《暗淡蓝点》是1990年2月14日NASA的旅行者1号(Voyager 1)在距离地球64亿公里的地方为太阳系拍摄了一张照片,地球在照片上呈现出一个暗淡的小蓝点,美国天文学家卡尔.萨根,以此为灵感,写成了《暗淡蓝点》这篇著名的文章。
“再来看一眼这个小点。就在这里。这就是家。这就是我们。在这个小点上,每一个你爱的人,每一个你认识的人,每一个你听说过的人,每一个人,无论他是谁,都曾经生活过。我们所有的快乐和挣扎,数以千万自傲的宗教信仰、思想体系观念意识,以及经济学原理教义,每一个猎人或征服者,每一位勇士或是懦夫,每一个文明的缔造者或摧毁者,每一位君王或农夫,每一对陷入爱河的年轻伴侣,每一位为人父母者,所有充满希望的小孩,发明家或探险者,每一位灵魂导师,每一个腐败的政客,每一个所谓的‘超级巨星’,每一个所谓的‘最伟大领袖’,每一位我们人类史上的圣人或是罪人……我们的一切一切,全部都存在于这样一粒悬浮在一束阳光中的尘埃上。
地球,只是浩瀚宇宙竞技场上一个小小的舞台。想那鲜血流淌成的河流,仍由那些帝王将相挥洒。所以他们的胜利与荣耀,可以让他们成为这样一颗小小点的某一区间上,瞬间而逝的主人。想想有些永无止境的残暴,竟然就发生在这个小点上某个角落里的一群人、与几乎分不出任何区别的同样这一个小点上的另一个角落的另一群人之间。他们之间的误解能有多频繁,他们之间想灭掉对方的愿望能有多迫切,他们之间互相的仇恨能有多炙烈。
我们的故作深沉,我们想象出来的自我重要性,我们以为自己在宇宙里有什么特权的错觉,一直被这颗发着微弱蓝光的小点挑战着。我们的这颗星球,是一粒孤孤单单的微尘,被包裹在宇宙浩瀚的黑暗中。在我们有限的认知里,在这一片浩瀚之中,没有任何迹象表明救助会从别处而来帮助我们救赎自己。
地球目前是我们唯一所知有生命居住的世界。其他没有任何一个地方–至少在不远的未来,可供我们这一物种移民。去看看,可以。常驻,不可能。不管你喜欢还是不喜欢,目前为止只有地球是我们的立足之地。
一直说天文学是一门谦卑的、同时也是塑造性情的学问。没有什么能比从遥远太空拍摄到的我们微小世界的这张照片,更能展示人类的自负有多愚蠢。于我而言,这也是在提醒我们,我们的责任:互相间更加和善的对待彼此、维护和珍惜这颗暗蓝色的小点–这个我们目前所知唯一共同的家园。 ”
卡尔萨根《暗淡蓝点》我们是星尘英文原文
暗淡蓝点原文:
That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there, on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors, so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light.
Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment, the Earth is where we make our stand.
It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.
— —Carl Sagan, in Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey (S01E13) Unafraid of the Dar