The Question

Why?

 

Mythic proportionality.

More than any other image or collection of images, the Deep Field communicates the immensity of the Universe in way which is (almost?) accessible to the human mind. I like Norma's (Fred's) reference to proportionality, though I prefer referential scale. It is kind of like, though far larger than, the overwhelming sense of time described by Colin Fletcher in The Man Who Walked Through Time, as he tried to explain his own comprehension of the time scales exposed for observation in the rock layers of the Grand Canyon.

There is something very humbling about being put in my place so absolutely.

To the point of misty eyes......

The question is simple.

 

We are on one little burning dirt ball in a vast cosmos of discovery....

 

The hubble deep field photographs are a inspiration....

Fascinating stuff.....I love looking Up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWyhHoRGeEo

Edited July 21, 2018 by Moving On

because!

WTF not?

Because.

As a bit of relevant side note......

New Equation Tallies Odds of Life Beginning

In the video it's brought up several times how hard it is to grasp how big the universe is, and how citing the diameter in light years is almost useless in helping us visualize its size. Then it's claimed that the image from Hubble helps us visualize the immensity. I don't buy it. There is no good way to describe what the deep field shows that makes me understand the size of the universe any better than previous photos of galaxies. Whether a galaxy is a zettameter away, or a yottameter away, there is no way to really visualize the difference.

 

I have seen stars that are ten thousand light years away, and I've looked through a telescope at a quasar that is two billion light years away. I can't truly visualize either of these distances, even though I've seen these objects with my eyes.

 

The Hubble deep field image is technically amazing, and scientifically important, and I do not intend to detract from that. But to claim that we can visualize the size of the universe when we look at the image is bogus. To say that it's the single most important image ever taken is just melodrama.

According to my calculations, it would take 75,573,000 years to reach the nearest star to earth if traveling 600 mph on a jet airliner. Ain't no way anyone can imagine that, much less the miles to the nearest galaxy. Edited July 24, 2018 by Vincent Peri

In the video it's brought up several times how hard it is to grasp how big the universe is, and how citing the diameter in light years is almost useless in helping us visualize its size. Then it's claimed that the image from Hubble helps us visualize the immensity. I don't buy it.

 

The Hubble deep field image is technically amazing, and scientifically important, and I do not intend to detract from that. But to claim that we can visualize the size of the universe when we look at the image is bogus. To say that it's the single most important image ever taken is just melodrama.

 

First that claim was not made.

More like:

“The Hubble Deep Field is one of the few examples that help us get our head around how big our Universe is”

 

Second post me an image that supersedes the scope and gravity of that image.

Edited July 24, 2018 by Moving On

According to my calculations, it would take 75,573,000 years to reach the nearest star to earth if traveling 600 mph on a jet airliner. Ain't no way anyone can imagine that, much less the miles to the nearest galaxy.

 

Certainly you can imagine the very figures you come up with......

. There is no good way to describe what the deep field shows that makes me understand the size of the universe any better than previous photos of galaxies.

That is absurd considering the Deep Field Image extends far beyond any image you have ever seen in your “previous photos of galaxies”....

But I can certainly understand your frustrated criticism.

The boundary continues to be observed to be moving farther with each advance in imaging. James Webb is “batter up”.

And there you are stuck with a tiny sensor on your little bitty camera taking pictures and posting them online on a tiny planet in a reality that passes like so many particles of dust in a brief puff of air.....

Edited July 24, 2018 by Moving On

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2_6h15UCMg

 

A little context......

Roger Penrose - Wikipedia

 

During an interview with BBC Radio 4 on September 25, 2010, Penrose states, "I'm not a believer myself. I don't believe in established religions of any kind. I would say I'm an atheist", during a discussion on the Big Bang Theory. [31] In the film A Brief History of Time, he said, "I think I would say that the universe has a purpose, it's not somehow just there by chance ... some people, I think, take the view that the universe is just there and it runs along – it's a bit like it just sort of computes, and we happen somehow by accident to find ourselves in this thing. But I don't think that's a very fruitful or helpful way of looking at the universe, I think that there is something much deeper about it."[32] Penrose is a Distinguished Supporter of Humanists UK.

Edited July 25, 2018 by Moving On

melodrama

Well, sure. What’s more melodramatic than the enormity of the universe? :)

 

Only thing more melodramatic would be Dorothy Malone narrating . . .

As for intelligent life elsewhere in the universe...

 

Lola by Todd Clark for Jul 25, 2018 | GoComics.com

According to my calculations, it would take 75,573,000 years to reach the nearest star to earth if traveling 600 mph on a jet airliner. Ain't no way anyone can imagine that, much less the miles to the nearest galaxy.

 

Man, you’d get tired of ‘chicken or beef’ wouldn’t you.

speaking from a maths (set theory) point of view, the numbers mentioned in cosmology aren’t that difficult to comprehend. they are big, for sure, but they are still a sequence of digits.

 

there are “more” real numbers between (0,1) than there are objects in the universe (including the number of miles).

 

furthermore, the number of real numbers in (0,2) is the “same” as the number in (0,1).

 

now, that is weird. but that’s infinite sets for you. :)

some other numbers; the universe is 14 billion years old or, 14 x 10^9 years, a rather small number compared to the solution of certain mathematical problems using a super computer. the last time i looked, some problems took 10 x 10^276 centuries. or would do if someone had bothered to press “Start”.

 

as David said, relative measures are everything.

some other numbers; the universe is 14 billion years old or, 14 x 10^9 years, a rather small number compared to the solution of certain mathematical problems using a super computer. the last time i looked, some problems took 10 x 10^276 centuries.

.

 

And you'd just get to the end when a Windows Update crashed the damn thing..............

If I'm comparatively not even microscopic the same goes for the challenges I face. This is comforting to me.

Or more precisely put with the viewer left to watch the image as its own consciousness. It’s what all art is essentially about. How to express that which is pre-language by speaking in its own voice. Phil

 

Sorry, Phil.

 

They left the philosophers behind, on the dying embers of earth.

 

What have they to offer to mankind?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7t6uGwUrRTg

May be in the embers - I sure hope not.

The word "philosophy" comes from the Greek word "philosophia," which combines the words "philo" meaning "love of" and "sophia" meaning "wisdom." Some common etymological definitions of philosophy are "love of wisdom" or "love of knowledge."