Nearly 46 years ago, NASA launched two small probes carrying a pair of gold-plated copper records that would soon become the farthest human-made objects from Earth ever created. The probes — named Voyager 1 and 2 — and their golden payloads are currently floating more than 12 billion miles (19 billion kilometers) from Earth, and gaining distance every day. But this week, you can add a master copy of those legendary records to your personal vinyl collection without even leaving your home — and all you need is half a million dollars.
On July 27, Sotheby's will auction two double-sided reels of audio tape containing the master recordings of the Voyager Golden Record, plucked from the personal collection of celebrity astronomer Carl Sagan and his wife, Ann Druyan, both of whom helped with the record's design and development in 1977.
