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How cool is that? A book that is all about saving our biosphere just happens to be officially launching today, April 22, 2020 - the 50th anniversary of Earth Day.
The first Earth Day was also celebrated on April 22 - fifty years ago in 1970 - and here's what it looked like on 5th Avenue back then.
Unfortunately, there aren't likely to be any parades or mass gatherings anywhere in the USA Today...
That said, it is the absolutely perfect day to formally launch a book
promoting harmony between Homo sapiens and Mother Nature.
Take a look:
(Please note that there are a few minor technical errors in the current "Outcry" e-book. If you make a purchase now, corrections to those errors will be electronically "pushed" out to all of your e-book devices within 2-3 weeks)
The Purpose of this book
is to promote a serious global
conversation
about what it will take for humanity to learn to live in harmony with nature - a condition that is necessary in order to ensure our longterm survival as a species.
As an engineer and a business executive who has enjoyed a lengthy career of solving lots of problems - I have drawn upon that experience as we strive to answer the question that James Cameron asked on the cover of our book:
How do we make the crash as soft a landing as possible for some kind of continuation of human
civilization?
So how do we answer that question? We do it by sharing data, ideas, vision and encouragement. As I see it, we have four roles in this book:
- Researcher (gathering data about the problems)
- Problem-solver (envisioning one possible solution)
- Story-teller (explaining the data and the vision)
- Instigator (sparking a global conversation on this all-important topic)
Now, in the spring of 2020, we should also leverage the unprecedented,
life-disrupting, impact of Covid-19 to jolt us into action as it relates to carefully examining the way we live on this planet and the consequences of failing to live in harmony with nature.
That is exactly what we're trying to do in this book. It is only available in the Kindle e-book format - which you can read in a free Kindle app on all of your devices. As I just learned this morning, the Kindle app provides a far better reading experience than does the Kindle Cloud Reader that you can find online.
Why no paperback? There are many reasons for only publishing Outcry as an e-book, but the original and primary reason is that this book has hundreds of links to referenced articles, relevant books and short videos.
Those all-important links are simply not possible in a hard-cover, paper-back or audible book. E-books are also far-greener than hard copies as we explain below.
Published on the 50th anniversary of Earth Day
(Please note that there are a few minor technical errors in the current "Outcry" e-book version. If you make a purchase now, corrections to those errors will be electronically "pushed" out to all of your e-book devices within 2-3 weeks)
Three quotes illustrating the tone of this book
One of the nine "big picture" scientists who are featured in Chapter Four is Dr. James Lovelock. The first of his many quotes in this book appears at the beginning of Chapter One:
"We have to stop thinking of human needs and rights alone. Let us be brave and see that the real threat comes from the living earth, which we have harmed and is now at war with us."
-
James Lovelock, Creator of Gaia Theory
The last chapter begins with this quote by the Pulitzer Prize winning, Harvard professor of biology, E.O. Wilson:
"We should preserve every scrap of biodiversity as priceless while we learn to use it
and come to understand what it means to humanity"
-
E.O. Wilson, PhD, Biology, Harvard
At the end of that last chapter, which is entitled Jolted into Thinking Differently, there is a quote that conveys a bit of hope for us in the next few hundred years as we humans strive to establish a harmonious relationship with the biosphere that gave us birth:
"If we were logical, the future would be bleak, indeed. But we are more than logical. We are human beings, and we have faith, and we have hope, and we can work."
-Jacques Cousteau
The Bottom Line.
The escalating
outcries
from nature reinforce the fact that we're running out of time to get any traction when it comes to slowing climate change enough to buy the time needed for designing, building and populating a completely new civilization that will enable us to actually
improve
the natural world.
Our book is aimed at sparking a global conversation about how we might totally replace our harmful and wasteful way of living with one that is far greener - and infinitely more sustainable - than the way we are living today in the developed world.
Ending on a hopeful note, I want to share this recent quote from my friend, Dr. Peter Wadhams, who is one of the nine "big-picture" scientists featured in Chapter Four of this book. I lifted the following from a recent email that he sent to me. It's regarding what it means to be hopeful:
"It's surely better to retain hope, so long as that hope regulates and moderates one's actions in trying to play a small part in saving the world.
-Peter Wadhams, PhD, Ocean Physics
Professor Emeritus, University of Cambridge
Published on the 50th anniversary of Earth Day.
E-books are far greener. With e-books, no trees have to die and the books do not need to be manufactured and shipped to customers. As a bonus, our e-book is not only less expensive, but also provides readers immediate access to hundreds of references and videos via hyperlinks that appear within the text.
The books are also searchable and you can copy and paste excerpts - greatly enhancing the reading experience. And, with e-books on all of your devices, you can always have something meaningful to read - even in the dark.
For us, this decision was a no brainer, as we would feel like hypocrites if we had chosen to distribute this book - that is all about sustainability - in any other format.
Finally, if you have three electronic devices, you essentially get three copies for the price of one.
PS: You may be wondering how you can help promote the never-ending search for a way to save our species. You can get me in front of some audiences that you think might be ready to hear about the long-overdue, global "conversation" about our survival.
During this time of social distancing, I would be happy to speak to your group via a highly sustainable, virtual mode.
As always, I am just trying to spark a global conversation about what is needed. By sharing a vision of what I believe is possible, I hope to influence others to think bigger, better and bolder.
********************
As for speaking, I continue to search for mainstream audiences who may have an interest in learning more about a realistically hopeful vision for our future - and their role in making that vision come true. During the pandemic, let me know if you'd like to set up a Zoom virtual talk with your group.
In the months ahead, I will continue to focus on the urgent need for a totally reinvented greening of our civilization - beginning with a model in the USA that could be applied globally over the next fifty years.
Upcoming talks
: There are lots of open dates on my calendar as my next scheduled talk is
at
Camp Plant-Stock
in Black Mountain, NC, in August, although it may turn out to be virtual.
As for the specifics of my topic, I invite you to
contact me directly
about how I might tailor my presentation to best suit an audience you may have in mind:
Universities,
churches, think-tanks, legislative bodies, environmental
organizations, alumni associations, leadership clubs, PTA's
and/or civic groups who may appreciate a message of reality and hope for our future.
What else can you do to help?
Three things:
1. Live as greenly as possible while doing all that you can to raise the awareness of "big picture" solutions that are crucially necessary for saving our civilization.
2. Share this BSB and my
"Mama Ain't Happy" BSB with prominent journalists, thought leaders and/or elected officials whom you respect. They need to learn a lot more about the many reasons why
Mama ain't happy.
3. Here are a few more GRATOLA-related blogs that you can share with your most powerful friends, leaders, journalists and movie producers.
Until next time, just remember...
Humanity is on a collision course with Nature.
A damaged Nature will survive. We may not.
We must change course to avert an ecological disaster.
This SOS Memo series was created by:
J. Morris (Jim) Hicks
CEO, 4Leaf Global, LLC
In the past two years, I have spoken at a
VegFest in
Fort Myers, at
vsh.org
in Honolulu and Kahului, Maui, the
College of the Holy Cross
in Worcester, MA, a
Plant Powered Manhattan
event in New York, at a lakeside health conference in
South Haven, Michigan, in Buffalo, NY, at the
University of Scranton, at Dr.
Fuhrman's
Golden Gate Health Getaway
in California and at the
Healthy World Sedona Health and Sustainability Conference in AZ.
Promoting health, hope and harmony on planet Earth
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