Saturday, January 19, 2019

INSPIRATION FROM OUTER SPACE by Sarah J. McNeal







Yesterday I watched a new release on Netflix titled VOYAGER. I expected it to have some exciting facts and images, and I certainly was not disappointed, but I also got something unexpected.



Voyager 1 and 2 were launched a month apart in 1977, their mission to send back pictures and data on Jupiter, Saturn, and Neptune including the moons that orbit them. From there the two spacecraft would continue to travel out into interstellar space beyond our solar system into the great unknown. We will receive information from Voyager 1&2 for many years to come because they have nuclear batteries powering them.

Jupiter's Moon, IO

All of this scientific data is enough to excite us Earth-bound humans, but Voyager 1 has on board something very special, something that the scientist, Carl Sagan envisioned and included that will carry humanity into the stars in immortality.

The Golden Record

Carl Sagan made a golden record of Earth sounds, of animal sounds, a variety of music from classic, to jazz, to rock, and music from other countries around the world. A message of “Greetings from planet Earth” spoken by adults and children in many languages was recorded on the golden record. Sagan also included images of humans and a map to Earth using pulsars.

The Arrow shows the last picture of Earth from Voyager 1 

Voyager will be out there still traveling with humanity’s thumbprint long after all life on Earth has disappeared and our sun has turned into a red giant. And maybe somewhere, sometime if other intelligent beings are out there, they will find Voyager and discover that there was a planet named Earth where once life abounded and human beings reached out to say, “Hello, we were here.”


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