Terra Incognita

Fawcett (holding the dog) and his team search for the source of the Rio Verde in 1908

Ego and curiosity has long driven explorers beyond the frontiers of civilization, reducing an intimidating blank space to a series of figures and diagrams. The rise of the Great White Explorer took place during the Victorian era, where oppressed by the social conservatism, men fled the gentility of their homelands to the wilds.  The enshrinement of these achievements by the Royal Geographic Society meant that these men left the gentle pastures not as conquistadors, but as scientists. This prestige also attracted bored industrialists with money and time on their hands, bolstering the glamorous image of exploration. These expeditions however, were no walk in the park. Hobbes accurately describes natural wilderness as a state of "no arts, no letters, no society, and which is worst of all continual fear, and danger and violent death" (Leviathan, 1651).

Scott faced the blistering ice of Antarctica, Livingstone the wild beasts and tribes of deepest darkest Africa, and Fawcett the flesh consuming Amazon. All three eventually met their ends on expeditions, following long drawn out addictions of the unknown. Conrad described the fate of the perpetual geographer: "From North to South, East and West, conquering a bit of truth here, and a bit of truth there, and sometimes swallowed up by the mystery their hearts were so persistently set on unveiling". Speke, who fought to claim discovery of the source of the Nile against his rival Burton met his end not on the shores of Lake Victoria, but in Wiltshire from a self inflicted gunshot (suicide unknown). Many more lives were lost in the "Green Hell". 

 

Advances in sanitation, zoology and botany, and technological achievement mean that throughout the 20th century, the blank spaces became smaller. Our infiltration into the impenetrable continued to such an extent, that logging tracks now cut through the horizon spanning seas of green. Seen by many as the ultimate map of the World, Google Earth has shaken perceptions of our planet. Forty years after the photo of planet earth rising from the moon's shadow taken by the crew of Apollo 8, once again we are able consider our place on the planet, but also our influence on it. Google Earth outreach allows organisations to monitor changes occuring on the planetary surface over time, and is now used by organisations such as the UN Environment Programme to monitor deforestation. This ability to monitor large tracts of land simultaniously increases the scope and power of conservation organisations globally, allowing data to be generated in an instant ( once again reducing those intimidating blank spaces).

So where to next? Alpha Centuri, according to Carl Sagan (I love an Optimist):