Prodded by the latest issue of National Geographic, I pulled up Disney+ last night to check out the latest volcano document.
(I'm a big sucker for content about volcanos.)
Lake of Fire was riveting…but also disappointing. Disappointing in the sense that while the team managed to confirm the existence of the Earths's ninth lava lake—a relatively rare volcanic phenomenon, in which, well, there's a lake filled with lava exposed to the surface inside an active volcano—they were unable to get human eyes on it.
Although members of the expedition made an attempt to do so—climbing down into the ice-choked caldera and straining their necks for a clear view down into the heart of it—they ultimately made the safe choice and retreated, choosing instead to fly a drone out over the volcano.
The drone made it simple enough to spot the red dot way down inside they indicated the presence of the lava lake.
But there was something disappointing about this reliance on technology to get eyes on the lava lake. If human eyes didn't actually see it directly, then had we really discovered it?
I mean, of course we had. The moment I reflect on our decades of space exploration, from the Hubble's photos of distant galaxies to rovers trundling around the Martian surface, I can admit that we don't need humans physically present to use the word discover.
But then again, that's an expectation of space exploration—or exploration of any place where placing people would be difficult (the sea floor comes to mind).
What called this moment out to me was the recognition that the explorers themselves relied on technology to mediate their discovery in the way that the ultimate viewer of the documentary relies on technology.
Without technology, we don't get to join these explorers on their adventure at all—so isn't it fitting to have a drone's mechanical eyes the only to ever spot the lava lake?
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