exactly. The overview effect more likely generates love from a distance, which for most of us doesn't translate into protesting a badly-designed dam in the next county. But an experience-based love for a stream next door might get us moving to protect streams elsewhere.
I'm speaking generally, by the way. For some, those photos make a real difference.
Yeah, that's how *I* think it works.
Earth day one led to my 38 1/2 years as an environmental educator and center director. It has been the cause of 55 years of lecturing and teaching, writing and being an activist. The little Blue Ball image was one of the most inspiring images in history. I hope this new image can be as effective in creating another generation of Earth activists.
I loved the song the Little Blue Ball by Doug Wood - I think it captured my feelings. https://youtu.be/ulvz9PGjH2g?si=OJuOpJ_dEj5arBcX
So good to hear this story, Mike. Thank you for a lifetime of doing the good work on behalf of all of us. I hope you're right about the new images inspiring another generation, but I worry that it's just another image in the sea of images that now surround us. We'll see.
I haven't listened to the song yet, but I will.
Incredible piece. I don't even know where to start. In my best moments, I picture Earth as a mote suspended in a sunbeam, and feel the preciousness of life, so improbable as to be a literal miracle. We are awash in it every day, but never recognize its scarcity. You've brought that to us in this piece.
Thank you, Stef. "We are awash in it every day, but never recognize its scarcity." That's really nicely said. I'm glad my writing spoke to you and the insights you already have.
You’re probably aware that Christina Koch also spent a lot of time in Antarctica. That’s might be one of the reasons she said, “We’ll always choose Earth.” She’d already had the “under view effect” you mentioned, as well as the overview effect from her time on the space station.
Thanks, Larry. No, I didn't know that about Koch. I'll have to read up on her Antarctic experience.
Thank you, Jason. I really like how this post holds the complexities of ecological thinking by acknowledging the feelings of care stirred by viewing our planet/selves from afar and also drawing attention to the damaging mindset that this kind of thinking reinscribes. I am reminded of Timothy Morton's concept of the mesh, which is also critical of the sense that it is even possible to separate oneself from the planet, others, and so on. There's a sense of purity embedded in this idea of separation, the enticing possibility of stepping away from harm, which invites a denial of complicity. If we acknowledge the degree to which we are all entangled in systems that cause harm, perhaps this will serve as a call to take action to reduce this as much as possible.
Thanks very much for all of this, Suzanne. The reality of being entangled vs. our fictional sense of separation is very much it. I'm intrigued by "a sense of purity"; it immediately brings to mind the clerical collar and the false division between mind and body. And after a moment it reminds me of the tech gurus who somehow envision a merging with a machine/digital reality while abandoning the actual reality of flesh and feather. These abstractions are distractions that we grow so addicted to, despite the consequences all around us.
Oh yes, this is so interesting. Tech gurus peddling a version of transcendence that aspires to leave the body behind rather than develop a deeper sense of belonging to the rocky, woody, watery, fleshy world. I get the sense that they feel, or at least want their customers to feel, that the body and the world writ large are along the lines of the abject that Julia Kristeva writes about; something disturbing to the kind of order (and control) that they dream of. So sad, in so many ways.