A Shift in Focus Towards Planetary Awareness and Identity
Shifting
By 2015, the last of the funding with which David built the Overview Institute, was gone, and he radically downsized while continuing to research, write and work online. Frank, with a bit more personal funding was able to continue to make appearances for the Institute at away events.
David spent much of the next two years researching and writing his first book, focusing more on the core issues of the Overview Effect; planetary awareness and identity. A potential agent urged him to get some of the material published in recognized publications, which would allow the agent to represent the book to publishers. His first major article focusing on the substance in the book, The Case for Planetary Awareness, was published in the authoritative aerospace industry magazine, Space Times in 2016.
New Institutes
Much of our Institute work in the first half of 2017 was spent working with Richard Whitehurst to create the first spin-off of the Institute, the Overview Institute of Australia, now a growing and fully functioning Overview organization itself. Also, that year, The First International Symposium on the Overview Effect was held at the Columbus Space Center in Kerkrade, the Netherlands, where Frank was the keynote speaker, and which increased European interest in the Overview Effect.Negotiations are now in process to create an Overview Institute in Germany. Others in Europe to follow
Negotiations are now in process to create an Overview Institute in Germany. Others in Europe to follow.
Human Space Program
In 2018, with the Institute still not funded, and David’s funding exhausted, Frank began developing a new non-profit, The Human Space Program, focused on his original intent to bring the entire human space initiative together around the philosophy laid out in his books (now in three editions).
While David worked on a second major piece for publication, Frank began working with Cosmic Perspective to put together a group to support the HSP. With the Covid virus cutting back on travel and conference events, this provided a focus for a weekly Zoom event to begin developing the HSP, which has been going strong and growing ever since. David participated in and supported the online sessions while beginning the development of what became, in early 2021, The Center for Planetary Identity.