This is really cool. On Space.com there is a whole page with a bunch of facts about the Alpha Centauri system, including the newly found planet Alpha Centauri Bb. Most of the stuff I knew about (since these are the kind of things I’m interested in) but seeing things ‘graphically’ really makes it more cool!!
Alpha Centauri Infographic – Linked from Space.com.
I saw a picture of solar flare this morning comparing it to the size of the Earth. Years ago as a kid I used some old mainframe stream paper to ‘draw’ the solar system at scale (1/1 000 000 000 000). That really puts the whole solar system into perspective (about 9 meters long to fit Pluto on furthest point). The following things could/can be observed using stuff at this ‘scale’.
| Object | Description |
|---|---|
| The Sun | A little ball of 1 millimeter in diameter |
| Earth | would be 15 centimeters away from the sun (Moon about 0.4mm away from Earth) |
| Jupiter | about 0.8 meters away (and 0.15mm in diameter) |
| Saturn | about 1.3 meters (rings about 0.2mm in diameter) |
| Neptune | about 4.5 meters |
| Pluto | around 6 meters (average, varies from 4.4m to about 7.3m) |
| Voyager 1 | is about 18 meters away |
| 1 light year | is about 11 kilometers away (10.8km) |
| Proxima Centauri (The closest star) | would be about 45 kilometers away! |
| Sirius (The brightest star) | about 93 kilometers away! |
| Betelgeuse | about 6940 kilometers away! (diameter roughly 1 meter estimate) |
| Alnilam (Epsilon Orionis, middle star of the Orion belt) | about 14 000 kilometers away |
| The largest star known (estimated) | has a diameter of about 1.5 meters |
| Milky way galaxy diameter | about 1 000 000 kilometers! |
| Andromeda galaxy | about 24 000 000 kilometers away!! |
| Speed of light | about 1 meter per hour!!! |
Kinda put things into perspective – especially the speed of light
Image Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO
Being a bit of a space/science nut and also a sci-fi lover I often read articles related to these things when I get a chance. Yesterday I happen to stumble across a few images of some old space station ideas dating back to the 60’s/70’s with the O’Neil cylinder/Three island concept. People that time had really grand ideas where we would be by ‘now’. Perhaps it was a bit ambitious but at least they dreamed and saw some hope for ‘all mankind’.
Fast-forward to present time. We have no big space stations, regular space trips, no bases on the moon or mars, no traveling to the stars – not even (tangible) plans for any of these in the immediate or near future. Seems everyday things like politics, money, power (the political kind) are too important for anyone to still have great dreams for ‘man kind’. Funny, all those things are the ones our ‘mothers/fathers’ warned us about to avoid… but we don’t listen, like usual.
Even on the fictional track of life things are dying. When last did we have a good sci-fi show (space oriented)? I’m busy watching the whole Babylon 5 series on DVD and this is probably what started making me think about these things. I long for the times I had ‘time’ (and the willpower) to do proper reading of a good sci-fi book. The last book I was busy with but somehow abandoned was the third Rama book (like in Rendezvous with Rama). Damn, I must make time for that again… Why did sir Arthur C Clarke had to go and die? I miss him!
Why did ‘we’ stopped dreaming big?