We Who Are the Grass of the Universe... – Keynote speech and conversation on our relationship with the universe in a time of climate crisis

In the third decade of the 21st century, we are witnessing two opposing tendencies: on the one hand, we have the environmental movement trying to save a habitable Earth in the face of ecological collapse; on the other, we see rapidly growing space exploration and an industry driven by a utopian desire to populate space and disengage from our planet. But environmentalism and space research need not be at odds. On the contrary, the development of research on potentially habitable exoplanets or the current speculation about the development of intelligent life in space can be seen as examples of their alliance. Why should the environmental movement seek such an alliance? Shouldn't we rather, in Bruno Latour's words, go back to Earth? What can environmentalism and space research achieve together?

Speaker: Lukáš Likavčan 

Moderated by: Klára Peloušková