Posted by Davin Flateau on 3 Jun 2005 at 9:45 pm.
Filed under Astronomy.
Today, I was reminded of a fantastic passage from Carl Sagan’s book Pale Blue Dot – one of his last books before he passed away in 1996. I thought it would be good food for thought as we all depart our separate ways for the weekend.
It’s a comment on a picture from the Voyager 1 probe, as it looked back from the edge of the solar system. It’s the picture on the left. That’s the Earth. If you can’t see it, get closer to the monitor – it’s that slightly brighter dot hiding in the grain of the image. Yep, you’re there.
Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there - on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
- Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot
Phil Plait on 6 Jun 2005 at 2:48 pm: 1
That’s funny– I have a draft entry to my own blog about Pale Bliue Dot, because of the Messenger image of the Earth and Moon. I may still do it, but it’s nice to see great minds thinking alike.
dflateau on 6 Jun 2005 at 3:10 pm: 2
Go for it! That Messenger pic is what got me thinking of the Voyager images, too. Wierd cosmic forces may be at work. Hey, I could always use a million dollars!