Postscript to The Overview Effect - Shatner in Space

The Philosopher, Marshall McLuhan said, 

"There are no passengers on spaceship earth. We are all crew."

I ended season two with an episode about William Shatner and his brief trip to space. It’s episode 15, The Overview Effect. In it I spoke about a cognitive shift that happens when we see the Earth from space. 

Some time has passed since his flight. And in that time, Shater wrote a book -and spoke about the experience. So, I wanted to take a minute to share more of Shatner’s reflections about that day. The book is called “Boldly Go: Reflections on a Life of Awe and Wonder,” If you want to check it out, you’ll find a link in the show notes. If you decide to buy it, please use that link. You’ll get the book at the normal price, but a portion of your purchase will support this show. 

If you saw the documentary made about William Shatner’s space flight -or heard the episode - you know that Shatner was deeply moved by the experience. In the book he explains in detail what that emotion was. He was brought to tears by it. 

The following is from the book. It’s a long quote but hang with me. In it, he returns from his voyage with gifts for us all.

“Last year, I had a life-changing experience at 90 years old. I went to space, after decades of playing an iconic science-fiction character who was exploring the universe. I thought I would experience a deep connection with the immensity around us, a deep call for endless exploration. I was absolutely wrong. The strongest feeling, that dominated everything else by far, was the deepest grief that I had ever experienced.

I understood, in the clearest possible way, that we were living on a tiny oasis of life, surrounded by an immensity of death. I didn’t see infinite possibilities of worlds to explore, of adventures to have, or living creatures to connect with. I saw the deepest darkness I could have ever imagined, contrasting so starkly with the welcoming warmth of our nurturing home planet.

"This was an immensely powerful awakening for me. It filled me with sadness. I realized that we had spent decades, if not centuries, being obsessed with looking away, with looking outside. I did my share in popularizing the idea that space was the final frontier. But I had to get to space to understand that Earth is and will stay our only home. And that we have been ravaging it, relentlessly, making it uninhabitable."

There’s something that happens when we’re on a spiritual journey. We become more in touch with nature… for some it may be for the first time. For others, like me -it’s a strengthening of the love we have for the natural world… the outdoors… the Earth.   

Shatner’s experience was a spiritual one. Like so many others who experienced the overview effect when they went to space… Shatner recognized that the Earth is a fragile lifeboat in the vastness of space. He felt an undeniable draw back to the Earth. An instinctual draw towards home. And the experience changed him. It gave him a newfound love of home, like he’d never felt. When looking into the darkness of space he understood at the deepest parts of himself that Earth is home… Earth is fragile… and Earth must be protected from the very people Earth granted life to. 

We are born to our mothers, whose job it is to care for us. And we are also born of Earth, who also provides for us. We are biological entities who have evolved to thrive here. We have a symbiotic relationship with Earth. And we alone have the ability to protect the Earth. Not just to protect but to preserve for future generations. 

But so often we don’t.

There’s a place in the woods, far off a single-lane highway in the Sieras range of central California where me and my dog Skittles, love to camp. I hang my hammock on a ridge overlooking a valley above a place called Malakoff Diggins. Today it’s a state preserve. But looking off, down into the valley I can still see scars that remain from hydraulic mining that happened there in the 1800s. 

For nearly 30 years a company called North Bloomfield mining worked the area using giant hydraulic cannons to wash sections of the hillsides down. Mercury was used to extract gold from the heavy sediments collected. In nearly three decades of hydraulic mining, there had been about 41 million cubic yards of gravel and dirt removed. Most of the debris was washed into the waterways and flowed downstream.

And far downstream people were feeling the devastating effects of the mining nearly a hundred miles away. A lawsuit was filed in 1882, by a farmer who was stunned by the effects he was witnessing. The sand and gravel debris clogged the riverways, raising the water as much as 15 feet above the normal banks. The rise in water destroyed farms and farmland on either side of the Yuba River, over a space two miles wide and twelve miles long. The rising water also kept steam-boats from being able to operate on portions of the river -bringing commerce to a standstill. The North Bloomfield mining company ignored pleas for them to stop. The farmers continued to suffer through crop failures and flooding, before a ruling was handed down.

Two years after filing the case, Judge, Lorenzo Sawyer, concluded that the operations of the mine were destructive to those downriver. His ruling banned mining operations from washing debris into water ways. This ruling became what is essentially the first environmental law in US history. What is known as the Sawyer Act. It ultimately ended hydraulic mining operations within the state.

But North Bloomfield mining ignored the newly created act and was heavily fined two years later. After six years of flooding, many farmers moved away from the flooded areas downstream. But North Bloomfield kept operating. Four more years passed before the company was heavily fined and ceased the hydro mining part of the operation. 

The mine finally ceased operations in the late 1890s. They left behind a mining pit 6,900-foot long, 3,800-foot wide and 600-foot deep. 

More than 150 years have passed since it opened. What’s left are scars on the hillside and mercury in the soil. The methods they used were the quickest and cheapest way to get to the gold. Greed was the driving force. Greed destroyed lives downstream. Corporations haven’t changed. Greed is still a driving force. 

Again and again we allow profit to win out against logic as corporations strip away natural resources and leave the Earth damaged. We learn the lesson in one location… then do it again somewhere else. Years may pass. And the scars remain. 

We have many opportunities every day to tell corporations to make wise choices. Instead, we usually choose profit or cheap products over protecting the Earth. There are simple answers to this problem but no easy solution. They all require effort. "Simple but no easy.” 

It’s simple to say “let’s be smarter” but it’s not easy to force smart behavior when profit is involved, when greed is involved…

We often hear that we’re destroying the Earth. That’s a soft lie. We can’t destroy the Earth. We can only destroy our ability to live on Earth. After we’re gone, the Earth will recover. With or without us.

Shatner said it like this,

“Every day, we are confronted with the knowledge of further destruction of Earth at our hands: the extinction of animal species, of flora and fauna … things that took five billion years to evolve, and suddenly we will never see them again because of the interference of mankind. It filled me with dread.”

Do I have the answer? No. But I know awareness is the first step. 

Ask any person if they’d destroy the house they live in for profit. Of course, not -unless they were sure they’d have another home to inhabit when they were done. But somehow, we regard the Earth differently. It’s easy to assume she can take all we can ask of her, and she will still give back what we need. But we don’t know where that line is. That line where she is too far gone to provide for us anymore. And Shatner points out that we’ve destroyed many life forms, both plant and animal, which we’ll never get back. It’s possible we’re approaching a point of no return. And the primary reason we’re not changing is greed. 

It's easy to ignore the danger. We keep assuming the best -in spite of the evidence. Optimism is generally a good trait. Perhaps not in this case. You can’t see red flags through rose-colored glasses. Wisdom happened through the passage of time. And time is another resource we take for granted. 

Solutions? Answers… I’ll leave it to the individual how you help make corporations change the way they make money... and how we individually choose to care for the planet. How we individually chose to preserve her for future generations.

As long as there is money to be made, greed will be a powerful and destructive force. 

My hope is that the spiritual awakening happening today will be the turning point. When enough of us care, things will start to change. All we can do is our small part as individuals. Changes are made one person at a time. When enough people care, the change will be forced. 

For now, I’ll keep picking up and tossing out trash on my daily walks. 

Though I know I’m treating the symptom, not the cause. I’ll consider the companies I give my business to. I will do what I can -as an individual. And I’ll remember the words of Gandi, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” …while I love and appreciate this wonderful home, we call Earth. 

We’ve been conditioned by the idea that we should all want to get rich; that money somehow equals success. But it seems that to understand the greatest truth; to understand the true beauty of our existence here -all we must do is view Earth from space. In an instant, our reality shifts. And we are initiated into a new reality. What we thought we understood falls as we are stripped of our assumptions and exposed to the full truth of our situation. 

Maybe the billionaires who are creating space flight companies are the solution. Afterall, it’s only the wealthiest of us who will be able to afford a flight into space. When CEOS, politicians and the most powerful among us see the world as Shatner has… maybe then we’ll see a shift. As they are hit with the overview effect…

It’s an equation of sorts, isn’t it?! How many CEOs do we have to launch into space to turn the tide of destruction? Maybe we could spend billions launching influencers into space instead of on wars… That might be the best use of our money. We could change their thinking. This is a vital first step. To change the way we think is to change the way we act. 

Albert Einstein said,

“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” 

Floating above the Earth, we see we are on a fragile ball floating in space. We are all brothers and sisters… thriving on this beautiful orb. And – Earth is a tiny oasis in a vast, empty sea. And then we fully understand that it’s nothing less than a miracle that we exist at all. And we see… 

"There are no passengers on spaceship earth. We are all crew."

And as crew, we ask ourselves “What is my duty to Earth?”