This was just released today by NASA. It is quite a humbling image from the Mars rover Curiosity, though it’s not quite the same impact as the Blue Marble image from Apollo 8, but historically significant nonetheless.
This view of the twilight sky and Martian horizon taken by NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover includes Earth as the brightest point of light in the night sky. Earth is a little left of center in the image, and our moon is just below Earth.
Researchers used the left eye camera of Curiosity’s Mast Camera (Mastcam) to capture this scene about 80 minutes after sunset on the 529th Martian day, or sol, of the rover’s work on Mars (Jan. 31, 2014). The image has been processed to remove effects of cosmic rays.
A human observer with normal vision, if standing on Mars, could easily see Earth and the moon as two distinct, bright “evening stars.”
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, manages the Mars Science Laboratory Project for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. JPL designed and built the project’s Curiosity rover. Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, built and operates the rover’s Mastcam.
More information about Curiosity is online at http://www.nasa.gov/msl and http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/.
Click for a full resolution image:
Source: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA17936
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Earth even looks blue in the image. Has there been any colour correction or is that approximately how the human eye would see it (if it was no Mars)? I am not sure what “processed to remove the effects of cosmic rays” mean.
Stunning and belittling. Yikes.
One nice thing: No celebs photobombing it.
I guess if you live on Mars, Earth is the Morning Star.
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Yes. Glad it doesn’t say, “A Kardasian is here.” 😎
Agree with Bob. A humbling reminder of our place in the grand order of things.
We really are just a speck in the cosmos. Less than a speck.
That pic is a glimpse of the Total Perspective Vortex
http://hitchhikers.wikia.com/wiki/Total_Perspective_Vortex
“The prospective victim of the TPV is placed within a small chamber wherein is displayed a model of the entire universe – together with a microscopic dot bearing the legend “you are here”. The sense of perspective thereby conveyed destroys the victim’s mind.”
A new perspective on all our cares and troubles … we are but an evening star with nothing of note to draw anyone’s attention.
… and each of us but one being in billions on this speck.
I can see my house! 🙂
I had to clean the dust off my monitor to ensure I was looking at the right speck!
I wonder what it would look like without all the extra CO2
Andy also noticed on his NYT Blog.
Different emphasis. He could not resist “small is beautiful” in his first sentence.
“See that spec of light over there, Dad? I wonder if there’s intelligent life there…”
See what real science can do, even when it takes its focus off the real mission to just look around and record observations? Not a model anywhere. Just beautiful data.
I’m pretty sure I saw Al Gore’s footprint…..
Moon and Venus – seen from Earth:
http://i.imgur.com/DB09Ppe.jpg
H.R. says:
February 6, 2014 at 2:31 pm
“See that spec of light over there, Dad? I wonder if there’s intelligent life there…”
“Naw son, that’s Earth. Let me tell you the story of Barack Obama and the people who elected him…twice”
Did anyone else spot the canals?
But seriously though folks, what do Mar’s own moons look like from Mars?
Nobody outside the solar system would miss us if it suddenly disappeared.
Mars’ …. of course. (sigh)
Thanks for the new perspective, from a Martian robot’s eye.
We have sure gone far from our roots.
No Moon.
^^ Sorry, didn’t link for the Moon and Venus pic above: http://petapixel.com/2013/02/13/the-moon-and-venus-captured-in-a-single-photograph/
Er……….. Wow.