“The Overview Effect”
Would that we’d all be so lucky on such a pale and blue a dot as this
I‘ve been thinking and reading more globally lately. Sorry.
[Not sorry.]
In less than a month now, and if we were wise, we would commemorate an anniversary of sorts, then take a proper moment, in silence, to experience awe yet again, the likes of which was experienced by billions around the globe when the above photo was shared world-wide just after it was taken 55 years ago. On December 24, 1968, Christmas Eve of that year, a most tumultuous year that saw the assassinations of both Martin Luther King, Jr., and Bobby Kennedy, the world was given a photograph by Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders that has since been considered one of the most popular and important photographs of all time. THE very first full color photograph of our planet taken from a distance at which the entire planet could be seen. Kind of the ultimate selfie, if you will! It’s been titled “Earthrise.” You’ve likely seen it before, but we should just as likely see it anew. In fact, we should be compelled to see it anew. So consider yourself compelled.
Because the Earth in that photo is not the same Earth of today.
If we, as a collective species, fully comprehended the consequences of our current way of living on it, we would no longer spend a single minute in petty conflict with others (note: all conflict is petty when one gets right down to it). War among our fellow humans would cease to exist. Instead, every single resource we have would be spent, in a unified, “universal” effort, toward taking care of the only thing we have that takes care of us.
But that is obviously a dream.
There Is NO Plan(et) B
A phenomenon occurs, even to this day, with any human who has the experience of orbital space flight. This was first noticed in the 1970’s among the early Gemini and Apollo astronauts to the extent that the psychological phenomenon was given a name: “The Overview Effect.” It seems a majority of astronauts “came back to Earth” fundamentally changed. Like, profoundly changed. They were (are) privileged to experience Earth in a manner no single other organism had ever experienced, ever, going all the way back to the birth of the universe itself. They were privileged to see a planet without seeing humans on it.
And they saw its fragility.
From space, looking back toward Earth, there are no human-contrived divisions seen; there are no countries, no states, no ideologies, no religions, no economics and, for certain, no politics. There are no Democrats or Republicans or Catholics or Jews or Palestinians or Russians or Ukrainians. There are no presidents or dictators or kings or princesses or prime ministers or popes or imams or peasants or business tycoons or homeless veterans. There are no generals or billionaires or victims of war; no mothers or fathers or sons or sisters; no celebrities or superstars; no liars or truth-tellers. For that matter, there are no retired principals or hop farmers or firefighters or golfers or vegans or carnivores or pet Yorkies or Seahawks. There aren’t even saints or sinners…
…seen from space.
There is only this one, small, “pale blue dot,” floating in the vastness of a space so dark and so immense that from the vantage point of a lunar module coming ‘round the orbital bend in late 1968, was seen and captured for the first time ever the most fragile, lonely, singular, and extraordinary of places. The ONLY known object, among the trillion quadrillion plus objects in all the Universe, where life as we know it exists.
And on that singular dot, this singular dot beneath us right now, there are ONLY Earthlings. A place on which we are all the same.
Fundamentally.
If and when we think we are a patriotic American or Russian or Mexican or German, or immigrant or Catholic or Jew or Muslim, or athlete or couch potato or Independent or Mariner fan, or whatever lame and transient title we want to consider to be a part of our identity, we’d be wrong. None of that really matters when taken into consideration from the vantage point of space; a vantage point we should all be so lucky to have experienced, if only vicariously—aka the “Overview” view of a vantage point.
‘Cuz maybe things would then be different.
Heck, when you truly get down to it, none of that really matters even when taken into consideration from the vantage point of right here, right now! Forget all points extraterrestrial. None of that truly matters; we only think it does.
Every single thing, every single human who has ever lived or who will ever live, is Native to only one place. THIS place. Every single living organism that has ever been alive (and to our current knowledge, will ever BE alive), is an Earthling. Not a single one of us is an immigrant to the only place that truly matters. The place that was the focal point in “Earthrise.”
When we screw this place up enough, and we are, we have no other place to go. Astronauts and cosmonauts know this in their bones because they’ve seen first hand (first eyes?) there is no other place—we have no Planet B to fly ourselves to in the next cosmic neighborhood over yonder. And when they, the astronauts, land back on land, and all those human-made contrivances surface back into perception, quite a few are known to experience a profound melancholy, if not even depression. “The Overview Effect” is a sobering and sorrowful psychological phenomenon.
Sobering because the collective “we” don’t even know how bad we are making things for ourselves. Instead, we invent things to distract and delude us from a dying planet we, ourselves, are killing.
[Check that—FULL STOP. It’s not the planet we’re killing. Earth will long “survive” all life currently inhabiting it. It’s not the planet that is dying. Most just don’t know, or care to know, what is.]
But Here’s The Thing
We shouldn’t have to get ourselves into space to manifest and nurture “The Overview Effect” in ourselves—sobering as it is. All it takes is imagination. All it takes is will. All it takes is understanding. All it takes is choice.
Maybe that’s a dream too.
But I don’t think it is. It’s an Alchemy of our collective journeys. As spiritual beings manifested physically as Earthlings, the only way known that the Universe can be conscious of itself, it is a part of our chemistry, our Alchemy, if not our destiny that could be available to us should we only choose, to imagine differently. If we allowed ourselves to fall so deeply into the darkness of despair and depression while living on this “dying” planet, and rely solely on a false sense of hope (all hope is false btw—more on that in a later post) to save us from ourselves; or worse, continue to just allow ourselves this ongoing fog of deception and delusion believing that what we choose not to see won’t harm us, we’d forget we were also born with a sense of agency to make our way differently. It is also a part of our Alchemy to BE different when a difference would make all the difference for ourselves and for each other, for all other Beings—human and non-human alike: a difference, in fact, down to the seventh generations. Unlike being an astronaut, it’s not rocket science.
All it takes, I think, is a new perspective that can be found…
…in a simple photograph.
And it can begin right now with the next person you see. Never, NEVER underestimate the life-changing, life-affirming, life-giving, life-saving, life-sustaining power of a smile, a kind word (or three), or a hug. The world, our world, our Planet A, (we), need more hugs. THAT’s our agency. THAT is our way through; our Alchemy, THE journey. But we have to choose.
See? It’s really not rocket science.
(Oh, and you could also plant a tree, use just a little less plastic, and turn off some lights. That’s not rocket science either.)
[This is worth your time, I promise. Who knows, it might just make a difference.]
Always and Ubuntu,
~ k
🌎
PS: RIP and Godspeed Carl Sagan.
“From this vantage point, our obsession with nationalism is nowhere in evidence. We are too small on a scale of worlds. Humans are inconsequential; a thin film of life on an obscure and solitary lump of rock and metal. [It] has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the only home we’ve ever known, the pale blue dot.”
~ Carl Sagan (b. Nov. 9, 1934 - d. Dec. 20, 1996).
Hi Kert, this is profoundly beautiful and important -timely too. Thank you! Lisa
Thank you Lisa!