Random astronomy thoughts thread

[Doctor Cringelord]

What a lonely existence to be a star located between galaxies, to be truly isolated from the rest of the cosmos. By our perception of the scale of the universe, even the distance between stars in a single galaxy seems colossal. Imagine the distance for a rogue star between Andromeda and The Milky Way.

 

[Lexicon]

What a lonely existence to be a star located between galaxies, to be truly isolated from the rest of the cosmos. By our perception of the scale of the universe, even the distance between stars in a single galaxy seems colossal. Imagine the distance for a rogue star between Andromeda and The Milky Way.

I read this in Leonard Nemoy’s voice. I hope that’s cool with you.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

I read this in Leonard Nemoy’s voice. I hope that’s cool with you.

Yeah, but what if it was in Gilbert Gottfried's voice?

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

rogue planets are also a real thing too. Icy, homeless orbs hurtling through space. I wonder if any of these house life beneath their icy crusts.

 

[Population: 1]

There are rogue stars, planets, star systems, and even rogue globular star clusters.

The possibilities.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

In fact I think they speculate now that half of all active stars are rogues or parts of smaller star clusters situated between galaxies. I wonder if a sentient being living on a planet orbiting one of these stars truly imagines their planet as being alone in the cosmos. I also wonder how astronomers on those worlds might come to different or similar conclusions to those of earth astronomers, if basing their findings on their own observations and their relations to the greater universe.

 

[theablekingedgar]

humans may be the only sapient life in the universe.
it's not egotistical to think this - but a possibility.

 

[Totenkindly]

Basically spatial size/distances if the earth were scaled to the size of a small marble.

I think what blows me away is the sense of how quickly it STILL ratchets up to a galactic scale even when it is scaled down so much. I can grasp the first half or so of the video, then it all becomes too large again.

Human beings seem incapable of processing / envisioning very large numbers. Like, we kind of grasp a million, but after that point we don't really perceive scale well. Like, with all the economic discussions popularized in the news today, we have trouble grasping how much larger 1 billion is compared to 1 million. (I think the best scale I have seen that is understandable is that a million seconds is 11.5 days, and a billion seconds is 31.7 years.)

Space is so goddam vast especially when we start talking about the size of galaxies and the space between then. Even the orbits of our farthest ranging planetary bodies in our solar system is a bit difficult to grasp. What would life conditions even be at those locations? And any traveling between them would need some kind of way to circumvent the distance/time involved in such travel.

 

[jaymesonsurya]

i am very curious about astronomy and stuff, if u do too check this artcle out, it is nice to read https://www.space.com/spaceflight-destroys-red-blood-cells

 

[Virtual ghost]

Basically spatial size/distances if the earth were scaled to the size of a small marble.

I think what blows me away is the sense of how quickly it STILL ratchets up to a galactic scale even when it is scaled down so much. I can grasp the first half or so of the video, then it all becomes too large again.

Human beings seem incapable of processing / envisioning very large numbers. Like, we kind of grasp a million, but after that point we don't really perceive scale well. Like, with all the economic discussions popularized in the news today, we have trouble grasping how much larger 1 billion is compared to 1 million. (I think the best scale I have seen that is understandable is that a million seconds is 11.5 days, and a billion seconds is 31.7 years.)

Space is so goddam vast especially when we start talking about the size of galaxies and the space between then. Even the orbits of our farthest ranging planetary bodies in our solar system is a bit difficult to grasp. What would life conditions even be at those locations? And any traveling between them would need some kind of way to circumvent the distance/time involved in such travel.

Out of curiosity I decided to poke around this channel and found even more interesting video. Which evidently proves my belief that no matter how much the size of the universe is giving people existential shock, this shock is still nothing next to what the concept of time has to offer in that regard. However time is kinda too abstract term that even smarter people would think about it too much. Therefore I recommend full screen and watching the whole thing in one take until it actually finishes. For those that don't know: when a smaller number sits in the right corner next to the number 10 that is the amount of zeros behind it. What is simply the most practical way of writing very large numbers.

People have no idea what is actually ahead.

 

[Doctor Cringelord]

humans may be the only sapient life in the universe.
it's not egotistical to think this - but a possibility.

More likely is that any planet with conditions similar to Earth has a chance of sprouting lifeforms very similar to Earth's. Unless conditions were drastically different, convergent evolution was likely to have occurred on some of these planets--i.e. fish-like creatures in the water, terrestrial animals with features and adaptations similar to our own land animals, and in some cases, sentient humanoids. If there are a near-infinite number of planets similar to our own in makeup and distance from their own suns, then it is reasonable to assume humanoid life would have developed or will come to develop. The possibility of something like some of those "earth like" planets with near or identical humans and cultures we saw in old sci fi serials and star trek's lower budget episodes may not be all that outlandish and within the realm of possibility, if not necessarily

Now, whether the distances are too great to ever allow "face to face" contact with other humanoid species is another question entirely, especially for any which have reached roughly the same level of technology as our own (and the silence of the skies suggests there may be no advanced humanoid civiliations within our immediate vicinity, although who's to say they'd even want to announce themselves? If there are so advances, they could possess cloaking technology, advanced sensor drones, and who knows else, and we would never learn of their presence.

 

[FlamingSword]

Maybe it's pessimistic but the truth known to us is only part of the truth we are able to know. The universe, or, multiverse, might be beyond our wildest imagination. Science has shown many things about the world we live in. The JWST makes us see even further. But, what we can know, what we can see, might ultimately be limited to our settings (or, biological composition). There are certain things that we can imagine but cannot observe, such as multi-dimensional space; there are some things that we cannot even imagine, e.g., what is the other side of a black hole, if there is such a side? There might be eternal mysteries, e.g., anything beyond the observable universe, who knows?

WMAP- Content of the Universe

Public access site for The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe and associated information about cosmology.

wmap.gsfc.nasa.gov

What does this mean? It means that the universe known to us is merely a tiny part of the whole. There are things we can know, if not now, then in the future; and there are things we cannot, regardless. Maybe, in dark energy many creatures exist, but is this true? We don't know yet. We haven't found aliens yet, but perhaps they are already among us, perhaps they are everywhere, but we cannot find them. They exist in another dimension.

Life is like a never-ending exploratory journey. We can never know enough. That makes life so exciting. The beauty of the universe lies in its mysteries, infinity, and constant change.

The multiverse exists, in the sense that the infinitely small, quantum world, shares a similar structure as the infinitely huge, universe, as we know it. Perhaps, if they share the same principles, by knowing the quantum world, we can know what is currently impossible to know - the universe and beyond. Everything is interrelated and interdependent.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Maybe it's pessimistic but the truth known to us is only part of the truth we are able to know. The universe, or, multiverse, might be beyond our wildest imagination. Science has shown many things about the world we live in. The JWST makes us see even further. But, what we can know, what we can see, might ultimately be limited to our settings (or, biological composition). There are certain things that we can imagine but cannot observe, such as multi-dimensional space; there are some things that we cannot even imagine, e.g., what is the other side of a black hole, if there is such a side? There might be eternal mysteries, e.g., anything beyond the observable universe, who knows?

I don't think it's pessimistic. It's invigorating to me, knowing that we will likely never exhaust our search for knowledge.

Life is like a never-ending exploratory journey. We can never know enough. That makes life so exciting. The beauty of the universe lies in its mysteries, infinity, and constant change.

Essentially this is how I feel, at least on a good day.

The multiverse exists, in the sense that the infinitely small, quantum world, shares a similar structure as the infinitely huge, universe, as we know it. Perhaps, if they share the same principles, by knowing the quantum world, we can know what is currently impossible to know - the universe and beyond. Everything is interrelated and interdependent.

That's a fascinating possibility.

 

[stevewill12]

The distance between the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and the Milky Way Galaxy is approximately 2.537 million light-years(calculated on here https://oneconvert.com/unit-converters/length-converter/light-year-to-meter). However, a rogue star would not necessarily be located at this precise midpoint between the two galaxies, as rogue stars are not bound to any particular galaxy and can travel through intergalactic space. Rogue stars can be found at various distances from galaxies, depending on their individual trajectories and velocities.

 

[stevewill12]

What a lonely existence to be a star located between galaxies, to be truly isolated from the rest of the cosmos. By our perception of the scale of the universe, even the distance between stars in a single galaxy seems colossal. Imagine the distance for a rogue star between Andromeda and The Milky Way.

It's pretty mind-blowing to think about. how alone it must feel out there! Even within one galaxy, the distance between stars is huge. So for a rogue star without a galaxy to call home. It's a reminder of how big and mysterious the universe really is.