Monday, June 20, 2005

just how much is really out there.

hubble ultra deep field thumbnail view

http://hubblesite.org/newscenter...releases/2004/07/

follow the top link to view the shot at full resolution (warning: it's 60mb. it's 6200x6200px)... and then do the following:
hold out your hand at arms length, up towards the sky, palm towards the sky, fingers out. now look at the amount of sky covered by your pinky fingernail. that is more than the area covered by that picture. and take a good look at just how much is in that picture.

start reading a little bit about the numbers of stars in the galaxies in just that picture alone, just the ones visible. then imagine that in every direction...

if you can even begin to grasp the sheer amount... maybe you might want to think about things like whether or not you really believe that out of all that... that we are the only life in the entire universe? there could be life all over the universe, right now. traveling around the stars... and we wouldn't know it because unless they were traveling exponentially faster than the speed of light, they wouldn't be able to get here or send us ANY type of signal that we would recieve for THOUSANDS, if not MILLIONS of years. some of what we are just now seeing out there is BILLIONS of years ago. the LIGHT is just now getting to us.

there is plenty in the universe to be amazed about, but don't let it stop you from pursuing the facts and understanding what is actually there. resting on fantasy and superstition isn't going to get us very far, to say the least.

No comments: