Top 10 Earth Selfies

By Dilip -
some of these snapshots of our home planet were taken by astronauts on board humanity's floating platform in orbit (the International Space Station), satellites in space around Earth, and even from a telescope zooming around Saturn.
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While we may think we know Earth well since we live here, it's worth taking a few moments to ponder just how special our planet is. First of all, it's the only place we know about in the entire Universe that has life. Scientists are looking for evidence of life elsewhere in the Solar System and even from the far-flung reaches of the galaxy, but so far Earth is it as far as hosting anything living -- current or past.
The Earth is in a sweet spot -- traveling on average about 93,000,000 miles from the Sun -- that lets the planet get not too hot or too cold. This means we can have liquid water, which is something we humans certainly need to survive. Our atmosphere is also the right recipe for life to exist. Not only does it have necessary ingredients like oxygen and nitrogen, it's also a good thickness and density. In other words, it doesn't trap too much heat making us a crazed greenhouse like Venus, nor is it too thin that it lets the energy and sunlight escape into space like Mars does.
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Now that we've established what a great home planet we've got, take a few minutes to enjoy these pics of Earth. If anyone or anything deserves a little attention, it's the amazing place in space that we call home... see more:

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