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Let's put things in proportion!

Discussion in 'Alley of Dangerous Angles' started by Clixby, Jan 3, 2007.

  1. Clixby Gems: 13/31
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  2. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

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    What are you on about?
     
  3. Clixby Gems: 13/31
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    Sorry, I screwed up the image links there for a moment-I kind of hoped no-one would notice the thread until I'd fixed them :bad: . They're up for seriously now.
     
  4. Bahir the Red Gems: 18/31
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    That's pretty cool.
     
  5. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

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    Ah, I thought you must have missed something off dude.

    Very interesting stuff!
     
  6. Duffin Gems: 13/31
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    I've only seen the scale upto the Sun before and I thought that was huge!
     
  7. T2Bruno

    T2Bruno The only source of knowledge is experience Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Another perspective.... (written by Eric Idle)

    Whenever life gets you down, Mrs. Brown,
    And things seem hard or tough,
    And people are stupid, obnoxious or daft,
    And you feel that you've had quite eno-o-o-o-o-ough,

    Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
    And revolving at nine hundred miles an hour.
    That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,
    'Round the sun that is the source of all our power.
    The sun, and you and me, and all the stars that we can see,
    Are moving at a million miles a day,
    In an outer spiral arm, at fourteen thousand miles an hour,
    Of a galaxy we call the Milky Way.

    Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars;
    It's a hundred thousand light-years side to side;
    It bulges in the middle sixteen thousand light-years thick,
    But out by us it's just three thousand light-years wide.
    We're thirty thousand light-years from Galactic Central Point,
    We go 'round every two hundred million years;
    And our galaxy itself is only one of millions of billions
    In this amazing and expanding universe.

    The universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding,
    In all of the directions it can whiz;
    As fast as it can go, the speed of light, you know,
    Twelve million miles a minute and that's the fastest speed there is.
    So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
    How amazingly unlikely is your birth;
    And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,
    'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth!
     
  8. Harbourboy

    Harbourboy Take thy form from off my door! Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Reminds me of that Blur song "Far Out".
     
  9. revmaf

    revmaf Older, not wiser, but a lot more fun

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    Very neat. The sort of thing you already know but have never visualized.

    Saw a documentary on the Science Channel this week, which I've seen before, in which Vera Rubin's (sp?) graphs of rotational speed of galaxies were shown - first indication that something was amiss with assumptions about mass of universe. One of the other scientists interviewed commented on how stunning those simple graphs were when first published.

    Never underestimate the power of an image!
     
  10. Dendri Gems: 20/31
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    To walk among giants...

    It boggles the mind. We dont even qualify as stardust.
     
  11. Ofelix

    Ofelix The world changes, we do not, what irony!

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    I feel soooo small.
     
  12. Saber

    Saber A revolution without dancing is not worth having! Veteran

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    Ooh, yay, we're insignificant!
     
  13. dmc

    dmc Speak softly and carry a big briefcase Staff Member Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

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    I have a completely different take. The fact that a bunch of overdeveloped apes on a ball of dirt know enough of the cosmos to put these pictures on computers that we all have so we can marvel at the universe makes me feel rather pround and significant.
     
  14. kuemper Gems: 31/31
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    They're only models.
     
  15. Taluntain

    Taluntain Resident Alpha and Omega Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) BoM XenForo Migration Contributor [2015] (for helping support the migration to new forum software!)

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    Neat. AoDA material, I think.
     
  16. Clixby Gems: 13/31
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    Models they may be, but they are accurate models of nearby stars and their size in proportion to our own Sun, which is nothing more than a yellow pixel compared to the basketball that is Antares.
     
  17. chevalier

    chevalier Knight of Everfull Chalice ★ SPS Account Holder Veteran

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    It's quite likely that there's something next to which Antares looks like a pixel, no?

    Yep, looks like we have quite some room to populate. :shake:
     
  18. Ofelix

    Ofelix The world changes, we do not, what irony!

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    I've always thought that the universe is such a waste of space...
     
  19. kuemper Gems: 31/31
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    If they were truly accurate, they'd be much bigger. :p
     
  20. Montresor

    Montresor Mostly Harmless Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder

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    Our Sun may seem insignificant compared to Antares, Betelgeuze or Rigel - but it will last much longer, and it is known to have at least one habitable planet orbiting it. :p
     
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