That's home

      From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. 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 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.

That's home

       我们成功地(从外太空)拍到这张照片,细心再看,你会看见一个小点。再看看那个光点,它就在这里。那是我们的家园,我们的一切。你所爱的每一个人,你认识的每一个人,你听说过的每一个人,曾经有过的每一个人,都在它上面度过他们的一生。我们的欢乐与痛苦聚集在一起,数以千计的自以为是的宗教、意识形态和经济学说,所有的猎人与强盗、英雄与懦夫、文明的缔造者与毁灭者、国王与农夫、年轻的情侣、母亲与父亲、满怀希望的孩子、发明家和探险家、德高望重的教师、腐败的政客、超级明星、最高领袖、人类历史上的每一个圣人与罪犯,都住在这里——一粒悬浮在阳光中的微尘。
        在浩瀚的宇宙剧场里,地球只是一个极小的舞台。想想所有那些帝王将相杀戮得血流成河,他们的辉煌与胜利,曾让他们成为光点上一个部分的转眼即逝的主宰;想想栖身于这个点上的某个角落的居民,对别的角落几乎没有区别的居民所犯的无穷无尽的残暴罪行,他们的误解何其多也,他们多么急于互相残杀,他们的仇恨何其强烈。我们的心情,我们的妄自尊大,我们在宇宙中拥有某种特权地位的错觉,都受到这个苍白光点的挑战。在庞大的包容一切的暗黑宇宙中,我们的行星是一个孤独的斑点。由于我们的低微地位和广阔无垠的空间,没有任何暗示,从别的什么地方会有救星来拯救我们脱离自己的处境。

--Carl Sagan

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