Colored Pluto Comes Into Sight For The First Time

The New Horizons probe, which was launched in January of 2006, has sent its first color photo of the red-esque Pluto and its largest moon Charon. The probe is on schedule to fly by Pluto on the 14th of July and it will collect an unprecedented amount of data before its 16 month, and extremely slow, return to Earth.

From 5 billion kilometers away (3,106,860,000 miles), it takes 4.6 hours for data and signals from New Horizons to reach Earth. The probe's completion of its mission will complete the reconnaissance of the "Classic Nine" planets in our solar system. However, this will be the first time since the 1980's and the Voyager 2 that we encountered a completely new world for the first time.

As of now, Pluto's most in-depth photos come from the Hubble Telescope, however even those are very foggy and are hard to conduct any thorough scientific inquiry with.

"The spacecraft is in perfect health; it's full of fuel; and it's carrying a scientific arsenal of seven instruments that are - combined - the most powerful suite of instruments ever brought to bear on the first reconnaissance of a new planet,” enthused Alan Stern, New Horizons' principal investigator."Nothing like this has been done in a quarter of a century and nothing like this is being planned again by any space agency. This is a real moment in time for you to watch us turn a point of light into a planet."

Science has undoubtedly played an extremely influential role in the progression of society, and it has always held a particularly romantic identity in my heart. While we often tend to grasp to traditional beliefs out of fear of change, there is no doubt that progressivism in culture and cultural identity is the only way we as a people will be able to give the next generations a better reality than ours, and so forth with their children and their children.

That's all I have to say today, but I'll be back tomorrow.

"For me, the most ironic token of that moment in history is the plaque signed by President Richard M. Nixon that Apollo 11 took to the moon. It reads 'We came in peace for all of mankind.' As the United States was dropping 7.5 megatons of conventional explosives on small nations in Southeast Asia, we congratulated ourselves on our humanity; We would harm no one on a lifeless rock." -Carl Sagan