View from the Top

February 11, 2013 Wisconsin Public Television Leave a Comment

Watch NOVA “Earth from Space” at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 13 on Wisconsin Public Television.

Is it still considered a bird’s-eye view if it’s from space? I mean if you want to get technical, it’s essentially the same perspective, it just happens to be zoomed out a little further than you would originally think.

That being said, perspective is everything. It’s amazing how the things around us really look when you can see them on a larger scale with all of their surroundings. A city may seem huge when you have to walk from one side to the other, but if you can back away enough, that city suddenly becomes a tiny concrete dot on a lush background of trees and fields.

I think the most interesting discoveries that have been made using satellite imaging are the natural global systems. Of course there are obvious uses like storm-tracking to see when and where a hurricane or blizzard might strike, but before satellites we could never put all of the pieces together. Being able to see a weather system is one thing, being able to watch how it influences systems on the other side of the planet opens up a whole new way of seeing how the world works.

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