Hubble Goes to the eXtreme to Assemble Farthest-Ever View of the Universe

NASA ^ | September 26, 2012 | Staff

[Moonman62]

So these objects, now redshifted into much longer wavelengths by virtue of universal expansion, are in the neighborhood of 13.2 billion times 6 trillion miles away from us. And they’re 13.2 billion years older by now. Did I screw up on any of this?

I'm not going to double check your work, but it's amazing that we were all touching at one time.

[ETL]

LOL! I just watched that MP clip you linked. I never saw that skit before. The music is the same theme as that from the conclusion of their film Life Of Brian (”Always Look On the Bright Side of Life”).

[Windflier]

The field is smaller than a grain of sand held at arm’s length. Yet it contains some 5,000+ galaxies. Galaxies typically contain 50-200 billion stars (each).

The human mind simply doesn't the capacity to fully imagine the total scope of what we behold in the night sky.

I mean, just try picturing your entire field of vision in a spherical, 360 degree aspect, divided into segments as small as a grain of sand held at arm's length. Then, imagine that there are at least 5,000 galaxies in every one of those segments - each containing 50 to 200 BILLION stars.

I don't think I can do it. In fact, I know that I can't.

I'm telling you, people who think the only life in the cosmos is on this planet, just aren't thinking with the staggering numbers involved with the question.

[ETL]

I'm not going to double check your work, but it's amazing that we were all touching at one time.

According to Big Bang Inflation theory, the entire universe, currently 13.2 billion light years in radius, and assuming we're actually 'seeing' to its near end/beginning, was once contained within a volume of space many billions of times smaller than the nucleus of a hydrogen atom.

[Vote 4 Nixon]

Poor guy is probably spinning in his grave over the catastrophic damage obama has done to our space program.

[ETL]

A grain of sand held at arm’s length is roughly 1/12th the apparent diameter of the full moon. The Hubble eXtreme field, I believe, is even tinier than that. Amazing achievement. Then again, astronomers didn’t do that, Obama did!

[Artie]

Each time I view this, I just cannot help thinking that we, the human race, is the highlight and the epitome of creation in the history of time.

[Noumenon]

Galaxies Like Grains of Sand is also the evocative title of science fiction work by Brian Aldiss published in 1960. I read that book over and over until I literally wore it out; it captured my imagination and sense of wonder as few books or writers have since.

I think I'll have to find a copy...

[ETL]

Carl Sagan “100 Billion Galaxies each W/100 Billion Stars”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ex__M-OwSA

[garjog]

From the play Our Town:

REBECCA: I never told you about that letter Jane Crofut got from her minister when she was sick. He wrote Jane a letter and on theenvelope the address was like this: It said: Jane Crofut; The Crofut Farm; Grover’s Corners; Sutton County; New Hamp-shire; United States of America.

GEORGE: What’s funny about that?

REBECCA: But listen, it’s not finished: the United States of America; Conti-nent of North America; Western Hemisphere; the Earth; the Solar System; the Universe; the Mind of God — that’s what it said on the envelope.

GEORGE:

What do you know!

REBECCA: And the postman brought it just the same.

GEORGE: What do you know!

[BykrBayb]

Makes you wonder how big Michelle’s shorts will be after they can no longer maintain pressure.

[fella]

And not a radio signal from any of those civilizations out there.

[Windflier]

Galaxies Like Grains of Sand by Brian Aldiss

Thanks for the tip. I'll have to read it. That was an excellent recommendation.

[ETL]

just try picturing your entire field of vision in a spherical, 360 degree aspect, divided into segments as small as a grain of sand held at arm's length. Then, imagine that there are at least 5,000 galaxies in every one of those segments - each containing 50 to 200 BILLION stars.

And the miniscule segments wouldn't be 'slices'. They would be more like little squares of which a tiny grain of sand (held at arm's length) would fill.

[cardinal4]

Six trillion miles *shakes head* it is hard to get your head around that distance..!

[workerbee]

LOL... perhaps.

[no-to-illegals]

Thanks lbryce. Am simply in awe.

[ETL]

Carl Sagan on the Tonight Show w/ Johnny Carson:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NsvOaYher8

[ETL]

Johnny Carson as Carl Sagan in Tonight Show sketch:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jVQg87MA9s

[no-to-illegals]

A mystery, of why there is so much static. Maybe and I do not know if this is anywhere correct, though, could it be frequency modulation problems, or perhaps use of the wrong spectrum?