I know it was posted earlier in the thread, but the greatness of Carl Sagan's words, twinned with the most incredible photo ever taken, must be reposted. please log in to view this image We succeeded in taking that picture, and, if you look at it, you see a dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever lived, lived out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings, thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every hopeful child, every mother and father, every 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. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilt by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of the dot on scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner of the dot. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.
It was posted by me in fact. Don't know if you ever saw the TV series Sagan did called "Cosmos", or have read the published book of it "The Pale Blue Dot". Both were phenomenal. Thoroughly recommend them.
I've been able to see most of it, but not every episode. It's a superb show, and is imo as good as Planet Earth, possibly better (but I am more interested in space than life here to be honest). I do have a copy of the book somewhere which was gifted to me, but I'm not sure exactly where it is. EDIT: Just checked, and the entire series is on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKSi40WEKtMxykDBP8_vrC6bKXotys8KJ
Thanks. I actually copied the whole series onto VHS off the telly when it was first broadcast - must be 30 years ago maybe ? Have digitized it since. Rewatch it every couple of years. Planet Earth excellent too.
Have you watched Tyson's Cosmos? I think it's superb but not as good as the original, and I think it comes down to Sagan, to be honest. Tyson's a great host, he's just no Sagan.
It was on Netflix until recently, but it seems to have been removed, which is a shame. I have a 100% definitely legally gained copy on my external hard drive, but I can't see a version of it on the interweb.
If it was on Netflix, one of my friends or ex-colleagues will have copied it, so long as it wasn't in the last 1.5 years. One way or another - I'm just puzzled why I've never heard about it ! Can't keep up with everything I suppose when dementia is looming
I think it originally came out in 2014 but I only saw it about 18 months ago. To be fair, I can't think of anyone better suited to take the mantle of Carl Sagan other than Neil DeGrasse Tyson. Brian Cox maybe, but I don't know how many yanks would react to him.
I've seen a number of Tyson's video's on Cosmology etc, ( copied them even) , so maybe I didn't get the "Cosmos" connection. He's extremely good, as is Cox.
Where did NASA get it's live transmission from? If you relied on the film "The Dish" you would be wrong!
I watched it with my Mum in our flat in Weston Court, Weston Road. Stayed up late to watch it. Still remember the excitement and have really enjoyed all the programmes over the last couple of weeks. I was 12.