The Blue Marble, a photograph of the planet Earth made on 7 December 1972 by the crew of the Apollo 17 spacecraft.
The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that exists. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the world as unique, while others talk of a "plurality of worlds". Some treat the world as one simple object, while others analyze the world as a complex made up of parts.
In scientific cosmology, the world or universe is commonly defined as "the totality of all space and time; all that is, has been, and will be". Theories of modality talk of possible worlds as complete and consistent ways how things could have been. Phenomenology, starting from the horizon of co-given objects present in the periphery of every experience, defines the world as the biggest horizon, or the "horizon of all horizons". In philosophy of mind, the world is contrasted with the mind as that which is represented by the mind.
Theology conceptualizes the world in relation to God, for example, as God's creation, as identical to God, or as the two being interdependent. In religions, there is a tendency to downgrade the material or sensory world in favor of a spiritual world to be sought through religious practice. A comprehensive representation of the world and our place in it, as is found in religions, is known as a worldview. Cosmogony is the field that studies the origin or creation of the world, while eschatology refers to the science or doctrine of the last things or of the end of the world.
Global Peace Index 2023. Countries appearing with a deeper shade of green are ranked as more peaceful, countries appearing more red are ranked as more violent. Global Peace Index (GPI) is a report produced by the Australia-based NGO Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP) which measures the relative position of nations' and regions' peacefulness. The GPI ranks 163 independent states and territories (collectively accounting for 99.7 per cent of the world's population) according to their levels of peacefulness. In the past decade, the GPI has presented trends of increased global violence and less peacefulness.
A timelapse composite panorama of different natural phenomena and environments around Mount Bromo, Indonesia.
Nature is an inherent character or constitution, particularly of the ecosphere or the universe as a whole. In this general sense nature refers to the laws, elements and phenomena of the physical world, including life. Although humans are part of nature, human activity or humans as a whole are often described as at times at odds, or outright separate and even superior to nature.
During the advent of modern scientific method in the last several centuries, nature became the passive reality, organized and moved by divine laws. With the Industrial Revolution, nature increasingly became seen as the part of reality deprived from intentional intervention: it was hence considered as sacred by some traditions (Rousseau, American transcendentalism) or a mere decorum for divine providence or human history (Hegel, Marx). However, a vitalist vision of nature, closer to the pre-Socratic one, got reborn at the same time, especially after Charles Darwin. (Full article...)
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Photograph of three Douglas World Cruiser aircraft on a beach, Alaska, 1924. The "New Orleans" is in the foreground. The first aerial circumnavigation of the world was completed in 1924 by four aviators from an eight-man team of the United States Army Air Service, the precursor of the United States Air Force. The 175-day journey from April to September covered over 26,345 miles (42,398 km). The team generally traveled east to west, around the northern-Pacific Rim, through to South Asia and Europe and back to Seattle's Sand Point Airfield in the United States. Airmen Lowell H. Smith and Leslie P. Arnold, and Erik H. Nelson and John Harding Jr. made the trip in two single-engined open-cockpit Douglas World Cruisers (DWC) configured as floatplanes for most of the journey. Lead aircraft Chicago, and the New Orleans completed the expedition. Four more flyers in two additional DWC began the journey but their aircraft crashed or were forced down. All airmen survived. They were awarded the Distinguished Service Medal, and the Mackay Trophy aviation award for 1924. (Full article...)
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The modern Olympic Games (OG; or Olympics; French: Jeux olympiques, JO) are the world's leading international sporting events. They feature summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games are considered the world's foremost sports competition, with more than 200 teams, representing sovereign states and territories, participating. By default, the Games generally substitute for any world championships during the year in which they take place (however, each class usually maintains its own records). The Olympics are staged every four years. Since 1994, they have alternated between the Summer and Winter Olympics every two years during the four-year Olympiad.
GCOS is a system that comprises the climate-relevant components of many contributing observing systems and networks. Its mission is to help ensure that these contributing systems, taken as a whole, provide the comprehensive information on the global climate system that is required by users, including individuals, national and international organizations, institutions and agencies. The programme promotes the sustained provision and availability of reliable physical, chemical and biological observations and data records for the total climate system - across the atmospheric, oceanic and terrestrial domains, including the hydrological cycle, the carbon cycle and the cryosphere. (Full article...)
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Juno in the Underworld by Jan Brueghel the Younger, between 1626 and 1630 The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underworld. The concept of an underworld is found in almost every civilization and "may be as old as humanity itself". Common features of underworld myths are accounts of living people making journeys to the underworld, often for some heroic purpose. Other myths reinforce traditions that the entrance of souls to the underworld requires a proper observation of ceremony, such as the ancient Greek story of the recently dead Patroclus haunting Achilles until his body could be properly buried for this purpose. People with high social status were dressed and equipped in order to better navigate the underworld. (Full article...)
The series is traditionally played in October, although before expansion of the regular-season schedule from 154 to 162 games the event occasionally started in late September (most recently in 1955) and the entire 1918 series took place early in that month due to the World War I "Work or Fight" order forcing an early end to that year's regular season, while some more recent editions have been played into November due to in-season delays and expansion of earlier postseason rounds. Because the series is played in the fall or autumn season in North America, it is often referred to as the Fall Classic. (Full article...)
Image 13Japanese depiction of a Portuguese carrack. European maritime innovations led to proto-globalization.
Image 14Conjectured illustration of the scorched Earth after the Sun has entered the red giant phase, about 5–7 billion years in the future (from Earth)
Image 16Exaggerated illustration of Earth's elliptical orbit around the Sun, marking that the orbital extreme points (apoapsis and periapsis) are not the same as the four seasonal extreme points, the equinox and solstice (from Earth)
Image 18Earth's western hemisphere showing topography relative to Earth's center instead of to mean sea level, as in common topographic maps (from Earth)
Image 19A schematic view of Earth's magnetosphere with solar wind flowing from left to right (from Earth)
Image 20Earth's axial tilt causing different angles of seasonal illumination at different orbital positions around the Sun (from Earth)
Image 23Pangaea was a supercontinent that existed from about 300 to 180 Ma. The outlines of the modern continents and other landmasses are indicated on this map. (from History of Earth)
Image 39Trilobites first appeared during the Cambrian period and were among the most widespread and diverse groups of Paleozoic organisms. (from History of Earth)
Image 48Earth's night-side upper atmosphere appearing from the bottom as bands of afterglow illuminating the troposphere in orange with silhouettes of clouds, and the stratosphere in white and blue. Next the mesosphere (pink area) extends to the orange and faintly green line of the lowest airglow, at about one hundred kilometers at the edge of space and the lower edge of the thermosphere (invisible). Continuing with green and red bands of aurorae stretching over several hundred kilometers. (from Earth)
Image 49An artist's impression of ice age Earth at glacial maximum. (from History of Earth)
Image 51Artist's impression of a Hadean landscape with the relatively newly formed Moon still looming closely over Earth and both bodies sustaining strong volcanism. (from History of Earth)
Image 58Change in average surface air temperature and drivers for that change. Human activity has caused increased temperatures, with natural forces adding some variability. (from Earth)
Image 59Geologic map of North America, color-coded by age. From most recent to oldest, age is indicated by yellow, green, blue, and red. The reds and pinks indicate rock from the Archean.
Image 60A 2012 artistic impression of the early Solar System's protoplanetary disk from which Earth and other Solar System bodies were formed (from Earth)
Image 62The replicator in virtually all known life is deoxyribonucleic acid. DNA is far more complex than the original replicator and its replication systems are highly elaborate. (from History of Earth)
Image 63A view of Earth with its global ocean and cloud cover, which dominate Earth's surface and hydrosphere; at Earth's polar regions, its hydrosphere forms larger areas of ice cover. (from Earth)
Image 64Earth's land use for human agriculture in 2019 (from Earth)
Image 82Tiktaalik, a fish with limb-like fins and a predecessor of tetrapods. Reconstruction from fossils about 375 million years old. (from History of Earth)
Image 83Chloroplasts in the cells of a moss (from History of Earth)
Image 84An artist's impression of the Archean, the eon after Earth's formation, featuring round stromatolites, which are early oxygen-producing forms of life from billions of years ago. After the Late Heavy Bombardment, Earth's crust had cooled, its water-rich barren surface is marked by continents and volcanoes, with the Moon still orbiting Earth half as far as it is today, appearing 2.8 times larger and producing strong tides. (from Earth)
Image 85Artist's conception of Hadean Eon Earth, when it was much hotter and inhospitable to all forms of life. (from History of Earth)
Image 86Artist's impression of Earth during the later Archean, the largely cooled planetary crust and water-rich barren surface, marked by volcanoes and continents, features already roundmicrobialites. The Moon, still orbiting Earth much closer than today and still dominating Earth's sky, produced strong tides. (from History of Earth)
Image 87A reconstruction of human history based on fossil data. (from History of Earth)
Image 88An animation of the changing density of productive vegetation on land (low in brown; heavy in dark green) and phytoplankton at the ocean surface (low in purple; high in yellow) (from Earth)
The metropolitan area is named after the Rhine and Ruhr rivers, which are the region's defining geographical features and historically its economic backbone. (Full article...)
Various lists of the Wonders of the World have been compiled from antiquity to the present day, in order to catalogue the world's most spectacular natural features and human-built structures.
The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World is the oldest known list of this type, documenting the most iconic and remarkable human-made creations of classical antiquity; it was based on guidebooks popular among Hellenic sightseers and as such only includes works located around the Mediterranean rim and in the ancient Near East. The number seven was chosen because the Greeks believed it represented perfection and plenty, and because it reflected the number of planets known in ancient times (five) plus the Sun and Moon. (Full article...)
Protected areas of Canada consist of approximately 12.1 percent of the nation's landmass and freshwater are considered conservation areas, including 11.4 percent designated as protected areas. Approximately 13.8 percent of Canada's territorial waters are conserved, including 8.9 percent designated as protected areas. Terrestrial areas conserved have increased by 65 percent in the 21st century, while marine areas conserved have increased by more than 3,800 percent.
Conservation and protected areas have different mandates depending on the organization which manages them, with some areas having a greater focus on ecological integrity, historical preservation, public usage, scientific research, or a combination of usages. Some areas such as the Polar Bear Pass, are co-managed and overseen by government and local indigenous agencies. (Full article...)
The protected areas of Michigan come in an array of different types and levels of protection. Michigan has five units of the National Park Service system. There are 14 federal wilderness areas; the majority of these are also tribal-designated wildernesses. It has one of the largest state forest systems as well having four national forests. The state maintains a large state park system and there are also regional parks, and county, township and city parks. Still other parks on land and in the Great Lakes are maintained by other governmental bodies. Private protected areas also exist in the state, mainly lands owned by land conservancies. (Full article...)
The supreme responsibility for conservation lies with the Norwegian Ministry of the Environment, which has delegated the management to the Governor of Svalbard and the Norwegian Directorate for Nature Management. The foundation for conservation was established in the Svalbard Treaty of 1920, and has been further specified in the Svalbard Environmental Act of 2001. The first round of protection took force on 1 July 1973, when most of the current protected areas came into effect. This included the two large nature reserves and three of the national parks. Moffen Nature Reserve was established in 1983, followed by four national parks, three nature reserves and one geotope protection area between 2002 and 2005. (Full article...)
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The main protected areas of Croatia are national parks, nature parks and strict reserves. There are 444 protected areas of Croatia, encompassing 9% of the country. Those include 8 national parks in Croatia, 2 strict reserves and 11 nature parks. The most famous protected area and the oldest national park in Croatia is the Plitvice Lakes National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Velebit Nature Park is a part of the UNESCO Man and the Biosphere Programme. The strict and special reserves, as well as the national and nature parks, are managed and protected by the central government, while other protected areas are managed by counties. In 2005, the National Ecological Network was set up, as the first step in preparation of the EU accession and joining of the Natura 2000 network.
The total area of all national parks in the country is 930 km2 (359 sq mi), of which 235 km2 (91 sq mi) is sea surface. Each of the national parks is maintained by a separate institution, overseen and funded by the government ministry of nature conservation and spatial development. The State Institute for Nature Protection provides centralized oversight and expertise. (Full article...)
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Andohahela National Park in southern Madagascar The national parks of Madagascar include all officially recognized protected areas as of 2015. The protected areas network of Madagascar is managed by the Madagascar National Parks Association (PNM-ANGAP). The network includes three types of protected areas: Strict Nature Reserves (IUCN category Ia), National Parks (IUCN category II) and Wildlife Reserves (IUCN category IV). At the 2003 IUCN World Parks Congress in Durban, the Malagasy President, Marc Ravalomanana, announced an initiative to more than triple the area under protection from approximately 17,000 km2 (6,600 sq mi) to over 60,000 km2 (23,000 sq mi) (from 3% to 10% of Madagascar's area). This "Durban Vision", as it has been dubbed, involved broadening the definition of protected areas in the country and legislation has been passed to allow the creation of four new categories of protected area: Natural Parks (IUCN category II), Natural Monuments (IUCN category III), Protected Landscapes (IUCN category V), and Natural Resource Reserves (IUCN category VI). As well as allowing these new objectives for protected areas management, the new legislation also provided for entities other than PNM-ANGAP to manage protected areas, such as government ministries, community associations, NGOs and other civil society organizations, and the private sector. (Full article...)
Part of the Brecon Beacons National Park, looking from the highest point of Pen y Fan (886 m/2907 feet) to Cribyn (795 m/2608 feet). Protected areas of the United Kingdom are areas in the United Kingdom which need and /or receive protection because of their environmental, historical or cultural value to the nation. Methods and aims of protection vary depending on the nature and importance of the resource. Protection operates at local, regional, national and international levels, and may be backed by legislation and international treaty, or less formally by planning policy.
Within the United Kingdom, different approaches are taken to some forms of protection within the constituent countries of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, while other forms of protection are more consistent across the UK. Protected areas can be divided according to the type of resource which each seeks to protect. Primarily, these are: scenic or landscape value; biodiversity value (species and habitats); geodiversity value (relating to geology and geomorphology); and cultural or historic value. Several types of protected areas are focused on more than one of these areas. (Full article...)
Based on the Collaborative Australian Protected Area Database (CAPAD) 2020 data there are 2136 separate terrestrial protected areas with a total land area of 7,696,641 hectares (19,018,810 acres) (9.61% of the state's area). CAPAD data also shows 18 marine protected areas with a total area of 348,849 hectares (862,020 acres), covering 39.63% of NSW waters. (Full article...)
Image 6Only a few of the largest large igneous provinces appear (coloured dark purple) on this geological map, which depicts crustal geologic provinces as seen in seismic refraction data
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Cuneiform inscription, eastern Turkey
"Lucy", the first Australopithecus afarensis skeleton found, was only 1.06 m (3 ft 6 in) tall.
Earth's history with time-spans of the eons to scale. Ma means "million years ago". (from History of Earth)
Dinosaurs were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates throughout most of the Mesozoic (from History of Earth)
Olmec colossal head, now at the Museo de Antropología de Xalapa
Empires of the world in 1898
A computer-generated image mapping the prevalence of artificial satellites and space debris around Earth in geosynchronous and low Earth orbit (from Earth)
Fall of the Berlin Wall, 1989
Lithified stromatolites on the shores of Lake Thetis, Western Australia. Archean stromatolites are the first direct fossil traces of life on Earth. (from History of Earth)
Japanese depiction of a Portuguese carrack. European maritime innovations led to proto-globalization.
Pillar erected by Ashoka, a Mauryan Emperor in India
Cross-section through a liposome (from History of Earth)
Earth's western hemisphere showing topography relative to Earth's center instead of to mean sea level, as in common topographic maps (from Earth)
A schematic view of Earth's magnetosphere with solar wind flowing from left to right (from Earth)
Earth's axial tilt causing different angles of seasonal illumination at different orbital positions around the Sun (from Earth)
A banded iron formation from the 3.15 Ga Moodies Group, Barberton Greenstone Belt, South Africa. Red layers represent the times when oxygen was available; gray layers were formed in anoxic circumstances. (from History of Earth)
Pangaea was a supercontinent that existed from about 300 to 180 Ma. The outlines of the modern continents and other landmasses are indicated on this map. (from History of Earth)
Yggdrasil, an attempt to reconstruct the Norse world tree which connects the heavens, the world, and the underworld. (from World)
Taj Mahal, Mughal Empire, India
Angkor Wat temple complex, Cambodia, early 12th century
Peopling of the world, the Southern Dispersal scenario
Obelisk of Axum, Ethiopia
A view of Earth with different layers of its atmosphere visible: the troposphere with its clouds casting shadows, a band of stratospheric blue sky at the horizon, and a line of green airglow of the lower thermosphere around an altitude of 100 km, at the edge of space (from Earth)
13th-century French historiated initial with the three classes of medieval society: those who prayed (the clergy), those who fought (the knights), and those who worked (the peasantry) (from Human history)
Florence, birthplace of the Italian Renaissance
Ming dynasty section, Great Wall of China
Artist's impression of the enormous collision that probably formed the Moon (from History of Earth)
COVID-19 pandemic, 2020 (from Human history)
Trilobites first appeared during the Cambrian period and were among the most widespread and diverse groups of Paleozoic organisms. (from History of Earth)
A 580 million year old fossil of Spriggina floundensi, an animal from the Ediacaran period. Such life forms could have been ancestors to the many new forms that originated in the Cambrian Explosion. (from History of Earth)
Pale orange dot, an artist's impression of Early Earth, featuring its tinted orange methane-rich early atmosphere (from Earth)
Last Moon landing: Apollo 17 (1972)
Shanghai. China urbanized rapidly in the 21st century.
Notre-Dame de Paris, France
A map of heat flow from Earth's interior to the surface of Earth's crust, mostly along the oceanic ridges (from Earth)
First airplane, the Wright Flyer, flew on 17 December 1903.
Earth's night-side upper atmosphere appearing from the bottom as bands of afterglow illuminating the troposphere in orange with silhouettes of clouds, and the stratosphere in white and blue. Next the mesosphere (pink area) extends to the orange and faintly green line of the lowest airglow, at about one hundred kilometers at the edge of space and the lower edge of the thermosphere (invisible). Continuing with green and red bands of aurorae stretching over several hundred kilometers. (from Earth)
An artist's impression of ice age Earth at glacial maximum. (from History of Earth)
Battle during the 1281 Mongol invasion of Japan
Artist's impression of a Hadean landscape with the relatively newly formed Moon still looming closely over Earth and both bodies sustaining strong volcanism. (from History of Earth)
Benin Bronze head from Nigeria
One of the eleven Rock-hewn Churches of Lalibela constructed during the Zagwe dynasty in Ethiopia (from Human history)
A reconstruction of Pannotia (550 Ma). (from History of Earth)
Great Pyramids of Giza, Egypt
A composite image of Earth, with its different types of surface discernible: Earth's surface dominating Ocean (blue), Africa with lush (green) to dry (brown) land and Earth's polar ice in the form of Antarctic sea ice (grey) covering the Antarctic or Southern Ocean and the Antarctic ice sheet (white) covering Antarctica. (from Earth)
Chennakesava Temple, Belur, India
Change in average surface air temperature and drivers for that change. Human activity has caused increased temperatures, with natural forces adding some variability. (from Earth)
Geologic map of North America, color-coded by age. From most recent to oldest, age is indicated by yellow, green, blue, and red. The reds and pinks indicate rock from the Archean.
A 2012 artistic impression of the early Solar System's protoplanetary disk from which Earth and other Solar System bodies were formed (from Earth)
Ajloun Castle, Jordan
The replicator in virtually all known life is deoxyribonucleic acid. DNA is far more complex than the original replicator and its replication systems are highly elaborate. (from History of Earth)
A view of Earth with its global ocean and cloud cover, which dominate Earth's surface and hydrosphere; at Earth's polar regions, its hydrosphere forms larger areas of ice cover. (from Earth)
Earth's land use for human agriculture in 2019 (from Earth)
Artist's conception of Devonian flora (from History of Earth)
A composite image of artificial light emissions at night on a map of Earth (from Earth)
Satellite time lapse imagery of Earth's rotation showing axis tilt (from Earth)
Carving of Persian and Median soldiers, Persepolis, Achaemenid Empire, 5th century BCE
Machu Picchu, Inca Empire, Peru
Image of the physical world, captured by the Hubble Space Telescope (from World)
A pillar at Göbekli Tepe
Tracy Caldwell Dyson, a NASA astronaut, observing Earth from the Cupola module at the International Space Station on 11 September 2010 (from Earth)
Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci epitomizes the advances in art and science seen during the Renaissance. (from History of Earth)
Standing Buddha from Gandhara, 2nd century CE
Great Mosque of Kairouan, Tunisia, founded 670 CE
An artist's rendering of a protoplanetary disk (from History of Earth)
Artist's rendition of an oxinated fully-frozen Snowball Earth with no remaining liquid surface water. (from History of Earth)
Graph showing range of estimated partial pressure of atmospheric oxygen through geologic time (from History of Earth)
Tiktaalik, a fish with limb-like fins and a predecessor of tetrapods. Reconstruction from fossils about 375 million years old. (from History of Earth)
Chloroplasts in the cells of a moss (from History of Earth)
An artist's impression of the Archean, the eon after Earth's formation, featuring round stromatolites, which are early oxygen-producing forms of life from billions of years ago. After the Late Heavy Bombardment, Earth's crust had cooled, its water-rich barren surface is marked by continents and volcanoes, with the Moon still orbiting Earth half as far as it is today, appearing 2.8 times larger and producing strong tides. (from Earth)
Artist's conception of Hadean Eon Earth, when it was much hotter and inhospitable to all forms of life. (from History of Earth)
A reconstruction of human history based on fossil data. (from History of Earth)
An animation of the changing density of productive vegetation on land (low in brown; heavy in dark green) and phytoplankton at the ocean surface (low in purple; high in yellow) (from Earth).png)
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Time zones of the world
Mollweide projection of the world
A plate tectonics map with volcano locations indicated with red circles
1516 map of the world by Martin Waldseemüller
United Nations Human Development Index map by country (2016)
Only a few of the largest large igneous provinces appear (coloured dark purple) on this geological map, which depicts crustal geologic provinces as seen in seismic refraction data
Index map from the International Map of the World (1:1,000,000 scale)
The Goode homolosine projection is a pseudocylindrical, equal-area, composite map projection used for world maps.
The world map by Gerardus Mercator (1569), the first map in the well-known Mercator projection
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