Seven Days Moon special

I’m on the panel of Seven Days at noon with art critic Mike Catto, writer Annie McCartney and Colin Johnston, who is science communications officer at the Planetarium in Armagh.

The producer’s brief arrived on Friday with the issues the programme hopes to cover. This happens before all TV and radio debates and allows the participants to do some general preparation in advance. 

It is of course live radio so you never know what will happen and often all the issues listed in the original brief do not get covered. But the big rule is; never turn up at a studio without some idea of what you will be discussing.

Another email greeted me this morning, this one from NASA with a link to an interview with Astronaut Michael Collins 40 years on. Turns out he is no fan of the A list…

Celebrities? What nonsense, what an empty concept for a person to be, as my friend the great historian Daniel Boorstin put it, “known for his well-known-ness.” How many live-ins, how many trips to rehab, maybe–wow–you could even get arrested and then you would really be noticed. Don’t get me started.

But also a bit of a environmental pacifist – local politicians take note!

I really believe that if the political leaders of the world could see their planet from a distance of 100,000 miles their outlook could be fundamentally changed. That all-important border would be invisible, that noisy argument silenced. The tiny globe would continue to turn, serenely ignoring its subdivisions, presenting a unified façade that would cry out for unified understanding, for homogeneous treatment. The earth must become as it appears: blue and white, not capitalist or Communist; blue and white, not rich or poor; blue and white, not envious or envied.”

Small, shiny, serene, blue and white, FRAGILE.

Does he think it would look the same today?

Yes, from the moon, but appearances can be deceiving. It’s certainly not serene, but definitely fragile, and growing more so. When we flew to the moon, our population was 3 billion; today it has more than doubled and is headed for 8 billion, the experts say. I do not think this growth is sustainable or healthy. The loss of habitat, the trashing of oceans, the accumulation of waste products – this is no way to treat a planet.