Earth Day 2010

Happy Earth Day everybody!!! Earth Day was founded by U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson as an environmental teach-in held on April 22, 1970. It has fast become a day designed to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth's environment. Earth Day is now observed on April 22 on virtually every country on Earth.

Below is an interesting post from one of our favorite bloggers. We couldn’t have said it better. From Archive Fire: 

So here we are: April 22, 2010, another Earth Day.The 40th such day in fact. Earth Day is the only institutionally recognized day I actively celebrate. Our species emerged from the thin organic layering of flora and fauna covering this big bad space rock. Scientists call this intricate web of life enveloping the Earth a biosphere. We simply call it home. To be honest, it feels great each year to join millions of people around the planet in celebration of this wondrous and lonely planet.

Here are some things you may or may not know about our home: First, the name "Earth" derives from the Anglo-Saxon word erda, which means ground or soil. It became eorthe later, and then erthe in Middle English - yet humans did not perceive the Earth as a planet until the 16th century.

Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. Earth is also the largest, most massive, and densest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets. Earth formed roughly 4.54 billion years ago. Life first appeared on its surface within just a billion years. Earth's outer surface is divided into several rigid segments, or tectonic plates, that gradually migrate across the surface over periods of many millions of years. About 71% of the surface is covered with salt-water oceans, the remainder consisting of continents, islands and small pools of fresh water we call lakes. The planet has a circumference of 40,041.47 km (mean), but a surface area of 510,072,000 km2! The Earth's interior is constantly active, with a thick layer of relatively solid mantle, a liquid outer core that generates a magnetic field, and a solid iron inner core. At present, Earth orbits the Sun once for every roughly 366.26 times it rotates about its axis. This is a sidereal year, which is equal to 365.26 solar days. 

The planet is expected to continue supporting life for another 1.5 billion years, after which the rising luminosity and expansion of the Sun will gradually eliminate the plant's biosphere. Rising luminosity? Yep.

Usually on April 22 I set aside my online explorations and spend the day outside – engaged in activities i believe actually contribute to cultivating a more humane and creative world. But this year, in addition to my offline strategies, I wanted to spend some time with you, the readers, and bang the virtual drum for Mother Earth so that we can celebrate together, in some small way.

Read More: Here