I ran across a quote by Julian Assange, and it really resonated.
He said, “By getting rid of paper files and replacing them with digital ones they can erase history. One day, you will encounter the message ‘page not found,’ and the next day, you will see them deny it ever actually happened.”
Silence. Then my mind wanders to the data center conundrum.
I’ve already said so much about data centers, but as I told my friend tonight while we were making plans to change the world, “Isn’t it something to be sitting here front and center and part of the Planet Earth Digital Revolution?”
The fact is that the only way the digital revolution snowball is going to stop rolling down the hill is if everyone throws all their digital stuff out the window and goes back to days of yore. Not likely. Or, if Mother Earth decides she’s sick enough and decides to vomit it all neatly away, which would result in a major reboot.
My friend mentioned the fires, earthquakes, and hurricanes as a possible mini-reboot happening, so I did some digging. First, because for those who know me, you’re fully aware I’m convinced a psyop is going on to keep the earthlings living in fear and confusion.
I learned that in 2026, the data for global natural disasters is a mixed bag. According to my trusty AI friend (whom I argue with daily about being incorrect on a number of things), wildfire activity and major earthquakes are tracking within or slightly above long-term averages, while Atlantic hurricane activity has actually seen a sharp decrease.
A metrics breakdown for each disaster indicated that “despite a string of high-profile, devastating earthquakes hitting regions like the Philippines, Venezuela, and Colombia, there is no statistically significant increase in global seismic activity.” By mid-August, the world recorded 11 earthquakes above a magnitude of 7.0. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) notes the annualized pace for 2026 tracks toward roughly 17 major quakes, which sits squarely within the normal historical average of 16 to 18 per year.
It seems my AI was tired of me calling it a liar – knowing how cranky I can be when it lies – and it wrote: “Perception vs. Reality: Rapid modern communication makes us aware of global tremors instantly, making it feel like they happen more frequently.”
As for hurricanes, tropical storm counts are well below average in the Atlantic basin for 2026. The reason is said to be due to a powerful, strengthening “Super El Niño” climate pattern in the Pacific Ocean. El Niño creates high vertical wind shear across the Atlantic, which literally tears developing storms apart before they can organize. In fact, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) downgraded its Atlantic outlook, predicting only seven to 13 named storms and two to six hurricanes (down from the typical average of 14 named storms and seven hurricanes).
As for the wildfires, the Copernicus Climate Change Service said, “Regionally extreme, but globally lower.” In North America and Europe, regions are experiencing highly destructive and intense “fire weather,” fueled by El Niño-driven heat waves and severe regional droughts. In the U.S., acres burned are tracking at roughly 146% of the 10-year average, while parts of Canada and Southern Europe have dealt with severe, runaway blazes. Counterintuitively, total global emissions and total land area burned worldwide have sat at record lows. This is because massive savanna fires in Africa and parts of Asia are way down due to shifting agricultural practices and land use, offsetting the severe blazes making headlines in the West.
By tracking the regional ups and downs of 2026 – counting every hurricane, wildfire, and earthquake – it is easy to get lost in the noise of a world in crisis. But if you step back, a different picture emerges. It is the exact shift in awareness that astronauts experience through what is called the Overview Effect.
The term came from decorated NASA astronaut Ron Garan, who spent 178 days in space and flew on both the US Space Shuttle and the Russian Soyuz spacecraft. He mentioned the Overview Effect, which focuses on how looking at Earth from orbit dissolves human division: “From space, I saw Earth not as a collection of nations, but as a single entity with one destiny.” He also reminded us, “When we look down at the Earth from space, we see this amazing, indescribably beautiful planet. It looks like an iridescent biosphere teeming with life. But when you look closer, in spite of the overwhelming beauty, serious inequity exists on the apparent paradise we have been given.”
Indeed, he is correct, since we can’t even get different religions to get along. Did you know that according to academic and sociological estimates, there are roughly 4,200 active religions on Earth today? While that total includes thousands of small, localized, and indigenous belief systems, the majority of the global population belongs to the “Big Five”: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Judaism. Then come secular/non-religious people, those who practice ethnic and folk religions locally, and minor established faiths like Sikhism, Shinto, Taoism, and the Bahá’í Faith.
From there, I looked up how many political parties are on the Earth worldwide (definitely not getting along in that category).
That number was even more staggering, with an estimate between 5,000 and 7,000 active, legally registered political parties today. Because political parties constantly form, merge, split, and dissolve across the world’s 195 countries, that number is never fixed.
But the main system types include Democratic multi-party systems (India, Brazil, and Indonesia), two-party dominant systems (United States, Jamaica, United Kingdom), and one-party systems (China, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, North Korea). Europe heavily utilizes proportional representation, leading to highly fragmented parliaments where countries like France, Germany, and Italy routinely have dozens of distinct parties competing every cycle. There is also Africa, which has multi-party democracies like South Africa and Nigeria, with hundreds of registered factions contesting national and regional ballots regularly.
And you wonder why you are not supposed to talk about religion and politics at the dinner table.
I looked up a few other astronauts who experienced the Overview Effect and found touching words by Mike Massimino (USA, Space Shuttle): “It looks like a thin blue line... like a fingernail clipping. It’s so tiny and so fragile and such a precious little spot in that universe and you realize it’s everything we have.”
Charlie Duke (USA, Apollo 16, 1972) noted, “If somebody’d said before the flight, ‘Are you going to get a religious experience?’ I would have said ‘No.’ ... But you look down and see that little warm blue thing down there, and you see all the black around it, and it just grabs your soul.”
And Edgar Mitchell (USA, Apollo 14, 1971) observed, “You develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics looks so petty.”
We are all on this planet; round, flat, under a firmament, infinite, or maybe just the matrix, but whatever the case, we are here. And so, for those people who are making religions, politics, and greed the main event, I am going to enjoy the peace instead. It is all we have.
Well, that, and I am going to make myself another espresso martini.
Rita Cook is a freelance writer for The Ellis County Press. She can be reached at rcook13@earthlink.net.