Three Thoughts:

For the Present and Future

Sharing the same land

?When two neighbours want the same land and are prepared to go to extreme lengths to ensure dominance or define resistance, we retell old stories which are as old as human time.

?The only solution is to share it. Share it and provide equal opportunity for all who choose to live there. The right to remain, to citizenship, free movement, access to education, to jobs, regardless of what came before.

?The alternative to this is being played out on a daily basis. Some days, it’s in the open and some in the shadows. Not just over days, months, years, and decades but over generations. Engrained in a cycle destined to repeat itself after pauses end.

Eventually, there could be no more neighbours if taken to a logical conclusion.

The land, however, will still be there.

?So why should sharing be considered when so much sacrifice has taken place and so much resentment stored up?

?Two words. Cycle and Opportunity

?Cycle. To break the cycle.

Albert Einstein said, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.

No dispute I’ve ever seen has ever been fully resolved by defeating or dominating another. Suppressed ideas remain and are passed on to the following generations.

?Opportunity. The only true path is equal opportunity. To collaborate, to move forward, to rebuild.

People may fear differences, but differences are our strength.

People may have alternative views, but perspectives reveal unique insights.

Singular visions stymie self-expression

Creative expression blossoms and enlightens human existence.

?

Writing in each other’s book of knowledge

?In the days of Marco Polo, Marco was inspired by the mysteries of the East, inspired enough to want to discover it for himself.

Though arduous and dangerous to reach, he nevertheless persisted in his quest to discover the country we now know predominantly as China.

?A land steeped in culture and traditions but a place where knowledge was valued and recorded.

Despite many changes over the centuries, this is something that remains important in Chinese society today.

?Their current leader is no exception and has a book of his own with a wide readership.

?I suppose it will be said that such a book has been produced through a certain set of optics. However, a country that has grown the way it has could not have done so without innovation, perspective, and a willingness to think into new spaces.

?One thing that has been shared recently between East and West has been the importance of conversations. In a connected world, this cannot be understated, for it was once said that if a person sneezed on one side of the world, a person on the other side would catch a cold.

?Therefore, knowledge and understanding are something that can always be built on.

Whatever the optics we are using, we all share the same world, and we all breathe the same air.

?If such an opportunity occurred, exchanging knowledge through books would be an ideal time to write words of hope in each other’s work.

?

There is much we can learn about one another.

There is much we can collaborate on together.

?

Exploration is our shared future

?Not to find a reason not to blow each other up…

?…this should be a good enough reason, but there are others.

?When a team of scientists led by Robert Oppenheimer successfully detonated a nuclear weapon…

?…it solved one problem but created many others

A story that doesn’t need to be retold here.

?One narrative that does get repeated, though…

?…is that all problems on earth should be solved first

Before we go anywhere else.

?The thing about this is, in a technological world

We are all competing for the same resources

?We are generating waste that we don’t want…

…at a faster rate than we know what to do with

?We send and consume items at a pace that may prove to be…

…detrimental to the planet we all share.

?However, we have an opportunity to reduce this pressure significantly.

?It’s called Space

It’s not just the final frontier we laughed and joked at in the 20th Century.

?It’s real. We are developing space vehicles that are…

…getting cheaper…getting lighter…and are increasingly reusable

?So, what questions and challenges can space answer?

?Resources. Our sister planets are remarkably similar.

They contain substantial quantities of multiple abundant resources…

…that we wouldn’t run out of anytime soon.

?

Waste. Waste that we burn, crush or bury could be stored on space rocks…

…that will probably be unusable for anything else.

How about the dark side of the moon?

?

Dirty Energy. I know we are striving for clean energy, but what is not talked about is the scale of dirty energy production. This can be done off the planet.

?

Space. Has anybody mentioned there is lots of space in space?

Every new probe and telescope we send into our solar system tells us more about…

…the colossal vastness of space.

?

Our solar system of nine planets is a spec in the Milky Way galaxy.

Planet earth takes 365 days to rotate our sun.

Our solar system takes 100,000 years to rotate inside our galaxy.

?

Our current estimate is that there are trillions of detectable galaxies.

And as far as we know, there is no one else out there besides us.

?

“Ah, that’s interesting, but isn’t there one small thing you are forgetting?”

?

You mean survival in space for any length of time.

I believe we can solve this.

?

In the meantime, we are developing robot technology.

They can already go……where (you know) …. where no robot has been before, right?

?

They can build, they can produce, they can manufacture, and they can transport…

…what we need in the medium short term.

We are learning how we can join them.

?

This is our shared future; this is what makes us human

This is an exciting age to be alive.