oktober 2022

‘Man is destined by his reason to live in a society with men and in it to cultivate himself, to civilize himself, and to make himself moral by the arts and sciences. No matter how strong his animal tendency to yield passively to the attractions of comfort and well-being, which he calls happiness, he is still destined to make himself worthy of humanity by actively struggling with the obstacle that cling to him because of the crudity of his nature.’ – Immanuel Kant Humans are biophysically connected to the biosphere through the flows of materials and energy appropriated from ecosystems….

The Universe is immense, estimates suggest at least two trillion galaxies. Our galaxy holds 100 to 400 billion stars. One of those stars, our sun, has eight planets orbiting it. Planet Earth has a biosphere, a complex web of life, at its surface. The thickness of this layer is about twenty kilometers. This layer, our biosphere, is the only place where we know, for now, life exists. The existence of life on Earth depends on the distance from the Sun, neither too close nor too far away, to receive enough energy to allow water to exist as a liquid on…

The challenges that lie before us is unlike any other ever faced by humankind. As a society we must acknowledge humanity’s greatest existential threat, bend the curve, avert the impending disaster and opt instead to embark on the fastest and most exciting ecological, social and economic transformation in human history The evolution of intelligent life on a planet requires not only that planetary conditions are conducive to life at the start, as it first evolves, but also that the planet remains habitable subsequently, without interruption. This is because there has to be enough time to allow life to increase in…