Counter-culture turned cyber-culture visionary Stewart Brand (influencer of Wired, Steve Jobs amongst of others) campaigned in 1966 for the release of a then-rumored NASA satellite photo of the Earth from space. The blue marble image, well represented by the 1972 Apollo 17 one, is iconic and revolutionary. Brand says it induced mystical experiences as people got their heads around how magnificent our island in a sea of darkness truly is.
Boingboing pointed out this photo of the Earth and Moon taken by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera from Mars.
I've often wanted to see a photo of planets in space combined with another with a long enough exposure time to image the stars one would see appearing in the 'blackness' if one were in space.
The blackness, introduced by a limit in our imaging equipment, is misleading. It makes us feel alone rather than at awe by the possibility that many of the bright dots surrounding us may each have a blue, green or red rocky marble with thriving intelligence in seeming contradiction of the law of increasing entropy.
