We are in a dramatic period of genuine darkness of reason and the human world now seems to find itself in a strange and complex situation of instability and precariousness, I would venture to say above all, of mental and cultural health.

What is completely astounding today is an increasingly widespread political attitude that attacks scientific knowledge, encourages climate and environmental denialism as a whole, and opposes those who do research on these issues. This fundamentally undermines the very possibility of doing science, as is happening in particular in the USA, which has always been a symbol of an extraordinary capacity for research and scientific culture, recognised the world over.

The new administration of President Donald Trump is trying in every way to counter scientific research with the aim of substituting the fundamental principles of how science is done, for the approaches and visions of its own political ideology.

This is a devastating approach that increases ignorance for a large part of the population.

Unfortunately, today we see widespread scientific ignorance, the operation of denialism and the creation of platforms producing genuine fake truths, such as QAnon with its conspiracy theories.

This is an extremely important issue that operates, mainly through social media, in a globalised world where the extraordinary scientific advances of recent decades (in all disciplines of astrophysics, physics, chemistry, biology, genetics etc.) and their growing and fundamental interrelationships (particularly in the sciences of the Earth system) are ignored by the vast majority of the political and economic world, not to mention the ignorance present on these issues in the vast majority of populations in all countries.

Related to this problem is the widespread functional illiteracy or return illiteracy. For example, the 2024 report of the OECD’s Programme for the international assessment of adult competencies (PIAAC), a Survey of Adult Skills, demonstrates the presence and in some cases the growth of illiteracy in various countries. The skills measured in the survey are essential for individuals to navigate daily life and participate fully in the economy and society. They include reading and understanding written texts (literacy), the ability to comprehend and use mathematical and numerical information (numeracy) and the ability to solve problems in dynamic situations where solutions are not immediately evident (adaptive problem solving). The results point out that a ‘return illiteracy’ such as that which existed in the 1950s looms over our current society, for example, in Italy.

Furthermore, we have numerous concerns over the state of mental health of the population. As the World Health Organisation (WHO) reminds us, mental health is a state of mental well-being that enables people to cope with the stresses of life, realise their abilities, learn and work well and contribute to their community. As the WHO writes, ‘It is an integral component of health and wellbeing that underpins our individual and collective abilities to make decisions, build relationships and shape the world we live in. Mental health is a basic human right. And it is crucial to personal, community and socio-economic development. Mental health is more than the absence of mental disorders’. The WHO publishes annual reports on the subject, as do other research groups such as the Global Mind Project.

This is especially concerning when all the most important documents produced in recent decades on the relationship between Homo sapiens and nature, by United Nations and other international organisations, base their conclusions on fundamental research in Earth system science, including the very important encyclical “Laudato sì” published in 2015 by the extraordinary Pope Francis who sadly passed away recently. This document addresses all humanity to realise an integral ecology. It was based on previous workshops and meetings of several important scientists from the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, and in the press conference where ”Laudato sì” was presented at the Vatican, one of the speakers was Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, a scientist with decades of experience on these issues, and a member of The Club of Rome.

The goal of Earth system science is to obtain scientific understanding of the entire system on a global scale by describing how its component parts and their interactions have evolved, how they function and how they may expect to continue to evolve on all timescales. Its challenge is to develop the capability to predict changes that will occur, both naturally and in response to human activity (National Research Council, 1986, Earth System Science: A program for Global Change, The National Academy Press).

Most of the educational world and our dominant culture all around the world considers Homo sapiens above and even outside of nature. This problematic vision is significantly present in the world of politics, economics and business. This is the basic approach of today’s economic system. In contrast, interdisciplinary Earth system science forms the scientific basis of sustainability and points the way to a truly sustainable world.

To contain the negative effects of scientific denialism, return illiteracy and the mindset distancing humans from nature, I believe we need a major commitment to promoting and activating lifelong learning, especially to promote sustainability. A widespread action to diffuse lifelong learning approaches is fundamental.

We require an unprecedented mobilisation towards a human presence on Earth that is totally sustainable not only from an environmental point of view but also from a social one, satisfying the essential needs for a dignified life for every human being.

In 1979, Aurelio Peccei, founder and the first president of The Club of Rome, stimulated the production of the report ‘No Limits to Learning’. A new report on a new vision of innovative learning, with a provisional title “No limits to hope” is now underway It can be the catalyst for widespread lifelong learning. We have no future unless we have limitless hope for changing it.