We can actually see Pluto for the first time ever. Incredible!

We (meaning the brilliant humans of NASA and the New Horizons team) launched this piano sized spacecraft nine years ago and sent it hurtling toward the edge of the solar system.

It is now more than 3 billion (!) miles from home and sending back stunningly detailed information about what was the most mysterious world in our planetary neighborhood.

That we can do something like this, that we can truly “boldly go where no one has gone before”, burnishes my optimism for our species.