That day in the sky, but I don’t remember seeing them there. I didn’t know how to look yet. These stars are much older than the rest.
It was right after these. I’m told they were good for the city. Those stars are indicative of the eras passing and forming.
It was before these stars came around, but it feels like they were present and helped.
I’m sure that there are more and that these are only the beginning.
The 21st century: mankind has colonized the last unexplored region on Earth; the ocean. As captain of the seaQuest and its crew, we are its guardians. For beneath the surface lies the future.
This video was made from stills taken by Donald R. Pettit during his stay at the International Space Station in 2003. I can’t help, but feel moved when I watch this. You can see so much, the many stars in the background, the lights, man. It is real. It is really happening. This is outer space. This is the Earth’s atmosphere.
In my growing fascination in outer space I’ve decided I want to visit a lot of observatories and planetariums in 2008. I’m not sure how many I will actually get to go to, but it’s happening. The idea came to me when I learned that Dr. Bronner donated 1,000 acres of land at the base of Mount Palomar to the Boys and Girls Club of San Diego. I realized I have never been to the Palomar Observatory. I’ve lived in San Diego since I was 5 and never have gone. It’s a crying shame. I would have gone there first, but their tours don’t happen until April.
Last week we went to Griffith Observatory because the Total Lunar Eclipse was happening and because Julie and Johanna gave me passes for my birthday, which was a profoundly thoughtful gift (thank you so much). It was amazing and beautiful and moving, but first, a little history on the observatory.
Griffith Observatory is named after a man named Griffith Griffith. Griffith Griffith gave the land to the city of Los Angeles for the creation an observatory and park because he believed all great cities need a great park. “[Griffith Griffith] believed that an individual gained an enlightened perspective when looking at the skies.” I really dig this outlook. That somehow we will all be better more whole people if we look at the sky. Whoa. This guy is rad! Listen to what he said: “If all [humankind] could look through that telescope, it would change the world!“1
Although it was cold and windy and rainy the sky was clear enough for us to see the Total Lunar Eclipse. It was red and darkened. I kept thinking about how it was happening and that space exists. I didn’t get any good photos with my tiny camera though. And they had telescopes setup on the lawn that we didn’t use because it was packed out. Star party!
The planetarium show was particularly moving. It’s called “Centered in the Universe.” It is really hopeful and inspiring and I think I cried. Sort of the “we are all in this together” vibe. We sat directly next to the star projector and when it rose up it sort of blew me away, the device itself, not just the star projections. It’s so great and massive and accurate. I sight to see. Also, as a side note, the Griffith Observatory has a Tesla Coil, which is worth the trip in itself.
Thanks to my pals at Radio Lab1 I found out a great deal more about Voyager. Yeah, that Voyager. And it involves Carl Sagan. Between my limited knowledge and experience, I hadn’t heard about this before Radio Lab introduced it to me.
So it’s 1977, Ann Druyan and Carl Sagan, put together a compilation of all the world’s media, a basic view of humanity to be launched into space. The idea began with Pioneer 10 and 11, “destined to be the first man made object to escape from the solar system into interstellar space,” which carried small plaques to show scientifically educated inhabitants of some other star system, who might intercept it millions of years from now, when Pioneer was launched, from where, and by what kind of beings.“2 Whoa. Right? So they were so inspired by this idea that they wanted to do something on a larger scale.
The plan was to include gold records on two probes sent into interstellar space. Using gold the records will last for a very long time. Longer than life will exist on Earth. A really long time. The records were coated in Uranium something, which “has a half-life of 4.51 billion years.“3 THAT long. (Plus, gold records look really bad-ass.) The idea was to send a message with these probes, a short description of where they originated. Unlike the plaques on Pioneer 10 and 11, the gold records would include sound. The contents of the records are well documented elsewhere, if you want to read more about it. NASA also has a sample of the recordings and images.
Where is Voyager now? About here. Somewhere in open space. WHAT? The furthest humanmade object away from Earth? Whoa, this is seriously beyond my mind’s capacity.
Voyager 1 is now at the outer edge of our solar system, in an area called the heliosheath, the zone where the sun’s influence wanes. This region is the outer layer of the ‘bubble’ surrounding the sun, and no one knows how big this bubble actually is. Voyager 1 is literally venturing into the great unknown and is approaching interstellar space. Traveling at a speed of about one million miles per day, Voyager 1 could cross into interstellar space within the next 10 years.
“Interstellar space is filled with material ejected by explosions of nearby stars,” Stone said. “Voyager 1 will be the first human-made object to cross into it.“4
It’s been about 2 weeks since I originally heard about this, and I can’t decide what to think about it. I’m blown away that an object we made is that far into the unknown. I keep tripping on the idea of an eternal time capsule (not really eternal, but come on! It’s close enough.) AND the distant, unlikely event of someone ever finding and playing the record! All that traveling through space and time to arrive where?!
So what I’m getting at, what would you choose to be a semi-eternal representation of yourself or humanity? And, I know, this is sort of a hypothetical question, but it is still important.
This blows my mind forever. I have a hard time believing this. I can’t see it. But it is happening. Thinking in context about how big an area that hexagon is versus how much space I occupy in the universe. It takes me a second to contextualize this. An infinite amount of seconds. Distances we measure in time. And at this same moment horrible things are happening. People are being brutalized and killed and I can’t get over the universe or myself or some planet.
