Comparing his experience to Jodie Foster’s character in the movie Contact, Shatner added, “I discovered that the beauty isn’t out there, it’s down here, with all of us. Leaving that behind made my connection to our tiny planet even more profound.”
In the excerpt, Shatner wrote that he later learned he “was not alone in this feeling,” which is called the “Overview Effect” and is “not uncommon among astronauts.”
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