1977, the year Voyager 1 was launched.
No longer in its teenage years, in early 2019, it had reached a point in space no human created object had travelled to, and transmitted back images of a planet it sought to focus on – Ultima Thule.
Thinking about this a month after the event feels like a long past event, historical. But scientists had planned for this several human generations ago; to some, even the launch was before they were born.
Human creativity and capacity in science is phenomenal. As someone completely uninformed about planetary science, I’m sure much of the science stuff here is ‘predictable’, in the sense that objects do tend to follow some predictable way of life, so long we discover each object’s “behavioural pattern”.
I’d like to keep up with planetary science because it is so beyond what we do or say day in and out.
Also, we have a capacity to put meaning to what’s happening “up there”, but really, these objects might simply be, they don’t have character.
With each new discoveries, it’s just sheer awesomeness of it that I feel about it. A tiny planet maybe, but Voyager 1 gets past to say hi. For them two to have met was quite something. It’s all beyond me. But I love keeping up with the story.
