In the middle of the luminous trails of an image, a pale dot seems almost negligible. It is not a defect to be erased: it is the Earth, photographed by Voyager 1 on February 14, 1990. The probe was then about six billion kilometers from the Sun, far away from the landscapes that its first planetary encounters had shown.
This view belongs to a series intended to constitute a portrait of the Solar System. The position of the Earth near the direction of the Sun has made the image delicate, and the visible light bands correspond to the light diffused in the instrument. The Earth point occupies about one pixel.
The photograph was named Pale Blue Dot. One might think that such a detailed picture learns little. Yet it shows a relationship that the usual maps make us forget: all the continents, cities and oceans are united in a barely visible presence when we look at our world from afar enough.
What we know
Real photograph from 1990; contrails due to the instrument, not beams materialized in the vacuum. Distinct from the Voyager gold disc.
To go to the source
References consulted on 3 October 2026. Linked pages may be in another language.
Signaler une erreur ou apporter une précision
