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Geotherapy Declaration

Mission Statement for Geotherapy Institute for Art and Field Science:

The mission of the The Geotherapy Institute for Art and Field Sciences is to end the Sixth Mass Extinction and to restore and heal our shared biosphere.  We spearhead global environmental restoration projects through the lens of art and science with the goal of creating prototype projects to instill a global bioetic geared toward collaborative stewardship for our shared in which humans actively nurture and create symbiotic relationships with damaged ecosytems. Our projects are carefully researched to become global examples for approved methods of environmental remediation and restoration. The ultimate goal is to create enough awareness, through art, open source material and education, to influence international regulation for safe and beneficial restoration practices using the Earth’s own natural biological cycles and processes as a means for change. 

Each project will encompass an education outreach program devoted to the people of the damaged region where the restoration is occurring. These education initiatives will foster indegienious and local communties to become global citizens to take pride in, and become stewards of, their own back yards. Ultimately, the outcome will be a healthy harmonious biosphere in which humans have a shared goal to protect and nourish their environment. The final goal is to create poetic examples of sustainable restoration practices, through the creation of thoroughly vetted open source data a basis for international global regulation to protect our shared biosphere.

Methodology:

Art attracts attention and has the capacity to capture the imagination and inspire both scientists and non-scientists to take responsibility in what ever way is available to them in essence to become global citizens that care for the planet.   Our methodology to effect change locally by involving indegenous, local communties and youth to engage with the science, materials and the ecology in each region coupled with  powerful and unique restoration artwork,  Through art and science, our vision is to mobilize action to heal the planet.

For example, art science restoration projects can repair ecologically damaged areas, making them examples of how remediation can and should be done while simultaneously acting as eco-art and tourist destinations.  Hence a symbiotic relationship with nature will be established.

 

Three Phases:

To achieve our mission of establishing a shared global bioethic—a universal doctrine that embraces the notion that, if we as a species act now together, humans can repair the damage caused by anthropogenic activity—the Geotherapy Institute for Art and Field Sciences will work in three phases. 

Phase One:

Feild sites will be identified, and field researchers will collect data about these damaged sites. And research the past history of the site in terms of its geology and ecology, and how humans  have interacted with the site in both positive and negative ways.  In addition, research into indigenous culture from each site will be researched and collected and integrated into the final design of the work.   Like doctors healing a patient, Geotherapy researchers will create data-backed sitespecific diagnoses and prescribe remedies to heal each site and will work with local inhabitants to create a symbiotic relationship with each site.

Phase Two:

Creation of a series of prototyped art projects based on the recommendations of each scientific team. These projects will function as restoration and remediation sites and become “earth works” that can inspire and galvanize the public to get involved in healing our injured ecosystems. In each of these site-specific works, the viewer will engage with work that creates a positive symbiotic loop between the artist and the living landscapes they inhabit. Each such work could beconsidered a “grand gesture” or homage to our diverse and living biosphere and our place as humans within it.

 Phase Three:

Creation of peer reviewed open source data with which we hope to inform international regulation of safe and effective restoration practices. 

Declaration for Geotherapy and Bioethics:

The following are the results of a panel discussion on May 17, 1991 at the Conference at Universite Claude Bernard in Lyons, France: Accelerating environmental degradation threatens the habitability of the biosphere. We believe that corrective action is possible and urgent.

  • Our goal is long-term survival in an acceptably maintained ecosystem.
  • We, as human beings, take full responsibility for our actions by not sacrificing natural resources for short term gains and by working to make the world a better living place.
  • This choice will influence our biological and cultural evolution; we cannot avoid it without grave consequences.
  • A global bio-ethic should further develop a guide and motivate geotherapy and our cultural evolution.
  • A root problem is excessive demographic growth; the earth’s carrying capacity is being exceeded. With the present style patterns of development pollution of all kinds will increase as long as the population increases.
  • We declare that scientists [people]* of all walks of life should adopt the aforementioned goals and participate in meeting at all levels to apply these principals. 


            *Suggestion from the artist Mara G. Haseltine change word scientist to all “people”  

Citations & References:

  1. R. Grantham, 1992, Conference Report of the Lyon CNRS  Colloquium on Modeling Geotherapy for Global Changes, Global Environmental Change, 2:66-67
  2. Grantham (1993) Reflections after the Lyon colloquium on Geotherapy and the Rio Earth Summit on Environment and Development, Global Bioethics, 6:1, 75-84
  3. V. R. Potter, 1990, Getting to the year 3000: Can global bioethics overcome evolution’s fatal flaw?, Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 34:89-98
  4. Potter V.R. and Grantham 1992, Scientists Responsibility for the Survival of the Human Species, The Scientist 25 May, p 10 and 11
  5. Potter V.R. Bioethics,1971, Bridge to the Future, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., USA Prentice Hall p 24-27, p 107-117
  6. Link to Original Document for CNRS Confrence which coined the phrase Geotherapy Signed by Richard Grantham for 1991 in Lyon, FRANCE.  http://www.soilcarbonalliance.org/2017/10/25/the-original-1991-geotherapy-proposal-to-reverse-global-climate-change/geotherapy_unced_1991/

NOTES:

The sixth Mass Extinction due do anthropogenic climate change has begun In fact on August 9th 2021 the United nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres offically announced after reviewing “The IPCC Working Group 1 Climate Report”  we are now in a “CODE RED” situation in which discruptions due to anthropomorphic climate change threaten humanity’s existence .  Humanity is now faced with the formidable task of reversing climate degradation on a global scale. 

*During the United Nations Conference on the Paris Climate Accord in December 2015 or “COP21” all nations present voted to cap CO2 emissions at 1.5 degrees Celsius. That goal is nowhere within target which is why the need for international regulation is so urgent. Each of our projects will include a lead artist and scientist. Each team will collect data, test hypotheses, and publish peer-reviewed findings in an open source forum. Each project will be a prototype that can be modified and scaled up on a global scale. The scientific data that is collected, as well as the materials that are tested, will inform international regulation of sustainable restoration practices. Therefore, it is critical thatour field science and restoration methods are thoroughly tested before they are published. By generating prototype restoration projects, that outline best restoration practices, that can be replicated, our goal is to provide a wealth of usable knowledgethat will be translated into laws and regulations at a global scale.

NOTE: The Paris Climate Accord or “COP21” was the result of nearly 30 years of UN Negotiations on climate change that began with the Kyoto Protocol in 1992 at Rio de Janeiro when the alarm bell about climate change was first rung on an international stage.

Link Origins and Meaning of the Word “Geotherapy”:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geotherapy.