I found this link on Digg earlier today. It left me deeply depressed. It’s simply a comparison of the night sky with and without light pollution. I know that my view of the sky at night is hampered by pollution, I’ve learned to accept this, but when it is shown so explicitly, one can’t help but hurt for what we are missing.
Awhile back I was reading about these glyphs carved into mountains somewhere down in S. America. There were seven in all, if I remember right. Those seven figures were the representation of the milky way constellations. The figures which were seen by earlier man in the milky band in the night sky. But, I have no idea what those look like with my naked eyes. I was raised in an area of the world where you can’t see the milky way. If I had discovered those glyphs, their meaning would have been unknown to me. There’s something sad in the loss of this primal knowledge. We’ve blotted out the things which were so instrumental in getting us to where we are now. I’m probably being over dramatic, but it’s like a bit of our history is being ignored, erased. I don’t think it’s too much to ask for, just unfettered access to the gods, idols, heroes and ancestor spirits of our more primal selves.