Common Earth Insights: Developing a Systemic Understanding of Climate Change
Improve your understanding of the diverse systems contributing to the climate crisis to effectively identify high-impact opportunities and optimize your efforts.
Through our comprehensive program, you'll develop an ability to zoom out, which helps to reveal the interconnectedness of seemingly unrelated issues. You will develop insights in the domains of systems thinking, socioeconomics, philosophy, and psychology, all through a scientific lens, thus empowering you to confidently be part of the change!
Course Outcomes
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Gain a fresh perspective on the interconnected systems driving the climate crisis.
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Empower yourself by grasping the pivotal role of our thoughts in shaping experiences and discover how to channel this insight for enhanced creativity and resilience.
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Cultivate empathy to better understand the consciousness levels of others.
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Develop versatile skills that can be applied in various aspects of life.
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Acquire valuable insights that enable you to strategically leverage your actions.
Duration: 3 months with 2 sessions per week
Session length: 2 hours
Format: Online - Live & Interactive sessions
Group size: 20 participants
Time Commitment: 7 hours per week (2 live sessions of 2 hours each plus 1.5 hours of prework per session.
Investment: This program is fully sponsored by Common Earth. A donation to support the continuation of the program is optional and appreciated at the end of the course.​
Course Content
The course identifies several universal principles that help participants to make sense of the world around them. Then, we zoom in to explore some key systems contributing to the climate crisis, while also exploring ways that we can respond to help move us towards a more sustainable and caring society.
The Climate Crisis
We explore the growing anthropogenic causes and implications of our changing climate as well as how to best respond . This element is present throughout the course and permeates all other themes.
Systems Thinking
Understanding systems thinking equips us with a more holistic understanding of how the dynamics and principes that can help us make sense of the behaviours of even the most complex system. Understanding the world this way provides transferrable skills that allows for a more fulsome understanding of the dynamics of any situation. This enables us to see what is holding the present system in place, and where to intervene to create positive change. Using this scientific approach to solving problems, we are more likely to be successful while avoiding unintended consequences.
The Principles of Human Experience
One of the foundational premises for Common Earth is the centrality of thought and our ability to be the authors of our own experiences. Once we understand that this is common to all human systems, it becomes that much easier to see how we can write a different story that serves us and the planet better.
The Origin Story
Every civilization has an origin story. These stories bind a community together and give meaning to individual lives. While honouring the world's cultural diversity, the world now needs a global unifying story of how we came into being. We will explore deep time and the history of the universe, as we get to today and consider future generations. Modern mathematical cosmology is the awe-inspiring story that unifies all beings on the planet and addresses the oneness of it all.
The Economy
With the support of new economic theories, we explore how our current economic systems are creating the climate crisis. From corporate monopolies to the role of debt, and to the growing concentration of wealth; we will explore how these aspects of our current economic and social systems also engender the climate crisis. With that understanding, we move into Modern Monetary Theory and inclusive economic models that can move us towards an empowering community.
Heat, Work, Temperature and Energy
Through a deeper understanding of fundamental physics principles of thermodynamics, we will reach a richer understanding of how energy systems work and our dependency on them in our daily lives. This will empower us to understand the constraints we have to work under, and how to move to a post-carbon caring society.
The Food System
An exploration that allows us to contrast the idealized image of food production with the harsh reality of the industrial food system. This system is nested within other complex systems, including ecology, economics, and culture. Industrial agriculture emits GHGs and disrupts critical feedback loops, hastening climate change. To create a sustainable food system, we must address this complexity, reevaluate practices, and promote a sustainable model for nourishing the planet while maintaining habitability.
Regenerative Agriculture
Current industrial agriculture practices release up to ¼ of the planet’s carbon emissions. This impacts both climate change and soil quality. At this rate, we will run out of arable soil within 60 years. Regenerative agriculture approaches farming with a focus on growing healthy soil, plants, and ecosystems while putting carbon in its place.
Biomimicry
The science of biomimicry is to understand ecological solutions to problems encountered in nature over millions of years and apply those solutions in our technological world. From aerodynamics to colour-changing properties, the natural world has elegant solutions to our sustainability problems if we only look to the wisdom of nature to guide us.
Community
With a deeper understanding of how natural communities work in partnerships that thrive through operating in support and reciprocity, we become empowered to see the connections in our own lives. This enables us to create stronger caring communities in our own lives and for the sustainability of the environment as a whole.
"I joined this program hoping to help make positive change in the world and it went way beyond that, starting with a deep personal change. This program is life-changing and a force for good! Every single human should go through this experience!"
- Felipe, Netherlands
Course Requirements
1 /
The course is fully delivered in English and requires fluency for acitve participation.
2 /
Reliable and consistent internet access to join interactive Zoom sessions, including the use of participant's audio and video.
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Commitment to attend sessions and complete prework.
Once your spot has been confirmed, we ask that you honour the commitment to maximize both your own experience and that of the group.
Registration Steps
01.
Complete the registration form.
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A team member schedules a zoom call with you.
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Align expectation and ask questions .
04.
Provide us with a short bio.
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You place is confirmed.
Upcoming Sessions
September 9th to December 12th, 2024
Mondays and Thursdays
All times in Eastern Time*
Group 1 - 8 am to 10 am
Group 2 - 12 pm to 2 pm
Group 3 - 6 pm to 8 pm
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*If connecting from a country that does not have daylight savings, please consider that the time you take the course may change slightly after November 3rd when daylight savings time ends.
Time Zone | Group 1 | Group 2 | Group 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
UTC +8 | 8 pm | 12 am | 6 am |
Eastern Time (EDT) | 8 am | 12 pm | 6 pm |
Pacific Time (PDT) | 5 am | 9 am | 3 pm |
Brasilia | 9 am | 1 pm | 7 pm |
GMT | 12 pm | 4 pm | 10 pm |
CEST | 2 pm | 6 pm | 12 am |
CAT | 2 pm | 6 pm | 12 am |
IST | 5:30 pm | 9:30 pm | 3:30 am |