Judi Dench

[the village idiot]

Last point in this latest VI derail.

 

The universe is literally unbelievably, incomprehensibly vast.

 

I recommend watching that Andromeda video again and them imagine standing on a planet in Andromeda looking back at our own galaxy (the milky way) through a powerful telescope. It would look pretty much identical to the collection of pixels of light in the video.

 

Our sun would be one of those pixels of light with our invisible planet revolving around it. 

 

The suns look incredibly close together but in actual fact, to travel from our sun to the nearest star in our galaxy (from one pixel to the next) in the fastest rocket we can currently build would involve a journey of 80,000 years!!!

 

We recently received the light generated from the collision of two neutron stars in one of the other 200 billion galaxies in the universe. The collision happened 130 million light years ago and the light has only just reached Earth. This is astounding in itself. Then consider that light travels at 186,000 miles per second. In every year of those 130 million it took for the light to travel from this distant galaxy to our own, the light was covering a distance of 6 trillion miles!!!

6,000,000,000,000 miles per year for 130 million years!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

It's big out there.

Edited December 29, 2017 by the village idiot

[openspaceman]

8 hours ago, the village idiot said:

The collision happened 130 million light years ago

Pedant but it happened circa 130 million years ago and that is the time it took the light to reach us

[the village idiot]

7 minutes ago, openspaceman said:

Pedant but it happened circa 130 million years ago and that is the time it took the light to reach us

Well spotted that man!

[wills-mill]

4 minutes ago, openspaceman said:

Pedant but it happened circa 130 million years ago and that is the time it took the light to reach us

 And for more pedantry didn't Tony K mention number of trees vs stars in our galaxy (ie just the Milky Way)?

As well as that, for an extra pedant badge, Surrey has the most tree cover of any English county, but not GB or the UK as a whole. Mainly down to 'brownfield' coppice woodlands that are left over from Tudor iron smelting, or lapsed sandy/ heathy common land that has loads of regen growth or softwood plantations.

 

[Gary Prentice]

8 hours ago, the village idiot said:

 

6,000,000,000,000 miles per year for 130 million years!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

It's big out there.

And the Royal Mail call the Highlands and Islands remote

[the village idiot]

3 minutes ago, wills-mill said:

 And for more pedantry didn't Tony K mention number of trees vs stars in our galaxy (ie just the Milky Way)?

As well as that, for an extra pedant badge, Surrey has the most tree cover of any English county, but not GB or the UK as a whole. Mainly down to 'brownfield' coppice woodlands that are left over from Tudor iron smelting, or lapsed sandy/ heathy common land that has loads of regen growth or softwood plantations.

 

That would be a bit more like it. My calculator says there would be 12 trees on earth for every star in the milky way, or thereabouts.

[the village idiot]

6 minutes ago, Gary Prentice said:

And the Royal Mail call the Highlands and Islands remote

If you wanted to send a letter to the edge of the observable universe and you gave your letter to the ultimate Gary Boy postman who had souped up his peugeot to reach a top speed of 671 million mph, it will still take him 45 billion years to get there.

 

The infuriating thing for the postman is that because the universe is expanding at the same speed or faster than he is driving, when he got there it would no longer be the edge, he would have to drive for another 45 billion years, and another and another....

 

Lets hope he took his thermos.

[Shaunpaul]

Completely mind boggling, makes you think how irrelevant the human race is in comparison to the vast scale. Are you saying the universe is actually physically expanding, and if so what is there now? Or expanding as we see it, with ever increasing technology?. Surely there has to be other life form out there.

[Stubby]

Any one read a book called " Weave World "   ?  It goes the other way , infinitely small as opposed to infinitely big ......  

Edited December 29, 2017 by Stubby

[the village idiot]

4 hours ago, Shaunpaul said:

Completely mind boggling, makes you think how irrelevant the human race is in comparison to the vast scale. Are you saying the universe is actually physically expanding, and if so what is there now? Or expanding as we see it, with ever increasing technology?. Surely there has to be other life form out there.

Yes, the universe is not only expanding, but the rate of expansion is speeding up. I think the astrophysisists generally think that there is literally nothing 'infront' of this expansion. Time and space expands as the universe expands. I know very little about this stuff unfortunately, I wish I knew more.

 

I agree with you, the idea that there is no other life in the universe is inconceivable. If there is life beyond our solar system it is pretty unlikely that we will come into physical contact with it for a very, very long time if ever. The distances between solar systems is so incredibly vast, and the distances between galaxies? Forget it!