Vision of the Mortal Earth
Astronauts have the peculiar tendency to become active environmentalists upon their return to Terra. This transformation is attributed to the Overview Effect, a radical shift in perspective occasioned by viewing a suddenly finite earth from the black void of space. It is like a reversal of a certain kind of Christian longing to fly away off-world; the desire for transcendence, for escape, for release from earthly cares, as when standing upon the cold stone floor of a church transfixed by the synthetic transcendence of a church architecture promising an unearthly heaven to all those who hate the earth. In the experience of so many astronauts it is precisely heavenly transcendence that gets turned inside out; the astronaut has achieved the old dream of the church, transcended earth in a literal sense, but now curiously, suffers a kind of mental breakdown, a conversion—in the true sense of that word—in which the old fantasies of transcendence blow away like so much smog, and are replaced by a mind-smoking vision of the mortal earth—in all of its fragility and finitude. William Shatner’s 2021 space flight is the most famous example of this conversion: “I hope I never recover from this” he said, weeping. One might call this a revelation of immanence; it is absolutely spiritual, not that different than Buddhist awakening, and is probably the only kind of revelation capable of saving us from ourselves.
