Earthrise:
Celebrating 50 years of a new perspective
In 1968, Apollo 8 gifted us a new image of the Earth rising over the surface of the Moon. It wasn’t the first time we received a photograph of our planet from the far side of the Moon, but it was the first time a human was on the other end of the camera. We had extended our human sensing element further out into the Cosmos, and it shook our collective being.
The Apollo 8 mission was deemed to have “saved 1968” — a year full of war, racism, assassination, and environmental crises. The three Apollo 8 astronauts, Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and Bill Anders, still claim that this perspective not only changed them, it changed the world. It gave us a view of the Earth as a whole, connected system. A fragile spaceship on which we are all crewmates.
This new perspective — coupled with the more immediate news of environmental contamination and dying ecosystems — sparked the start of the environmental movement. In 1970, just two years after the Earthrise photo was taken, the U.S. established the EPA and the Earth Day movement was born.
At the time, we were accomplishing so many firsts.
In the United States, there were only three TV stations available and you’d have to fiddle with the antennas to get a clear picture. All three channels broadcasted the events of the Apollo missions. Through the course of these missions, we watched as the astronauts left Earth’s gravitational pull, entered the orbit of the Moon, beamed back video of that lonely world, and eventually stepped foot onto its surface. We would look up at that familiar Moon, feeling connected in a new way. There were humans up there, looking back at us.
Since then, over 600 astronauts from all over the world have ventured into space. We’ve extended our sensing element further by sending robots to many worlds in our solar system and beyond. We’ve aimed our telescopes to see further back into space and time and we’ve increased the power of our microscopes to see further into the equally astonishing micro-verse. We continue to learn the vastness of this Cosmos, and the frailty of our home planet — the only one we know to harbor life.
What we’ve learned is that all this vastness is only bearable through the love we have for one another; that it is our responsibility to care for one another; and, if we wish to survive, we must.
"For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love."
Through the noise, we've nearly forgotten the perspectives of the past.
Today, there are an infinite amount of TV channels and endless streams of entertainment available at our fingertips. We’ve entered a new phase of individualism. Our egos are crying out to be saved, amidst being entirely connected through our technology. More than ever, we need to return our gazes to the sky and heed the words of the astronauts who have looked back at this planet from a distance.
Today, space travelers are returning from space as artists and humanitarians, desperate to share their new perspectives. Their undeniable urge to change the state of things has motivated them to create movements aimed at making positive change. Just as they learned during their space travels, we accomplish unimaginable feats when we work together.
After hearing of The Overview Effect, artists took it upon themselves to begin communicating the message of global oneness and interdependence.
This beautiful documentary short, Overview, was the start of something big. After gaining global acclaim, it eventually led to the creation of the full length documentary, Planetary. Fast-forward several years to today, and yet a new movement is born. On December 21st, 2018, members of The Planetary Collective, the creators of Planetary, joined forces with astronauts Ron Garan, Nicole Stott, Leland Melvin, and Anousheh Ansari, to form Constellation: an organization “Dedicated to inspiring positive action through the profound perspective shift experienced in space.”
Constellation has teamed up with existing organizations, such as The Buckminster Fuller Institute, Space VR, and others to form a coalition focused on making positive global change through their movement, #Earth2068.
As NASA Apollo-era astronaut Edgar Mitchell said,
“From out there on the Moon, international politics look so petty.”Our cultural differences, so insignificant. You can’t make out a single political border from space, but you can see the border that separates every living thing we know of from the harshness of space: our thin, fragile atmosphere.
Against all odds, life arose here; consciousness arose here; we exist. We are a very special way for the Cosmos to know itself.
"When we look at our planet from the perspective of the surface, we see diversity, even chaos. When astronauts look at it from orbit or the moon, they see unity. It is the same planet, seen from a different perspective."