The Pale Blue Dot is a photograph of planet Earth taken in 1990 by Voyager 1 from a record distance, showing it against the vastness of space. Both the idea for taking the distant photo and the title came from scientist and astronomer Carl Sagan, who also wrote the 1994 book of the same name.In 2001, it was selected by Space.com as one of the top ten space science photos.Voyager 1 was launched on September 5, 1977. Sagan had pushed for Voyager to take a photo of the Earth when its vantage point reached the edge of the solar system. On February 14, 1990, having completed its primary mission, NASA commanded the spacecraft to turn around to photograph the planets of the Solar System. Between February 14, 1990 and June 6, 1990, one image Voyager returned was of Earth, showing up as a “pale blue dot” in the grainy photo.
In his book, Pale Blue Dot, Sagan wrote:
“While almost everyone is taught that the Earth is a sphere with all of us somehow glued to it by gravity, the reality of our circumstance did not really begin to sink in until the famous frame-filling Apollo photograph of the whole Earth — the one taken by the Apollo 17 astronauts on the last journey of humans to the Moon.”
In a commencement address delivered May 11, 1996, Sagan related his thoughts on the deeper meaning of the photograph:
Internet portal UniverseToday.com reported yesterday on article published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics journal. The article is a study of what might have happened if chlorofluorocarbons (the chemical compounds responsible for so-called ozone hole effect) were not banned.
It is now clear, that with the Montreal Protocol (The first ever international protocol on regulation of chemical pollutants) we did save our children and grand-children from very unpleasant future.
But the real message of Montreal Protocol is simply that: “It Can Be Done!” We can join our forces and agree on common action, when facing really disastrous outcomes. As stated in the original article Montreal Protocol is a “remarkable international agreement that should be studied by those involved with global warming and the attempts to reach international agreement on that topic.”
I remember the times when the media was full of environmental activists calling for action on regulating the mentioned chemicals and it was looking equally hopeless as today’s fight(s) to regulate plastic pollutants, global warming or even increasing poverty levels and political destabilization. I think Montreal Protocol should be consider a “seed of hope “ and a template for many other following, positive, common actions.
You can check the original article on Universe Today: Here
It all started with a groundbreaking book of Marshal T.Savage “The Millennial Project: Colonizing the Galaxy in Eight Easy Steps”,which marked the beginning of the first “Millennial Project”. The Millennial Project (TMP) is a comprehensive plan for space development, beginning with the terrestrial cultivation of an environmentally sustainable civilization and Post-Industrial culture and culminating, far in the future, in the colonization of our immediate stellar neighborhood. The book itself was by far the most comprehensive study of all the requirements necessary to begin with a real colonization of space by then. And it still is one of the most inspiring reading concerning the subject out-there. TMP does no only consider technological blueprints of the actual space-fares and space habitats as it was done by then by most of the “space programmes”. Rather than that it is considering all the socio-political and cultural aspects of such an endeavour.
Savage proposed to build sustainable floating cities on sea, that could serve as a massive training centers for future space colonists.A foundation to accomplish this mighty goal was established.
“Foundation is the starting phase of the The Millennial Project. It’s objective is to establish a social and economic infrastructure upon which subsequent phases are based by communicating TMPs vision of the future to the global society, rallying those inspired by it to concerted action, developing the financial and industrial systems needed to accomplish it, and establishing the initial physical communities and facilities to host them. It is also the starting point of a cultural transformation intended to evolve the current dominant western culture and civilization into something more functionally suited to the concerted development of space and a more sustainable way of life on Earth.”
But the first Millennial Project was based on building sustainable habitats on sea shores first. The project developers found themselves competing with the leisure industry developers for the most expensive estate on earth and the programme eventually failed. Abandoned by Savage himself.
The Second Phase
The TMP2 project is a project of the Living Universe Foundation community to continually update and revise the content of the original plan as described by Marshal T. Savage in his book The Millennial Project. It is based on foundations Wiki and I think this is exactly what Wikis should be about. A massive collaboration environment to achieve complex goals. I think the Wiki is not very populated in the moment, but with a little promotion it can change in the close future. So we’ve build the encyclopedia and now we have to colonize the space.Check the link and find out more on: TMP 2.0
* 1930’s First computers
* 1950’s First remote connections between computers
* 1969 ARPANET (the first real computer network and a basis of todays internet)
* 1972 The actuall term “internet” used for the first time and first e-mail sent
* 1983 TCP/IP architecture universally adopted
* 1989 Archie. The first metadata search engine
* 1991 Gopher and hypertext
* 1992 Delphi (first commercial on-line service)
* 1993 Mosaic (the first graphical browser)
* 1994 World Wide Web Consortium formed
* 1998 The release of Windows98 and the rise of PCs
* 27th December 2008 Mohammed Ali Rogers threw a digital snowball on Ming C’ (Does Ming C’ want to throw back?)
We really don’t want to end it like this, do we?
So this is going to all my facebook friends. Please don’t throw snowballs on me! Do not invite me for digital cup of tea! Do not send me electronic kisses and do not ask me to take “which celebrity are you?” quitz! I really don’t want to share my (and yours) data with some weird application to do all those things. What I want is to talk to you. And I want to talk about things I was never been able to talk about before. In a way I was never been able to do before. Social media is a chance to meet the people who matter to us. To stay in contact with friends, that could be long forgotten. It is a chance to transform our lifes and thus transform the society and the world around us. Social Media is changing the equation. We cease to be consumers and we start to be marketers. We cease to be voters and we start to be policy makers.I want to use this great new tool to change the world around me. I want to be heard and I want to be understood. I don’t want to waste my information overloaded time throwing digital snowballs. Instead, I would like to know about your favorite blog or book. I would like to join some local group to get out and meet some real people. I would like to hear about the crazy idea you had this morning! The 90’s are over my friend. Now there are people out-there who actually listen to you. Don’t waste your time replying to all those tacky apps and better do something that have sense. I think with facebook we’ve reached something of a critical mass of users to really change the way we create our social realities. There is a bunch of good applications outhere (Like NetworkedBlogs I installed today), that really make a difference. In the end of the day. Lot of those tacky requests were not even send by your friends and you are just talking to the machine programmed to waste your time.
A fresh new initiative of Alternative Channel TV and the organization committee of 2009 China Europa business convention.
TV China Europa is a new web TV about sustainable urban development launched in English, French and Chinese. The web 2.0 platform offers reports on urban sustainable developments, energy, automotive,air, waste and water management.
In their own words; “Designed as a web 2.0 video platform, China Europa TV is an interactive and participative web based TV, which enables Internet users to suggest their videos related to urban sustainable development and participate in the debate on sustainable cities of tomorrow.”
The Pale Blue Dot is a photograph of planet Earth taken in 1990 by Voyager 1 from a record distance, showing it against the vastness of space. Both the idea for taking the distant photo and the title came from scientist and astronomer Carl Sagan, who also wrote the 1994 book of the same name.In 2001, it was selected by Space.com as one of the top ten space science photos.Voyager 1 was launched on September 5, 1977. Sagan had pushed for Voyager to take a photo of the Earth when its vantage point reached the edge of the solar system. On February 14, 1990, having completed its primary mission, NASA commanded the spacecraft to turn around to photograph the planets of the Solar System. Between February 14, 1990 and June 6, 1990, one image Voyager returned was of Earth, showing up as a “pale blue dot” in the grainy photo.
Internet portal UniverseToday.com reported yesterday on article published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics journal. The article is a study of what might have happened if chlorofluorocarbons (the chemical compounds responsible for so-called ozone hole effect) were not banned.
