Anne McClain Quotes

My space expedition has changed my perspective towards people. Looking down at the Earth, we could not see borders or people with different nationalities. It was then that realisation dawned on us that all of us are a group of human beings and citizens of the universe.

To see the earth as it truly is, small and blue in that eternal silence where it floats, is to see riders on the earth together, brothers on that bright loveliness in the eternal cold - brothers who know now they are truly brothers.

We are convinced of the fundamental unity of the human family.

It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars.

Ultimately, we actually all belong to only one tribe, to Earthlings.

You might have heard about a transformation that can occur when someone first sees Earth from space - how it becomes harder to think about 'my country' or 'my people' and harder not to think about 'our planet.' I can tell you, that transformation is real.

If we looked down at the world from space, we would not see any demarcations of national boundaries. We would simply see one small planet, just one.

See others as yourself. See families as your family. See towns as your town. See countries as your country. See worlds as your world.

Once you've been in space, you appreciate how small and fragile the Earth is.

The whole world is a man's birthplace.

Americans easily forget that the air they breathe is the same as those in Europe or Africa or Asia; it's the same air as Jesus breathed. I would like them to remember that connection.

We are one species, one people. Every individual on this earth is a member of 'homo sapiens sapiens,' and the geographical variations we see among peoples are simply biological nuances on the basic theme.

Creative people have no barriers. Ultimately, it's connecting with human beings. There's just one planet. I don't see it as different countries.

Spaceflight gives us a chance to reflect on the context of our existence. We are reminded that we are human before any of our differences, before all of the lines are drawn that divide us.

Anyone who goes to space tried to look at his own country first, but soon it appears that there is no boundary between the countries and the entire world is one family where our destinies are integrated.

How many years has it taken people to realize that we are all brothers and sisters and human beings in the human race? I mean how many years does it take people to see that? We're all in this rat race together!

As you pass from sunlight into darkness and back again every hour and a half, you become startlingly aware how artificial are thousands of boundaries we've created to separate and define. And for the first time in your life you feel in your gut the precious unity of the Earth and all the living things it supports.

We so desperately long for all of us to learn that we are meant for one another. We are meant for complementarity. The Syrians are members of our family.

It's been written about as "the overview effect." All I can give you is my perspective, but most all of the people who have been in space start to see the world without boundaries. You start to think about how we can keep doing these things we're doing that are destructive of the environment and destructive of the planet. It causes you to start to think things in a quite different way than we had before.

The peoples of the earth are one family.

There is no first world and third world. There is only one world, for all of us to live and delight in.

People need to be made conscious of a very simple reality: we have no choice but to share this planet, this small blue sphere floating in the vast reaches of space, with all of our fellow 'passengers.'

I think it's really important that we understand that we share this world and we're connected to it.

We are all cells in the same body of humanity.