The Overview Effect: An Out-of-Planet Experience
The words “awe” and “awesome” tend to suffer from overuse, and people use them to refer to a television show, a pair of designer shoes or even a celebrity crush. Anyone who watches the 19-minute film “Overview,” from the terribly clever people at the Planetary Collective, will surely be reminded of the original definitions of those two words. The Planetary Collective released the film on the 40th anniversary of the iconic photograph of Earth taken from space referred to as the “Blue Marble.” Its intention was to explain the Overview Effect, a term first used in 1987 by space theorist and author Frank White to explain the life-changing and perspective-altering experiences that astronauts have upon seeing the Earth from space. The collective interviewed White, five astronauts who have experienced the Overview Effect and two philosophers. The astronauts describe looking down at the Earth and marveling at the colors and motion produced from shooting stars, dancing curtains of auroras, thunderstorms and lights from major cities, all of which render the blue marble “hanging there” on this star-covered black canvas alive and, well, awesome. Being outside of the planet and looking down on it is not only an overwhelming experience that reminds more »
