We Have Seen the Light

Special to FreeRepublic ^ | 13 May 2005 | John Armor

[Congressman Billybob]

Thank you very much for your "complimentary thunderbolt," as Mark Twain would have called it.

John / Billybob

[Congressman Billybob]

Australia and Canada have some significant lights, despite having very low population per acre statistics. Compare their spotty lights to the near darkness in central China and sub-Sahara Africa, for instance.

As for "more recent data," this photograph is a professionally-done composite of perhaps hundreds of individual photographs to get all parts of the Earth at night, and in cloudless weather. If and when NASA does this detailed work again, the photo will be updated.

John / Billybob

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

the map would give a lot more information if the brightness of each region was reduced by a factor proportional to its population. If that is done, America would blaze, compared to any other region on earth

. . . because that would be a portrait of the middle class.

Excellent idea! Calling all Photoshoppers!

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Australia and Canada are sparsely populated countries

. . . and the population of Canada is concentrated primarily within 100 miles of the US border.

So on an image of this scale you might easily mistake most of the lighted area of Canadian for part of the US.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Here's a similar NASA image of global population density:

http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/images/116/pop_density.jpg

It shows primarily that dimming the light picture for population would drastically reduce the brightness of China and India. And to a lesser extent, Europe.

[Paul_Denton]

Awesome photo.

[Brett66]

That is amazing, just by looking at the lights you can tell which nations are the advanced ones and which are not. Africa literally is the "dark continent".

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Well they do say that about a quarter of the energy used by the entire world is used in the US . . . this is pretty much a picture of that!

[CarrotAndStick]

The large file (approx 30 MB) is an amazing one!!
Thanks for the link.

[CarrotAndStick]

It shows primarily that dimming the light picture for population would drastically reduce the brightness of China and India. And to a lesser extent, Europe.

Okay, then dim the lights with the appropriate real population density(cultivable land area divided by no. of people), and not just population.

[SaltyJoe]

While I generally agree with the assessment of North Korea, it should be noted that Central Asia is extremely arid especially in the area formerly known as Tibet. Other less illuminated dry areas are the Sahara, and Australia.

Maybe the angle of the satellite photo obscures the light beams from Russia, Alaska, and Australia? Maybe some people just want to sleep at night?

Also, the deep dark jungles of both Africa and South America don't seem to have a lot of bulbs lighting up the night sky. Maybe it's the trees that are in the way? Maybe I'm just being silly?

But what is overwhelmingly obvious is that people like fresh water. We're funny like that. I'll be a US penny that the dryer areas would become better lit at night if there were more irrigation of fresh water (hint: Las Vegas and Nevada in general).

Sometimes bright lights at night only signify a certain measure of financial success. Look at Saudi Arabia. I've been there briefly. It's dry dry dry! I remember the gov't there too. They didn't like outsiders very much, and that part of the world didn't like their women to walk about at night either. I wouldn't want to dwell their as I wouldn't want to dwell in North Korea. Yet, Saudi Arabia has some pretty bright lights.

Therefore, I'm going to have to use the McCarthy conspiracy theory to explain why North Korea is so dark: one of the 57 card carrying Communist in the U.S. Department of Defense alerted Pyongyang as to when the night-sky-picture-taking satellite would be snapping shots of the Korean Peninsula. For the exact time that this satellite was overhead, Kim Jong Il gave a "lights out" order. The North Korean SOF shot out any lights still burning and then imprisoned the previous caretaker of that light. Thus, they averted whatever knowledge we might have gained over their military strength.

I'm sure that if having a brightly lit sky at night is the ultimate measure of earthly success, then during a scheduled night-sky-picture-taking satellite shot that every nation seeking the inglorious achievements of human respect would have been burning flares by the millions to upstage their neighbors. I'm sure that there would also be a multitude of others giving a disrespectful "moon" to reflect more of the artificial lite. It may even make the Guinness Records?

Until then, I'll just categorize this as a "cool photo", and say "thanks for the post!"

[Congressman Billybob]

This is not "one photo," it is a combination of hundreds of separate photos. There is no "angle" to the photos. They are all shot looking straight down. And since there are hundreds of photos and the times are not announced, no nation has any opportunity to "prepare" for the photos with either "lights out" or "lights on." Even assuming that such an attempt to scam the results were even possible.

With regard to the North Korea / South Korea comparison, neither climate or geography or any other factor than the contrast in governments and economies explains the radical difference between North and South.

This is not just a "pretty picture." It is a global, clear, factual proof of the differences between societies, governments and economies. And the answer is clear. We have done it best; the others have done it progressively worse.

John / Billybob

[SaltyJoe]

"We have done it best; the others have done it progressively worse."

I don't have God's Wisdom to know such things; otherwise, I may be fooled into thinking that I don't need Jesus anymore. I was hoping to be funny in the last post. I do know the difference between South and North Korea and the abhorrent fruits of Communism. I also know when human life starts and that it should naturally end, so I won't wink at where "we" have done it best.

I think it's a cool photo, and just a "cool" photo.
Nothing more.

http://www.abortionfacts.com/statistics/world_statistics.asp

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/ab-southkorea.html

http://www.terrisfight.org/

[BufordP]

You're welcome!

[perfect stranger]

Thanks for the article Congressman. I found it most interesting.

[perfect stranger]

I like the way you shoot down your own "McCarthy conspiracy theory" in the next paragraph.

Why wouldn't N. Korea burn flares by the millions to upstage their neighbors? They could as well use them as misinformation. That is unless they don't have any.

[SaltyJoe]

My mind is a quagmire of humor that even I don't understand. I laugh at my own joke that I thought were never funny in the first place.

Furthermore, I don't doubt that the effectiveness of American air cover, indirect artillery, and NGF support during the Korean War was so superb that North Korea would have black outs even if they did have energy to spare.

[Gatún(CraigIsaMangoTreeLawyer)]

If I may be the spoilsport today (and my apologies), there is one strange thing and one probable strange thing about that Earth by Night thingy.

1. Cuba is all lit up. I’ve been to Cuba (Havana) and there are no lights to speak of…a rare light here and there coming from an apartment here and an apartment there, but one can say there are really no lights at night.

When Carter was there, I was amazed to see how the Malecón (the seawall which is paralleled by a boulevard) was suddenly all lit as if it were daytime. That isn’t true in real life. It’s dark.

2. That little strip of light going through Panama. It can only be the Panama Canal; except, the Panama Canal runs NW-SE and not NE-SW.

[chronic_loser]

I remember the stench in Tuscaloosa when there as a college student. One freshman night in Paty hall I walked out in the hall and literally had to squint to see the other end of the hall, the paper mill was so bad.

Had forgotten all about that till just now. I used to go out to run and would wind up retching sometimes.

An interesting aside on the plant came when the owner (an elderly lady) was confronted with some demand or other by the union. She told them point blank that the plant was marginally profitable and that she would shut it down if they persisted. They responded "you can't shut it down! We will sue!" Things went on, they did not back down and one morning the a.m. shift was met at the gate by armed guards and a note that said "I am in Europe. You can forward any lawsuits or questions through my attorney." My understanding is that it never fired back up.

[El Gato]

1. Cuba is all lit up. I’ve been to Cuba (Havana) and there are no lights to speak of…a rare light here and there coming from an apartment here and an apartment there, but one can say there are really no lights at night.

I think if you look at the large image, you can see that while Havana is visible, it's not anywhere near as bright as the Florida coasts, or most any medium sized US city. Most of Cuba is indeed dark. Except the GitMo area of course.

2. That little strip of light going through Panama. It can only be the Panama Canal; except, the Panama Canal runs NW-SE and not NE-SW.

A quick look at a map reveals that little strip of light is actually the southern coast of Panama. The bright light at the northwest end of it is Panama City, while the little spot of light to the northwest of Panama City is Colon. The canal itself runs through pretty unpopulated territory with few lights, and the largest part of it is the big lake, which contains no lights other than a few sets of ship's lights.