Peter Gleick
We call it Earth, but only because we're land dwellers. And we rarely see this picture but it shows how massive the Pacific Ocean is, covering about a third of the Earth's surface.
This is a cloudless satellite image of the Earth, centered on the Pacific Ocean. To get a single cloudless image, NOAA satellites took photos over eleven ten-day periods and merged them.
#water
Dec 8, 2024 at 6:10amWeb
Show threadJohn GreyDec 8, 2024
@petergleick Our maps lie to us in so many ways.
Show threadJames Harris Dec 8, 2024
A nice reminder of how much New Zealand really is a Pacific island
@petergleick
Show threadDunbar's NumberDec 8, 2024
@petergleick @Shobeck it's called the blue planet for a reason 😅
Show threadLen LaytonDec 8, 2024
@petergleick The colours seem off. Australia is much redder than this pic shows.
Show threadBarbara MonacoDec 8, 2024
@lenlayton @petergleick It appears to be a relief map. I live in a part of the western US seen on the upper right. It's very mountainous and forested, but it is depicted in brown and gold on the map.
Show threadRed_Shirt_no2Dec 8, 2024
@petergleick @lenlayton @Barbramon1
Yeah, it’s also showing low-res ocean-bottom topography…
Show threadthesweetcheatDec 8, 2024
@petergleick Howland Island sure is small in all that blue.
Show threadJoshua BarrettoDec 8, 2024
@petergleick I don't think this is correct. The land shows smooth colour gradients but the water has quantised colour. I think this is just a simple digital rendering.
Show threadSu_GDec 8, 2024

@petergleick

The mass of the Pacific Ocean is just stunning in this composite. And eye opening. Do you know where we can see the other side of the blue dot (the non-Pacific side)? Thank you!

Show threadVerđandi K SoldustyDec 8, 2024
@petergleick
Your alt text completely ignores the eastern end of the Eurasian continent in the top right quarter.
Show threadSearingTruthDec 8, 2024

@petergleick

"What piece of dirt on this planet were you randomly born on?

Does that entitle you to more or less life, or compassion or justice?"
SearingTruth

Show threadCab T. HanksDec 8, 2024

@petergleick

Just because we're scratching the surface doesn't mean the entire planet is made of water. It's like a lot of science and politics. More complex than it seems at first glance.

Show threadSublimeOverloadDec 8, 2024
@petergleick Would make a great tshirt.
Show threadThree LLMs in a TrenchcoatDec 8, 2024
@petergleick do we call our planet what call ground because we're land dwellers, or do we call ground what we call our planet because we're land dwellers?
Show threadYOGA~ZEN 🙏Dec 8, 2024
@petergleick
I find it stimulating to see the world from other perspectives and I think that should be one of the goals of education. Unfortunately, the opposite happens...
Show threadGatekeeper..Dec 13, 2024
@petergleick
What's bull shit is ,the map of Antarctica is totally blocked to all media. WTF are they hiding?
Show threadmatt wilkieDec 13, 2024

@petergleick given the amount of work it takes to make an image like this, maybe it should be called planet Air-Water 😁

(should we name things by their appearance - cloud, by their largest constituent component - ocean, or our experiential utility - earth? Picking out but 3 of many possible characteristics. All names are dreadfully limited)

Show threadwoollypigsDec 13, 2024
@petergleick many many moons ago (ha!) I read about a satellite that was spinning around earth to sling shot out into the unknown to look at other planet. As it was going around picking up speed on a route that was not above much land, e.g Pacific etc. The smart people who built it and put it up there, tested it out. It reported back, that there was potentiality for life but not intelligent life. I can't for the life of me remember what magazine or news paper I read it in, it was well before the internet as we know it today
Show threadJerry D. Harris 🦕👣Dec 13, 2024
@petergleick Reminds me of a time I was in a debate in 9th grade about the state of education in the US--I was on the "it's not good" side. I had dug up a statistic that said that something like 33% of students at a university in Florida couldn't find the Pacific Ocean on a map. My opponent argued that because Florida borders the Atlantic, that shouldn't be surprising. I responded with something like "It's the single biggest object on the face of the Earth--how can you miss it?!?"
Show threadJonathan SchofieldDec 28, 2024
@petergleick a huuuuuuuuge thermostat that we are destabilising, creating the #WTFcene
Show threadSimon GulakDec 16
@petergleick is this wonderful image available? I'm still looking for it. Any chance you could share?
Show threadBill TschumyDec 16

@petergleick Given how much of the Earth is covered by the oceans, it is surprising how little we know about them. Every deep sea submersible foray finds unexpected and unknown life.

We are so dependent on the oceans for sustaining life yet it is still a dumping ground. We used to think it was so big that it could absorb our pollution. Not we are learning that is not true.

I highly recommend Helen Czerski’s “The Blue Machine” to learn more.

https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-blue-machine-how-the-ocean-works-helen-czerski/86372fa7ac5f1a3b

#Oceans

Show threadFionnáinDec 17
@btschumy @petergleick another good one is 'The High Seas' by Olive Heffernan. It's like Czerski's book but covers more of the social politics of the deep ocean.
Show threadHeliographDec 17
@petergleick that's me right there (left bottom) *waves ecstatically* 
Show threadJan AntošDec 17
@petergleick remind me nasa blue marble data back in 2002, there was composed together satelite “map” image in tiff format having about 650MB in resolution where one pixel was roughly 1 square kilometre. The resolution is 43200x21600, I still have it in my data library.
Show threadtimoth‽Dec 17
@petergleick
What do ocean dwellers call it?