“Is this the best moment ever? Are we on the brink of extinction? Can both be true?”
So begins Lily Cole in her forthcoming book Who Cares Wins, a very Upsidey piece of work which manages to champion not one “ism” but two. Cole’s central argument is that if we are going to confront the looming climate catastrophe, we will need not just a prodigious surge in environmentalism but a huge dose of optimism as well.
The model, actress and activist articulates this well: optimism isn’t childish credulity or pretending things aren’t very serious. It isn’t the cynical tropes of the political classes eager to get voters to suspend their disbelief. Optimism, she says, is the belief that goodness can prevail, “that the long moral arc of the universe does bend towards justice”.
Oh, and it’s much better than pessimism at actually getting things done.
We felt Cole’s book was so perfectly attuned to the Upside that we optimistically invited her on to the Upside, live! to talk about hope, the environment, and all those inspiring agents of change out there.
She agreed. The event takes place on Friday 31 July at 1pm BST. Tickets are inexpensive, easy to get and here, in that order. Book now, and let me know whether you think optimism is enough, and I’ll endeavour to put your point to Lily during the hour-long chat.
In answer to Cole’s opening question – yes, of course both are true. It’s perfectly possible for two seemingly contradictory ideas to co-exist. Just look at this week’s Upside pieces:
Promising progress on the vaccine front (but Covid still rampant) Two-minute read
The ultimate compliment: it makes us both feel great Three-minute read
Can a great leader ever be two people? Three-minute read
The rise and rise of the bicycle (in a country where it’s a deadly form of transport) Two-minute read
Get in touch with your favourite contradictory ideas that co-exist. We’ll publish some of the best in coming weeks. Next week: what you said about population.
Lucky numbers
$1.15m. That’s how much Greta Thunberg won in the inaugural Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity. It’s also the amount she is giving away.
That is more money than I can begin to imagine, but all the prize money will be donated, through my foundation, to different organisations and projects who are working to help people on the front line, affected by the climate crisis and ecological crisis.”
In other environmental news, the likely range of global warming this century has narrowed to between 2.6C-3.9C. Apocalyptic predictions of warming of more than 5C now seem less likely.
And elsewhere, it’s apparently good times for books, bad times for coal. Book sales nudged up 4% in the UK last year. Coal will soon be discontinued as a fuel source in Portugal – the third European country to turn its back on the black stuff.
What we liked
The Seattle Times has a series called Stepping Up, which focuses on moments of compassion and community. We particularly liked this week’s piece on an initiative to connect farming surplus to food banks in Washington state.
And we enjoyed this project to display Unesco world heritage sites as they once were.
Where was the Upside
Somewhere out there, buried in this the largest 3D map of the universe ever published.
