This picture of Jupiter with a big black spot on it made me do a double-take and think of 2010: The Year We Make Contact.

When I first saw this image online, I thought it might have been a joke, playing on the old "2010" storyline by Arthur C. Clarke in which he envisions Jupiter being ignited into a sun through the collective power of the mighty (and mysterious) monolith replicating itself over and over again.

However, it was no joke. The large black dot is a shadow cast by Jupiter's own moon, Io, and the image was captured by NASA's Juno spacecraft. It's pretty creepy though, right? It makes me wonder if Arthur C. Clarke got the idea from having seen an eclipse on Jupiter before. Or barring that, maybe he saw a picture of what an eclipse looks like on Earth (when seen from space) and thought, "Hey, doing something like that to Jupiter would be really creepy and mysterious and it sounds like a great idea!"

Anyway, I just thought I'd share the pic with you (and my thoughts). Have a great Monday.