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When
we gaze upon that awe-inspiring, full-Earth image from Apollo
17, it is no wonder we feel a strong pull of something ineffable,
something transcendent. It is a pity, then that that very
image, and others like it, which were produced by the highest
pinnacle of our technological achievement at the time, are
used by some to deride that very technology as the doom of
us all. Some champions of technological progress are inclined
to call people of that sentiment liberal tree-huggers. Many
of those deeply feeling, deeply caring people respond by calling
the former crowd cold-warrior planet-destroyers. But the tossing
about of such incendiary labels only fans the flame of controversy,
and does nothing to mitigate the underlying problems. All
this sound and fury, signifying nothing, merely serves to
mask the true irony of the situation, which is that, increasingly,
the champions of technology and the environmentalists are
strong natural allies, and are more often than not, these
days, one and the same person.
To be able to find solutions to the grave problems facing
us all these days, one must have hope that the problems are
indeed solvable. To be able to do that, one must have hope
for the future, that solutions are within our grasp, that
tomorrow can be better than today. That is one of the prime
goals of the Overview Institute: to give us a sense of wholeness,
of wonder, of unity on this delicately-balanced, wondrous
blue ball of ours, floating in the blackness of space. It
is when we perceive this whole, this majestic beauty of the
mother of us all, Gaia, that we realize our deep responsibility
to use all the technology at our disposal to ameliorate conditions
on the planet. We are all in this together, and together,
we can rise to the challenges that we ourselves have created.
That is the ultimate message of the Overview Institute, and
its program of bringing images like the Apollo 17 picture
and other advanced simulation technology to bear on the problem
of increasing awareness, of fostering a desire to properly
care for this beautiful, wonderful planet we call home.
-- Alex Howerton
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