Fun with GIS 301: Giving Thanks
At this Thanksgiving, may those least scathed by the last 12 months rejoice and give thanks.
Few years have tested our species so deeply on so many fronts. Droughts and fires, storms and floods, heat waves and cold snaps torment billions. Famines and pests conspire with human tempest to compound desperation for many. Coursing through us all, an invisible sinister foe levers against us our weakness in thinking, action, or genes. Despite these pains, our gross numbers keep rising, our impact compounding. Around us, the air, water, and life of our inherited world cry quietly and buckle under the ravages of centuries.
Yet we who still stand should rejoice. At no time have we been more able to detect and document the impact of forces. Our growing capacity to see, analyze, understand, and share the patterns and relationships of our many tormentors lets us uncover and point the way to survival; scientists, seers, and students do it. We’ve shown we can change the world. We need only the will to steer that change.
So let us give thanks for the power to discover so much, for the vision to explore alternative futures, and for the wisdom to choose … and then call for the courage to act. May we in the coming year be wise enough to see the hard road that leads toward safety … and be bold enough to run it, bringing along even those most vulnerable.
