Harvey Whitehouse
Imagine yourself in deep space, circling Earth at around 28,000 kilometres per hour. Peering through the window of the International Space Station, you gasp as the sun rises beyond the curved horizon of the planet, like a diamond ring refracting light in all directions. Viewing the world from afar is awe-inspiring, as I discovered when I experienced this as part of a virtual-reality simulation. But it also makes you realise how isolated and vulnerable we are.
Humans are the only species capable of seeing our home from this unique vantage point in space or imagining how it came to…
