Dear Friends,

Let us have a moment of perspective this 50 th  Anniversary of Earth Day, while we reflect on our collective and individual frailty arising from global recognition that all our weapons and institutions are humbled by a small micro-organism, a mere virus. At this moment, here is a profound insight from a scientist that informs us on how we must learn to behave.

It was Carl Sagan who warned the world in his Parade Magazine article of October 30, 1983 that nuclear winter — the dropping of global temperatures to the point of destroying agriculture — would be the world-ending consequence of a nuclear war.

This excerpt from his book  Pale Blue Dot  was inspired by an image taken by Voyager 1 on February 14, 1990. As the spacecraft left our planetary neighborhood for the fringes of the solar system, engineers turned it around for one last look at its home planet. Voyager 1 was about 6.4 billion kilometers (4 billion miles) away when it captured this portrait of our world. Caught in the center of scattered light rays (a result of taking the picture so close to the Sun), Earth appears as a tiny point of light, a crescent only 0.12 pixel in size.

It was on Sagan’s suggestion that the picture was taken:

“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.

“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.”

— Carl Sagan,  Pale Blue Dot , 1994

 

Warmly,

Jonathan Granoff

President, Global Security Institute

Senior Advisor and Special Representative to the UN for the Permanent Secretariat of the World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates

April 21-22: Earth Day Events

A very special event on

Global Leadership for Sustainable Planet

Tuesday, April 21, 2020

8:00am PDT, 11:00am EDT

The rapid spread of COVID-19 revealed humanity’s vulnerable state of asymmetric shocks, lack of preparedness for change and the need for a new social, economic and political paradigm. The pandemic has induced a planetary momentum for change and requires coordinated global action now. Leadership is needed at all levels to transform the growing disunity into global solidarity based on complementary top-down and bottom-up initiatives.

Eminent leaders of international organizations and initiatives partnering with the World Academy of Art and Science will discuss the psycho-social, cultural, economic and political impact of the pandemic that made the world stop but gave the planet a moment to breathe and the new leadership needed to take us to the new paradigm of human development aligned with natural laws and planetary boundaries.

April 21, 11am – 2:30pm EDT

Move the Nuclear Weapons Money

International Webinar, Tuesday April 21, 2020

Move the Nuclear Weapons (and fossil fuel) Money: Cutting nuclear weapons budgets. Ending investments in nuclear weapons & fossil fuels. Reallocating these to public health, climate protection and sustainable development.

Held in conjunction with Earth Day 2020 the Global Days of Action on Military Spending, April 10 – May 5, 2020

13th ANNUAL

April 22, 6 – 9:30 pm EDT: World Peace Earth Day Celebration

Celebrating our Planet, Healing Our Heart

Watch LIVE or the Recording HERE:

https://www.facebook.com/thewecampaign

https://www.facebook.com/compassiongames

Like these pages to get notified for the Event and please share!

Featuring:

HOST/MC Mitchell Rabin: International speaker, Holistic Coach and Host of A Better World Radio & TV  https://abetterworld.tv

Rick Ulfik: Founder of We, The World, the WE Campaign, Co-Creator of 11 Days of Global Unity,  https://WE.net

Jonathan Granoff: President of the Global Security Institute, Attorney, Author, and Advocate for the Abolition of Nuclear Weapons

Michael Fitzpatrick: World-renowned Cello Soloist

Guy R. McPherson: American scientist, professor emeritus at the University of Arizona

Elly Lessin: Long time Environmental Advocate

and others

 

Mr. Granoff will speak at 7:20 pm edt

April 22, 1pm EDT – 11pm EDT:

Unify, Earth X and National Geographic Celebration of Earth Day.

 

Join us April 22nd, 2020 — 1am EDT – 11pm EDT for this Global Live Event!Video: https://www.facebook.com/unify/videos/1101365756898233/

 

 

Art, Inspiration, Leadership, Ceremony, Meditation, and Prayer

 

Global Ceremony for Peace On Earth – Reunion of the Eagle, Condor and Quetzal featuring prayers from indigenous elders:

7pm EDT

 

Jonathan Granoff

Earth’s Call: Hearts Without Borders

9:30 PM (EDT)

 

 Global Synchronized Meditation

10 pm (EDT)

 

Full Program:

Schedule (all times EDT):

 

1:00 UNIFY Official Intro

1:30 Unify Humanity

2:00 Planetary Film Screening

2:30 Earth X + National Geographic

4:00 Unified Planet/Lunch Portal

5:00 Bella Gaia + NASA

5:30 New Earth Manifesto Panel

6:45 Creator Series – Visionary Art Jam

7:00 Global Ceremony for Peace On Earth [intertribal]

9:30 Earth’s Call: Hearts Without Borders

10:00 Global Synchronized Meditation

 

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