Photograph courtesy of NASA.
For my Earth Day post, I wanted to feature the Earthrise photo taken in 1968 by Apollo Astronaut William Anders. This iconic photo has appeared in numerous magazines and books and on a postage stamp. Earthrise was the cover photo for LIFE Magazine's 100 Photographs that Changed the World and wilderness photographer Galen Rowell called Earthrise "the most influential environmental photograph ever taken.” According to futurist Stewart Brand, it is no coincidence that the first Earth Day took place just 16 months after we first saw our world framed against the vastness of space.
I am featuring the Earthrise photograph today because it, more than any other image, evokes the “Spaceship Earth” worldview. It reminds us that crew survival depends upon working together for the common good, prudent use of our limited resources, and taking care of the fragile blue bubble that feeds us and shelters us from the ravages of space.
Poet Archibald MacLeish expressed his reaction to the photograph in a poem entitled “Riders on Earth Together, Brothers in Eternal Cold," published on page 1 of The New York Times on Christmas day, 1968.
“To see the earth as it truly is, small blue and beautiful in that eternal silence where it floats, is to see ourselves as riders on the earth together, brothers on that bright loveliness in the eternal cold—brothers who know now they are truly brothers”
Context makes this photograph especially important. Taken at the end of one of the most socially and politically tumultuous years in recent memory, Earthrise is powerful for what it does not show – political boundaries, ideological conflicts, the struggle for power, position, and resources. It does not show gender, race, religion, right, or wrong. Instead, it shows one world, one path through the universe, and one sun to light the way. It shows all of us and our shared journey through the cosmos.
I am featuring the Earthrise photograph today because it, more than any other image, evokes the “Spaceship Earth” worldview. It reminds us that crew survival depends upon working together for the common good, prudent use of our limited resources, and taking care of the fragile blue bubble that feeds us and shelters us from the ravages of space.
Poet Archibald MacLeish expressed his reaction to the photograph in a poem entitled “Riders on Earth Together, Brothers in Eternal Cold," published on page 1 of The New York Times on Christmas day, 1968.
“To see the earth as it truly is, small blue and beautiful in that eternal silence where it floats, is to see ourselves as riders on the earth together, brothers on that bright loveliness in the eternal cold—brothers who know now they are truly brothers”
Context makes this photograph especially important. Taken at the end of one of the most socially and politically tumultuous years in recent memory, Earthrise is powerful for what it does not show – political boundaries, ideological conflicts, the struggle for power, position, and resources. It does not show gender, race, religion, right, or wrong. Instead, it shows one world, one path through the universe, and one sun to light the way. It shows all of us and our shared journey through the cosmos.
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Earth Day – April 22, 2014
6 Tech-based Writing Prompts
5 Books for Aspiring SciFi Writers
…and general SciFi articles.
SciFi Writers – The Shamans of Modernity
SciFi and the Dangerfield Effect
SciFi Authors and Editors as Agents of Change
What Would Your Robot Say?
What Were the First SciFi Stories You Read?
Earth Day – April 22, 2014
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