Category: Environment

Flowers for your Valentine

This opened my eyes; thought I would share it with you.

I know that many of the several hundred readers of Learning from Dogs are not in the USA.  But many are.  Hence me deciding, after mulling it over, to publish in full the contents of an email that came in a short while ago from the organisation Change.

Here’s that email.

Dear Paul,

Valentine’s Day, which accounts for 40% of fresh flower sales annually, is fast approaching.

Not always a sweet smell.

 

If you’re planning to order a bouquet from 1-800-Flowers — the world’s largest florist — you should know where most of those flowers really come from.

At flower farms in Ecuador and Colombia — the countries that export the most to the U.S. — two-thirds of the workers are women. These women are routinely subjected to harassment and even rape from their male supervisors. They suffer eye infections and miscarriages from consistent contact with dangerous pesticides.

In the weeks leading up to Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day, they’re routinely forced to work 80-hour weeks with no overtime pay. Attempts to form a union are met with opposition by police and armed forces.

Many retailers — such as Whole Foods and Stop & Shop — have taken the important first step of offering Fair Trade flowers to consumers who want no part of these abuses. Fair Trade certified farms must adhere to strict standards for workers’ rights, which prevents the abuses described above.

1-800-Flowers is the largest florist in the world. Yet they offer no Fair Trade flowers at all.

Tell 1-800-Flowers to join other major retailers in offering Fair Trade flowers.

1-800-Flowers uses a certifying agency called Florverde, which ensures that its flower farms measure up to certain environmental standards — this is a good thing. But Florverde has almost no labor standards: A farm can be certified even if it uses forced labor.Indeed, Florverde is owned by the Association of Colombian Flower Exporters, so it has a financial incentive to keep wages low and suppress workers’ rights.

This is the week before Valentine’s Day — more people will purchase flowers during the next seven days than any other week this year. This is our best opportunity to demand a promise from 1-800-Flowers to join its competitors in offering Fair Trade flowers. So after you sign the petition, please share this email widely and post on Facebook — do everything you can to pressure 1-800-Flowers to show a little respect for the women who toil in unbearable circumstances. The women without whom they’d have no flowers to sell.

Click the link below to tell 1-800-Flowers to make a promise this Valentine’s Day to sell Fair Trade flowers:

http://www.change.org/petitions/ask-1-800-flowers-to-offer-fair-trade-flowers-that-arent-picked-by-exploited-workers?alert_id=IiStMzHsCg_LCLOlfFAhl&me=aa

Since this campaign began, the company has emailed to tell us that it will post more information on its website about the farms that supply their flowers. But this is a far cry from selling fair trade products — and we have much more to do to make sure workers are protected. This is the week to do it.

Thanks for taking action,

Patrick and the Change.org team

If you feel so minded to sign the petition, which can be done by people outside the USA, then that may be done here.

Thanks.

What a Way to Go

An interesting companion to the World on the Edge book

Regular readers of the Blog will know that yesterday an article was published, the first of a series, looking more closely at the book by Lester Brown of EPI called World on the Edge.  That article followed on from this Post, Group Human Insanity, and yesterday’s Post, Total, Utter Madness, Pt 1.

Today, if you will forgive the emotional battering that the book and this film create, I want to draw your attention to a film that was produced in 2007, called What A Way To Go: Life at the End of Empire.

It was lent to us by John Hulburt, who lives in Payson, and holds many views that are close to the views of the founders of Learning from Dogs.  John has offered to write the odd guest article for the Blog, which is fantastic.

Anyway, back to the film.  Here are a couple of trailers.

A 2-minute trailer giving an overview of the film ..

and another one dipping into more detail.

And if you still want more, then here’s an interview of the two behind the film, Producer Sally Erickson and Writer/Director Tim Bennett.  Twenty-seven minutes long but so what.  Watch it!

We really do have so much to learn from dogs! (Before it’s too late!)

 

 

Total, utter madness, Pt 1.

The way we are most likely treating Planet Earth is almost beyond comprehension.

I have mentioned before the Earth Policy Institute and Lester Brown’s latest book, World on the Edge.  Details of the book are here.

At the time of writing this Post (10am US Mountain Time on the 4th Feb.) I have read through to the end of Chapter 5 of the book and will have it completed soon.  It’s opening my eyes hugely!

I have decided over the next week or so to summarise each chapter, hoping that this encourages many readers of Learning from Dogs to reflect, go to the EPI website, buy the book or think about making a difference in any way that you can.

Chapter One, On the Edge, sets the background:

  • Summer of 2010 sees record-high temperates in Moscow, Russia’s grain harvest shrank by 40 million tons (40%) to 60 million tons.
  • Record high temperatures in south-central Pakistan were recorded. Snow and glaciers in the Himalayas melted fast, 20 million Pakistanis were affected by the resultant flooding, 2,000 died, 6 million acres of crops damaged.
  • A 2002 study by Mathis Wackernagel concluded that, “humanity’s collective demands first surpassed the earth’s regenerative capacity around 1980.  By 1999, global demand’s on the earth’s natural systems exceeded sustainable yields by 20 percent.  Ongoing calculations show it at 50 percent in 2007.  Stated otherwise, it would take 1.5 Earths to sustain our current consumption.” [my emphasis]
  • “No previous civilisation has survived the ongoing destruction of its natural supports.  Nor will ours.”

Let’s turn to NOAA.  A few salient points from there State of the Climate – Global Review for 2010.

  • For 2010, the combined global land and ocean surface temperature tied with 2005 as the warmest such period on record, at 0.62°C (1.12°F) above the 20th century average of 13.9°C (57.0°F). 1998 is the third warmest year-to-date on record, at 0.60°C (1.08°F) above the 20th century average.
  • The 2010 Northern Hemisphere combined global land and ocean surface temperature was the warmest year on record, at 0.73°C (1.31°F) above the 20th century average. The 2010 Southern Hemisphere combined global land and ocean surface temperature was the sixth warmest year on record, at 0.51°C (0.92°F) above the 20th century average.
  • The global land surface temperature for 2010 tied with 2005 as the second warmest on record, at 0.96°C (1.73°F) above the 20th century average. The warmest such period on record occurred in 2007, at 0.99°C (1.78°F) above the 20th century average.

 

Russian forest fires.

 

 

From the UK Guardian newspaper.

2010 is becoming the year of the heatwave, with record temperatures set in 17 countries.

Record highs have occurred in Russia, Belarus and Ukraine – the three nations at the centre of the eastern European heatwave which has lasted for more than three weeks – but also African, Middle Eastern and Latin American countries.

Temperatures in Moscow, which have been consistently 20C above normal, today fell to 31C (86F), and President Dmitry Medvedev cancelled a state of emergency in three out of seven Russian regions affected by forest fires.

Thousand of hectares of forest burned in the fires, killing 54 people and leaving thousands homeless. For days, Moscow was shrouded in smog, and environmentalists raised fears that the blaze could release radioactive particles from areas contaminated in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Wildfires have also swept through northern Portugal, killing two firefighters and destroying 18,000 hectares (44,500 acres) of forests and bushland since late July. Some 600 firefighters were today struggling to contain 29 separate fires.

But the extreme heat experienced in Europe would barely have registered in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Niger, Pakistan and Sudan, all of which have recorded temperatures of more than 47C (115F) since June. The number of record highs is itself a record – the previous record was for 14 new high temperatures in 2007.

The freak weather conditions, which have devastated crops and wildlife, are believed to have killed thousands of elderly people, especially in Russia and northern India. The 2003 European heatwave killed about 15,000 people.

Be worried, be concerned but don’t panic – you and I, all of us, have the collective power to sort this all out.  More about this soon.

So near, so far!

Mixed emotions about those other worlds out there.

In recent times, Learning from Dogs has been reflecting on the magic, and fragility, of the planet we all live on.

There was the photograph of the Earthrise that attracted quite a few comments.  That was followed up by the amazing photograph of the Earth from Voyager 1 taken in 1990 from 3,762,136,324 miles away!  Then the lovely poem from Sue.

So it was interesting to note my mixed emotions to a piece on the BBC News website yesterday.  Here’s a flavour.

Worlds away

Astronomers have identified some 54 new planets where conditions may be suitable for life.

Five of the candidates are Earth-sized.

The announcement from the Kepler space telescope team brings the total number of exoplanet candidates they have identified to more than 1,200.

The data release also confirmed a unique sextet of planets around a single star and 170 further solar systems that include more than one planet circling far-flung stars.

Read the rest of the item here. (and there’s a fuller version on NetworkWorld)

So here are those mixed emotions.

  • Man has been, and still continues to be, wonderfully curious to the point of spending huge sums of money on projects that appear to do nothing more than satisfy that curiosity. (The (Kepler) mission‘s life-cycle cost is estimated at US$600 million, including funding for 3.5 years of operation, from here.)  That’s a beautiful trait, in my humble opinion.
  • Homo Sapiens is a wonderfully innovative and creative species, as so wonderfully presented by Alan Alda on a recent PBS Programme called The Human Spark.  (See the YouTube intro at the end of this Post.)
  • Look at all the inventions and incredible advances to our species that are all around us – including the PC I am using and the World Wide Web that is aiding this message!
  • For such an intelligent species as us, why is it that we are treating Planet Earth in such a suicidal manner through greed, pollution and over-consumption!
  • As was reported yesterday, we could be on the verge of total and utter chaos in terms of food.  Then also yesterday was a small item about food prices reaching a new global record.
  • It always struck me as absurd to conclude that this planet is the only habitable planet in the universe – ‘Astronomers estimate there are 1021 stars in the universe. With a conservative estimate of three planets per star (some could have many more, some would have none at all) this puts the estimated number of planets into millions of billions.‘ From here.
  • So the data coming in from Kepler is truly astounding and, personally, underlines this era as a great time to be alive.
  • But there simply is no choice in that for decades ahead, if not centuries ahead, Planet Earth is all there is for us.  So why do we do it so much harm!
  • Our civilisation is likely to go to the very limits of survivability before the message that the existing ‘model’ is broken is picked up by every major political party in the world.  That is very, very scary to contemplate.
  • So it looks as though, soon, mankind will face the ultimate decision of all time.  Give up and let the chaos overwhelm us all, or … or what?  In other words millions of us will have to live with the consequences of our greed.
  • The ‘or what?’ can only be a faith that it will be OK.
  • A faith that mankind will use the power of dreams, imagination and energy to create a new future that will, at long last, be a new dawn of democratic and just, integrous existence.
  • And maybe, just maybe, that could be the Second Coming and maybe, just maybe, the world’s Churches and religions will be our saving grace.

But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. Matthew 24:36

Fascinating times – a Chinese proverb, ‘It’s better to be a dog in a peaceful time than be a man in a chaotic period.’

Finally, here’s that video of the series preview to The Human Spark.

Earth Policy Institute

An organisation that deserves wide support.

Read it!

My copy of Lester Brown’s book World on the Edge arrived on Tuesday and already it’s opening my eyes big time.  I do recommend that you think about purchasing the book, or you may download the entire book for free – details here.

Regular visitors to Learning from Dogs will remember that there was mention in a recent Post, Group Human Insanity about Lester Brown’s new book.  I have subscribed to regular updates from the EPI and recently received the following; it’s worth reproducing in full, with the permission of the EPI.

Restoring Food Security for All
Takes Action on Many Fronts

www.earth-policy.org/book_bytes/2011/wotech12_ss5

By Lester R. Brown

Today there are three sources of growing demand for food: population growth; rising affluence and the associated jump in meat, milk, and egg consumption; and the use of grain to produce fuel for cars.

Population growth is as old as agriculture itself. But the world is now adding close to 80 million people per year. Even worse, the overwhelming majority of these people are being added in countries where cropland is scarce, soils are eroding, and irrigation wells are going dry.

Even as we are multiplying in number, some 3 billion of us are trying to move up the food chain, consuming more grain-intensive livestock products. As incomes rise, annual grain consumption per person climbs from less than 400 pounds, as in India today, to roughly 1,600 pounds, as among those living high on the food chain in the United States, where diets tend to be heavy with meat and dairy products.

When the United States attempted to reduce its oil insecurity by converting grain into ethanol, the growth in world grain demand, traditionally around 20 million tons per year, suddenly jumped to over 50 million tons in 2007. Roughly 119 million tons of the 2009 U.S. grain harvest of 416 million tons went to ethanol distilleries, an amount that exceeds the grain harvests of Canada and Australia combined. This massive ethanol distillery investment in the United States launched an epic competition between cars and people for grain.

On the supply side of the food equation, several trends are making it more difficult to expand production rapidly enough to keep up with demand. These include soil erosion, aquifer depletion, more frequent crop-shrinking heat waves, melting ice sheets, melting mountain glaciers, and the diversion of irrigation water to cities.

Farmers are also losing cropland to nonfarm uses. Cars compete with people not only for the grain supply but also for the cropland itself. The United States, for example, has paved an area for cars larger than the state of Georgia. Every five cars added to the U.S. fleet means another acre of land will be paved over—the equivalent of a football field.

The implications for China of this relationship between cars and cropland are startling. In 2009, for the first time, more cars were sold in China than in the United States. If China were to reach the U.S. ownership rate of three cars for every four people, it would have over a billion cars, more than the entire world has today. The land that would have to be paved to accommodate these cars would be two thirds the area China currently has in rice.

This pressure on cropland worldwide is running up against increased demand for soybeans, which are the key to expanding the production of meat, milk, and eggs. Adding soybean meal to livestock and poultry feed sharply boosts the efficiency with which grain is converted into animal protein. This is why world soybean use climbed from 17 million tons in 1950 to 252 million tons in 2010, a 15-fold jump.

Nowhere is the soaring demand for soybeans more evident than in China, where the crop originated. As recently as 1995, China produced 14 million tons of soybeans and consumed 14 million tons. In 2010, it still produced 14 million tons, but it consumed a staggering 64 million tons. In fact, over half of the world’s soybean exports now go to China.

Demand is climbing, but since scientists have failed to increase yields rapidly, the world gets more soybeans largely by planting more soybeans. The soybean is devouring land in the United States, Brazil, and Argentina, which together account for four fifths of world soybean production and 90 percent of exports.

Ensuring future food security was once the exclusive responsibility of the ministry of agriculture, but this is changing. The minister of agriculture alone, no matter how competent, can no longer be expected to secure food supplies. Indeed, efforts by the minister of health and family planning to lower human fertility may have a greater effect on future food security than efforts in the ministry of agriculture to raise land fertility.

Similarly, if ministries of energy cannot quickly cut carbon emissions, the world will face crop-shrinking heat waves that can massively and unpredictably reduce harvests. Saving the mountain glaciers whose ice melt irrigates much of the cropland in China and India during the dry season is the responsibility of the ministry of energy, not solely the ministry of agriculture.

If the ministries of forestry and agriculture cannot work together to restore tree cover and reduce floods and soil erosion, grain harvests will shrink not only in smaller countries like Haiti and Mongolia, as they are doing, but also in larger countries, such as Russia and Argentina—both wheat exporters.

And where water shortages restrict food output, it will be up to ministries of water resources to do everything possible to raise national water productivity. With water, as with energy, the principal potential now is in increasing efficiency, not expanding supply.

In a world where cropland is scarce and becoming more so, decisions made in ministries of transportation on whether to develop land-consuming, auto-centered transport systems or more-diversified systems that are much less land-intensive will directly affect world food security.

In the end, it is up to ministries of finance to reallocate resources in a way that recognizes the new threats to security posed by agriculture’s deteriorating natural support systems, continuing population growth, human-driven climate change, and spreading water shortages. Since many ministries of government are involved, it is the head of state who must redefine security.

At the international level, we need to address the threat posed by growing climate volatility and the associated rise in food price volatility. The tripling of wheat, rice, corn, and soybean prices between 2007 and 2008 put enormous stresses on governments and low-income consumers. This price volatility also affects producers, since price uncertainty discourages investment by farmers.

In this unstable situation, a new mechanism to stabilize world grain prices is needed—in effect, a World Food Bank (WFB). This body would establish a support price and a ceiling price for wheat, rice, and corn. The WFB would buy grain when prices fell to the support level and return it to the market when prices reached the ceiling level, thus moderating price fluctuations in a way that would benefit both consumers and producers.

One simple way to improve food security is for the United States to eliminate the fuel ethanol subsidy and abolish the mandates that are driving the conversion of grain into fuel. This would help stabilize grain prices and buy some time in which to reverse the environmental and demographic trends that are undermining our future. It would also help relax the political tensions over food security that have emerged within importing countries.

And finally, we all have a role to play as individuals. Whether we decide to bike, bus, or drive to work will affect carbon emissions, climate change, and food security. The size of the car we drive to the supermarket and its effect on climate may indirectly affect the size of the bill at the supermarket checkout counter. At the family level, we need to hold the line at two children. And if we are living high on the food chain, we can eat less grain-intensive livestock products, improving our health while helping to stabilize climate. Food security is something in which we all have a stake—and a responsibility.

#   #   #

Adapted from Chapter 5, “The Emerging Politics of Food Scarcity” and Chapter 12, “Feeding Eight Billion” in Lester R. Brown, World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse
(New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2011), available online at www.earth-policy.org/books/wote

Additional data and information sources at www.earth-policy.org

Feel free to pass this information along to friends, family members, and colleagues!

Not much I can add to that!

UPDATE:  Just a few hours after completing the Post, I saw this on the BBC News website.

The global consumption of fish has hit a record high, reaching an average of 17kg per person, a UN report has shown.

Fisheries and aquaculture supplied the world with about 145m tonnes in 2009, providing about 16% of the population’s animal protein intake.

The findings published by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) also stressed that the status of global fish stocks had not improved.

It said that about 32% were overexploited, depleted or recovering.

“That there has been no improvement in the status of stocks is a matter of great concern,” said Richard Grainger, one of the report’s authors and FAO senior fish expert.

Full article on the BBC is here.

 

Earth, a poem

A lovely comment and a beautiful poem.

On the 28th January, Learning from Dogs posted the second of two articles about Planet Earth.  The first one was here and the second here.  That second piece attracted a lovely comment from Sue of SueDreamwalker.  What follows from this point is all Sue’s work.

A very Good Post Paul.

I thought I might share a Poem of mine about Earth I was inspired to write this in 1995, long before we got the weather we are experiencing today… Appologies for its length..

I agree we need to respect… for we are along longs ways from Space hopping..

Earth


Earth gave her body; she gave it us to share
Her breath once sweet now pollutes the air
Her waterways of veins once were crystal clear
Now they hold our garbage lifeless pools and mires

Earth gave her body; she gave it us to share
She gave us animals for pleasure and yes for food
Not to be hunted to extinction penned up and abused
She gave us her Forests for shelter and for fuel
Not for mass developments using greed for cutting tools

Earth gave us her body; she gave it us to share
The soil she gave for harvest of plants that now are rare
For medicine and minerals, silver bronze and gold
Her treasure chests of beauty, we’ve pillaged raped and sold

Earth gave us her body; she gave it us to share
Now her tears are falling, can’t you see her pain?
The bombs that we are testing, fall out, Floods- the Rain.
Wars between each Nation, like stabbings in her back
Earthquakes——- Thunder, Lightning,
She’s Crying with each Crack..

“Enough” she cries “Enough”, as Planet Earth disrupts
Her breaking heart that Bleeds, Volcanoes then Erupts
Her breath now rages Anger, Tornadoes swirl revenge
Beware the Human Race, Planet Earth could still avenge

Earth gave her body she gave it us to share
The beauty is all around us, forever standing there
Let’s not take her for granted, for some day she will rebel
Treat her with some kindness, our fellow man as well.

Earth gave her body, she gives us Life
Let’s stop all our hating, stop the greed and strife
Earth gave us a garden, she gives us love
Love is the only answer, we are told so from above

Earth gave her body, Give her your respect
For she might rebel, turn her back sooner than you’d expect
So help her through her Torment, Heal her wounded sores,
We can start by healing each other around her windy shores
Love her and those upon her, take away her tears,
Her Promise in return,
Rebirth the “ Golden Years!”

By Dreamwalker..

Beautiful words!

This is the dog!

More close to man for more years than one could ever imagine.

A week ago, there was an article on Learning from Dogs entitled What is the dog? It was primarily based on the work of Dr. George Johnson; his details are here.

Anyway, last Thursday Pete N who is incredibly helpful in passing me items of interest, passed me a link to a series of videos that come under the collective name of Dogs Decoded.  They were on the website Top Documentary Films itself an interesting site.

It looks as though the videos are due to be released as a single film later on this year, as this link suggests.  Here’s how the three videos are introduced.

Dogs Decoded reveals the science behind the remarkable bond between humans and their dogs and investigates new discoveries in genetics that are illuminating the origin of dogs – with surprising implications for the evolution of human culture.

Other research is proving what dog lovers have suspected all along; dogs have an uncanny ability to read and respond to human emotions.

Humans, in turn, respond to dogs with the same hormone responsible for bonding mothers to their babies. How did this incredible relationship between humans and dogs come to be? And how can dogs, so closely related to fearsome wild wolves, behave so differently?

No more from me.  Just find a quiet corner and watch the three videos by clicking on each link in turn.  They will blow your mind.

Dogs Decoded (1/3)

Dogs Decoded (2/3)

Dogs Decoded (3/3)


An answer to Britain’s economic issues.

A wonderful letter, purported to be real, showing some of the crazier aspects of UK life.

FROM: Nigel Johnson-Hill Esq.,
Park Farm,
Rake Road,
Milland,
Liphook,
Surrey,
GU30 7JT

TO: Rt Hon David Miliband MP,
Secretary of State,
Department for Environment,
Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA),
Nobel House,
17 Smith Square,
London,
SW1P 3JR

Dear Secretary of State,

My friend, who is in farming at the moment, recently received a cheque for £3,000 from the Rural Payments Agency for not rearing pigs.

I would now like to join the “not rearing pigs” business.

In your opinion, what is the best kind of farm not to rear pigs on, and which is the best breed of pigs not to rear? I want to be sure I approach this endeavour in keeping with all government policies, as dictated by the EU under the Common Agricultural Policy.

I would prefer not to rear bacon pigs, but if this is not the type you want not rearing, I will just as gladly not rear porkers. Are there any advantages in not rearing rare breeds such as Saddlebacks or Gloucester Old Spots, or are there too many people already not rearing these?

As I see it, the hardest part of this programme will be keeping an accurate record of how many pigs I haven’t reared. Are there any Government or Local Authority courses on this?

My friend is very satisfied with this business. He has been rearing pigs for forty years or so, and the best he ever made on them was £1,422 in 1968. That is – until this year, when he received a cheque for not rearing any.

If I get £3,000 for not rearing 50 pigs, will I get £6,000 for not rearing 100? I plan to operate on a small scale at first, holding myself down to about 4,000 pigs not raised, which will mean about £240,000 for the first year. As I become more expert in not rearing pigs, I plan to be more ambitious, perhaps increasing to say, 40,000 pigs not reared in my second year, for which I should expect about £2.4 million from your department. Incidentally, I wonder if I would be eligible to receive tradable carbon credits for all these pigs not producing harmful and polluting methane gases?

Another point: These pigs that I plan not to rear will not eat 2,000 tonnes of cereals. I understand that you also pay farmers for not growing crops. Will I qualify for payments for not growing cereals to not feed the pigs I don’t rear?

I am also considering the “not milking cows” business, so please send any information you have on that too. Please could you also include the current Defra advice on set aside fields? Can this be done on an e-commerce basis with virtual fields (of which I seem to have several thousand hectares)?

In view of the above you will realise that I will be totally unemployed, and will therefore qualify for unemployment benefits. I shall of course be voting for your party at the next general election.

Yours faithfully,

Nigel Johnson-Hill
16 July 2009

Enjoy the week-end.

and it’s so insignificant!

Yesterday’s post It’s all we have showing the famous Earthrise picture taken from Apollo 8 generated a lovely follow-up.

One of the comments was from Mike Turner who wrote,

It’s all we have and it’s so insignificant!

The Pale Blue Dot

Mike included a link to an entry on WikiPedia about the tiny, small dot of light in the universe that is Earth, shown in a photograph taken by spaceship Voyager 1 from the edge of the Solar System on February 14th, 1990.  Here’s that photograph,

Planet Earth from 3,762,136,324 miles

Can you see our planet home?  Earth appears as a tiny dot (the blueish-white speck approximately halfway down the brown band to the right) within the darkness of deep space. In a 2001 article by Space.com, STScI‘s Ray Villard and JPL‘s Jurrie Van der Woude selected this photograph as one of the top ten space science images of all time.

Carl Sagan later wrote about his deep feelings about this photograph.  That was almost 20 years ago and, as I reflected just a few days ago, human insanity still seems alive and well; it’s about time that the majority of us recognised the fragility and vulnerability of where we live.

Sagan’s words are reproduced here and should be read by every inhabitant of this planet.

From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of particular interest. But for us, it’s different. Look again at that dot. That’s here, that’s home, that’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. [my italics, Ed]

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

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 pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.

You may also wish to watch this video.

Thanks Mike for prompting this piece.