joseph-allen (joseph-allen)

Great job!

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Looking back towards the Earth, Cernan commented: "the clouds seem to be very artistic, very picturesque. Some in clockwise rotating fashion… but appear to be… very thin where you can… see through those clouds to the blue water below." It is an enduring image of the beauty but also the vulnerability of our planet – adrift as it is in the vastness of the Universe, which hosts no other signs of life that we have been able to detect to date. But ours is also a planet of great change. The tectonic movements that shift the landmasses move too slow for our eyes to notice. Yet another force – humanity itself – has been reshaping our planet at a pace that we can see. Urbanisation, deforestation, pollution and greenhouse gas emissions are altering the way the Earth looks. So how, over the 50 years since that iconic image was taken, has the Blue Marble changed?

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