The photographs of Earth taken by the Apollo astronauts, which framed the Earth as a whole in the lonely context of space, helped foster an environmental ethos--that every place on the planet was made visible for the first time. Technical innovations accomplished by NASA and NOAA create a new level of clarity, allowing us to see for the first time the shape of our urban footprint.
Fascinating post. What strikes me as particularly interesting is how the electrically lit urban environment--read very broadly, almost mythologically--appears from space to be reflecting the heavens as viewed from the ground. It is admittedly, as you point out, a rather ordered reflection of the skies--an urban footprint. The idea that a footprint might also belong to the genre of constellations--that lit rural life at night looks like the nocturnal sky, while the urban life at night looks like circuitry and well-ordered nebula--may be old news, but that's what the really great picture made me think of.
ReplyDelete