"If we do not stop degrading the natural environment, it will collapse, so we must harmonise our global society with the natural world. If we allow global inequalities to remain embedded, we will perpetuate hardship on a vast scale, so we must harmonise our human cultures with one another. And if we continue to desire ever-increasing consumption without regard to its negative effects, we will suffer terrible consequences, so we must harmonise our aspirations with our opportunities."

Instead of going to bed at night dreaming of mining the minerals on Mars or finding some new pool of water on an asteroid, we need to ask ourselves some burning questions about our vision of life on Earth.

Now is the time to offer new political narratives—inspired by Indigenous ways of knowing, living, and being—that speak to a flourishing of ecologically-rooted communities and genuine prosperity. Now is the time for economic localisation. It is the way human beings can become part of the Cure of the Earth, the Cura da Terra, as Indigenous peoples have been since time immemorial.

Wall Street’s stock market is not the economy of the Main Street and while Wall Street and the financial system is an essential part of any market economy, it is a complex and fragile network of trust. The lesson of the current financial crisis is that such networks are prone to abuse and then to collapse. So, now what?

Alnoor: ...There is no doubt that we are in the midst of unprecedented moment where there is no return to old certainties. Part of this pain that we are facing in the world is a pathway toward transformation. Or will we perish in the horror of the onslaught that we are facing?