EARTH AND THE EXOPLANETS
Astronomers always suspected that there might be planets outside our solar system. Yet the scientific proof that exoplanets (planets around other suns) actually exist is still fresh, only a couple of decades old. Now there are over 6,000 known exoplanets in just one small section of our Milky Way Galaxy.
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Once something new has been found in the universe – a celestial body or planet – it needs a name. But do the dry scientific designations for exoplanets do justice to how astonishing it is to grasp that we live in a universe bursting with planets, and that we are the first humans to grapple consciously with this truth?
This film tells the story of the International Astronomical Union’s NameExoWorlds initiative, whereby the public around the world was invited to propose proper names for exoplanets, and considers what it says about humans that these names were drawn from our own rich stores of cultural fables on Earth.
This film can be screened on its own or with its companion film The Art of Exoplanets.
"Earth and the Exoplanets is a science communication film that asks you not just to learn something but to feel something new.
We made it as part of our own philosophical exploration of the symbolic names given to certain exoplanets by Earthlings – names
that hold within them a deep respect for the otherness of exoplanets, and also a real love for Earth."
- Ceridwen Dovey, Writer & Space Environmentalist