Welcome to the Center for Planetary Identity

Given multiple threatening world-scale challenges and potential crises, global cooperation would seem obvious.  But currently the world is experiencing waves of extreme nationalism and other separative philosophies and forces that inhibit cooperation.  There have been two efforts in the 20th Century to create a World Federation; the League of Nations, and the present United Nations.  But the hold of national identity and sovereignty has diluted it each time. 

Thoughtful voices have alternately argued for a sense of “world citizenship” to bridge this hold.  But lacking any larger center of identification than the collection of sovereign nations, there is no tangible center of planet-wide identification.  Appeals to identification with nature seem peripheral to more practical needs, so that even the threats to society by climate change are seen as simply one item on national agendas.  Planetary Identity does not deny national identity, but rather provides a non-political focus for the issues that concern all nations and peoples.

Cognitive (brain/mind) science describes the experiences reported by astronauts (most frequently termed the Overview Effect) as shifts in worldview or paradigm.  But to achieve a culture-wide shift to planetary identification, the nature and significance of these research-based cognitive worldview/paradigm shifts must become recognized as more than just changes in perspective, or philosophical concept.  

Worldviews and paradigms have long been recognized as exerting a tenacious hold on the mind, and are difficult to change through facts or images alone.  But this same research provides guides to the creation of techniques and technologies that enhance such shifts.  Given the limitations of conventional media, greater awareness and impact can be achieved through incorporating these complex ideas and difficult to achieve identifications into aesthetically powerful media forms and sophisticated immersive media technologies. 

The imminent need to communicate this research to the world, using all the most powerful tools at our disposal, is the reason for the creation, and the mission, of The Center for Planetary Identity. 

Our Program

Over the next few months, we will outline a comprehensive three-pronged program to support the proliferation of Planetary Awareness and Identity through world culture.  It will include continuing Research, Public Education, and a Space Experience Media Lab.

Research – We will begin by compiling and linking to all the academic research that has been done on the astronauts’ personal (non-mission) space experiences to date, and follow with commentary linking their specific areas of research focus to planetary awareness and identity. 

We will support and provide a platform for the continuing examination of the issues surrounding the Overview Effect, Planetary Awareness and Identity for all those interested in promoting these concepts and experiences in world culture.

We will also announce the first of several research proposals we have developed in-house and begin the search for funding and for research partners.

Public Education – We will begin with the website and this blog, as well the many links that will be included in every section of the site.  We will stand up a full social media campaign, and will also begin to publish articles, do interviews, and contribute to other sites and blogs where available.  As we stand up our Media Lab, we will begin to create videos and post them online, and finally, through our Media Lab, we will develop new media technologies to support our education program.

Space Experience Media Lab – We will begin by linking to the best space experience technologies and programs we can locate, and where possible, interview the principals.  Also, where possible, we will consult with them to bring a more researched-based version of planetary awareness and identity to their systems.  Finally, we will develop and proliferate our own revolutionary new virtual media technologies to tell the story of the Overview Effect and the Planetary Awareness and Identity it leads to, in powerful new ways.