Blogs
 


  Oddworld Forums > Blogs > I, BM
The Pale Blue Dot


I, BM

299 792 458 m·s^−1 6.67384(80)×10−11 m³·kg^−1·s−2 6.626 069 57(29) × 10^−34 J·s 1.054 571 726(47) × 10^−34 J·s 4π × 10^−7 N·A^−2 = 1.256 637 061... × 10^−6 N·A^−2 8.854 187 817... × 10^−12 F·m−1 376.730 313 461... Ω 8.987 551 787... × 109 N·m²·C^−2 1.602 176 565(35) × 10^−19 C 9.274 009 68(20) × 10^−24 J·T^−1 7.748 091 7346(25) × 10^−5 S 12 906.403 7217(42) Ω 4.835 978 70(11) × 10^14 Hz·V−1 2.067 833 758(46) × 10^−15 Wb 5.050 783 53(11) × 10^−27 J·T^−1 25 812.807 4434(84) Ω 5.291 772 1092(17) × 10^−11 m 2.817 940 3267(27) × 10^−15 m 9.109 382 91(40) × 10^−31 kg 1.166 364(5) × 10^−5 GeV^−2 7.297 352 5698(24) × 10^−3 4.359 744 34(19) × 10^−18 J 1.672 621 777(74) × 10^−27 kg 3.636 947 5520(24) × 10^−4 m² s^−1 10 973 731.568 539(55) m^−1 6.652 458 734(13) × 10^−29 m² 0.2223(21) 1.660 538 921(73) × 10^−27 kg 6.022 141 29(27) × 10^23 mol^−1
Rate this Entry

The Pale Blue Dot

Posted 10-20-2008 at 06:12 PM by Bullet Magnet
As Voyager 1 left our planetary neighbourhood for the fringes of the solar system on February 14, 1990, engineers turned it around, at Carl Sagan's suggestion, for one last look at its home planet. Voyager 1 was about 6.4 billion kilometers (4 billion miles) away, and approximately 32 degrees above the ecliptic plane, when it captured this portrait of our world. Caught in the center of scattered light rays (a result of taking the picture so close to the Sun), Earth appears as a tiny point of light, a crescent only 0.12 pixel in size.




Carl Sagan's book The Pale Blue Dot was in part inspired by this photograph, in particular this excerpt. It's one thing to read it, but quite another to hear him read it himself.















I miss you, Carl.
Posted in Science
Comments 5 Email Blog Entry
Total Comments 5

Comments
Anonyman!'s Avatar
Poetic, scientific, philosophical. All at once.
Bravo BM, for bringing this to us. I thank you. I praise you.

EDIT: Seriously, that was awesome.
Posted 10-20-2008 at 06:24 PM by Anonyman!
Updated 10-20-2008 at 06:46 PM by Anonyman!

Wings of Fire's Avatar
This was my daily dose of awesome.
Posted 10-21-2008 at 07:16 AM by Wings of Fire

Wil's Avatar
:
0.12 pixel in size.
I once came 5·293rd in a race.
Posted 10-21-2008 at 07:46 AM by Wil

Bullet Magnet's Avatar
I know, I thought that weird when I saw it, too. I can only suppose that, if the source it right, it was calculated from the luminosity of Earth within that pixel.

Or possibly, someone got the decimal point wrong.
Posted 10-21-2008 at 07:58 AM by Bullet Magnet

Wil's Avatar
Yeah, I was thinking it might be from the luminosity of the surrounding pixels. It actually makes sense of a sort, since each pixel of the photo should contain plenty of objects that aren’t the full pixel’s width. It just amuses me because it’s unusual.
Posted 10-21-2008 at 08:03 AM by Wil

 

Recent Blog Entries by Bullet Magnet





 
 
- Oddworld Forums - -