
The universe is big. This big. - wwwhizz
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/03/23/an-ultradeep-image-thats-full-galaxies/
======
lloeki
This [0] IMHO gives more perspective (don't be taken aback by the flashy
images, the good stuff comes after, ~2:50 mark) When watching, remember this
is when looking at _the absolute darkest spot_ of our sky.

[0] Hubble Ultra Deep Field in 3D <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAVjF_7ensg>

PS: Inevitably, the title reminded me of this:

    
    
       Space is big. You just won't believe how vastly,
       hugely, mind- bogglingly big it is. I mean, you
       may think it's a long way down the road to the
       chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.
    
       -- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

~~~
mortenjorck
I still remember the time I saw the first Hubble Deep Field. The idea that the
researchers could point this massive telescope at an empty part of the
starfield, run a long exposure, and come back with a plate full of galaxies
full of solar systems full of planets, while we've yet to get too far beyond
the surface of our own.

A lot of people's first reaction always seems to be "we're so insignificant!"
And yet, most fascinating to me is trying to reconcile the vast complexities
of our planet and of humans with our physical near-nonexistence in the
universe.

We have infinite complexity in approximately zero space. Kind of a strange
thing to consider.

~~~
grannyg00se
"A lot of people's first reaction always seems to be "we're so insignificant!"
"

Neil deGrasse Tyson often counters this reaction by pointing out that while
the universe is vast, we are made of it. So we are not simply small separate
objects in a large universe, we are actually part of the physical elements
that make it up and come from the same "stuff". At least that's what I gather
when he says this:

"Recognize that the very molecules that make up your body, the atoms that
construct the molecules, are traceable to the crucibles that were once the
centers of high mass stars that exploded their chemically rich guts into the
galaxy, enriching pristine gas clouds with the chemistry of life. So that we
are all connected to each other biologically, to the earth chemically and to
the rest of the universe atomically. That’s kinda cool! That makes me smile
and I actually feel quite large at the end of that. It’s not that we are
better than the universe, we are part of the universe. We are in the universe
and the universe is in us.”

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOzkEwaMnaE>
[http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/12855.Neil_deGrasse_T...](http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/12855.Neil_deGrasse_Tyson)

~~~
JonnieCache
Feynman countered this by saying we're extremely large compared to atoms and
fundamental particles, so we can "sit in the middle and enjoy everything both
ways."

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmzHQljJ4bc>

~~~
kls
I remember reading a quote once and you will have to forgive me for not
remembering who said it but the approximation of it was "all will be known
when the scientist looking trough the telescope, see the scientist looking
back at him, through the microscope on the other end". I though it was a great
quote about the recursiveness about the big questions. That amazing part about
it is the relevance of it, we really don't know how big or small we are it is
all perspective, for all we know the universe is a singularity in another
perspective. If you traveled far enough fast enough and looked back on the
universe it would be a singularity, as time and distance are related so you
would be looking at the universe pre-big bang or from the perspective of
distance however you want to view it.

------
geuis
How many galaxies are in the observable universe?

Quick numbers check:

Author estimates over 200k galaxies in the image. Image covers 0.004% of the
sky.

200000/0.00004 = 5,000,000,000 galaxies. (edited, thanks to % help from
commenters below)

Finding somewhat standardized values for this rather standard question is
frustratingly vague. Estimates range from a few billion to a trillion, though
the most frequently quoted number I could find was about 100 billion.

The standard for measurement in the last 10 years or so have been the Hubble
Deep Field Survey images. In the last one done, there were about 10k galaxies
shown. The HDFS had a square arcminute resolution of 11.5. It would require
12,913,983 HDFS-type images to cover the entire side. (ref:
<http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=720>)

Using these numbers: 12913983 * 10000 = 129,139,830,000 galaxies.

So why the vast difference between the two numbers? My supposition is the new
ESO image isn't as deep as the HDFS.

I would argue the larger number, ~129.134 billion galaxies is a bit more
accurate.

Damn, 129 billion galaxies. Someone else _has_ to be out there.

~~~
jerf
Galaxies are not evenly distributed. But for all I know this is an unusually
sparsely populated part of the sky. Still, your number could shift in either
direction by quite a lot.

~~~
geuis
That is an excellent point. To further refine the estimate we need
measurements of the number of galactic clusters and their various densities.
For example, in the Local Group (Milky Way, Andromeda, etc) there are about
50. The Virgo Supercluster contains over 2500. Getting those estimates is
beyond me at the moment.

Galaxies are strung out across the universe along filaments, with vast voids
in between. The voids are mostly empty and very cold, but recent observations
have found hot spots in some up to millions of degrees. Overall, the universe
has a soapy appearance, i.e. lots of space with the "stuff" strung together.

One thing to note is that, at least to my knowledge, there are galaxies in all
directions. There may be voids along the way, but you'll always see them
closer or further away.

One of the reasons that this ESO deep field view is important is that its
bigger than the original Hubble Deep Field, so we can start answering
questions about density and distribution.

------
EREFUNDO
I still remember when I learned that the Sun was a star. I was six years old
when my uncle told me about it. I actually asked him what the Sun was and his
answer pretty much shocked me to the core. I already knew the Earth revolved
around the Sun so learning that the Sun is just one of little tiny bright
lights at night was a true eye opener. That night I looked up the sky again
and wondered if there are other people up there.....

~~~
sliverstorm
_was_ a star? :)

~~~
EREFUNDO
Oops misstype! We still have 5 billion years before we could refer to it as
"was a star".....lol I just type what comes to mind and rarely do editing.....

~~~
mortenjorck
Actually, in narrative writing, as you were doing, you should use consistent
tense. So you were correct to use "was," as the sun was a star back then,
independent of the fact that it also is now.

~~~
EREFUNDO
That's probably why it just came naturally to me because I do read quite a bit
and may have seen this word arrangement many times before. My subconscious
mind were just spitting out words as I write them. English is only my second
language though, I am so much better in Filipino.....lol

------
Jun8
Totally unrelated to the universe (but maybe not): To me the "Ye. Gads" moment
came after this quote:

"There’s a long jet of material apparently coming from that bloated galaxy on
the left (I increased the brightness and contrast of this picture to make it
more obvious; it was subtle in the original image but I have a lot of practice
picking out things like this)."

I am once again totally stupified at the level of image processing a trained
brain paired with a good visual system can do. One day, instead of developing
complicated image processing algorithms, we will have it done by a brain-in-a-
vat & computer implant combo, using different animal brains and visual systems
for different applications, e.g. an owl or eagle for detecting pinpoints of
light in a large image of the universe.

------
Synthetase
I'm surprised someone hasn't converted the large image over to something like
the Google Maps navigation UI for better viewing. I guess I'll be attempting
that when I get home from work.

~~~
jlynn
Check out <http://zoom.it/VGFr>

~~~
jlynn
I also converted the 450mb tiff <http://zoom.it/dNMW>

~~~
arosomo
Wondered why it was Silverlight, then realised the site is owned by Microsoft.

~~~
jlynn
The site will use javascript if you don't have Silverlight installed, so it's
not a requirement.

------
jrockway
"A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away," is beginning to sound a lot more
plausible.

How could there _not_ be a few Death Stars inhabited by English-speaking
humans somewhere in one of those galaxies?

~~~
losvedir
> _How could there not be a few Death Stars inhabited by English-speaking
> humans somewhere in one of those galaxies?_

I know this is just a tongue in cheek comment, but I actually thought it
somewhat reasonable until recently when I spent a moment with the numbers and
saw its impossibility.

Basically, there's only ~100 billion galaxies with ~100 billion stars each (to
an approximation of several orders of magnitude...), while the space of
possible societies, languages, histories, etc, grows exponentially.

Even if there were 10^100 stars, log_2(10^100) is still only about 330. This
means all those stars can only accomodate 330 forks in history where it could
have gone one way or the other with equal probability. Or, in computer science
terminology, all those stars can only encode 330 bits of information. And
describing English alone takes far, far more than 330 bits. (Depending on how
inevitable language of a certain type is.)

~~~
lee
> This means all those stars can only accomodate 330 forks in history where it
> could have gone one way or the other with equal probability. Or, in computer
> science terminology, all those stars can only encode 330 bits of
> information. And describing English alone takes far, far more than 330 bits.

There's a huge gap in your logic here. The number of bits to represent all the
stars in the universe has nothing to do with the possibility that there is
some English speaking society out there.

------
asmithmd1
The tip of your little finger held at arms length would about cover this
image.

------
InclinedPlane
Interestingly we don't actually know how big our Universe is, perhaps even
within a great many orders of magnitude. This is because the visible Universe
has expanded at sub-light speeds over its history, but in the very, very early
Universe there was a period called inflation in which space-time expanded at
speeds much faster than light.

~~~
kamaal
>> _very early Universe there was a period called inflation in which space-
time expanded at speeds much faster than light._

References for this?

~~~
InclinedPlane
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation_(cosmology)>

------
jlynn
Looks like the image has been added to zoom.it. You can browse the full
resolution image without downloading all of it: <http://zoom.it/VGFr>

------
zrgiu_
How can you NOT want to travel the universe when you see such a wonderful
photo ? Imagine going closer and closer to a perfectly spiral shaped galaxy,
effectively discovering a new world, all-so-different yet similar to ours... I
get goosebumps just thinking about this..

I know I'm very probably not gonna get to leave Earth in my lifetime, but I
genuinely hope that my children or grandchildren will. This opens so many
possibilities...

------
jeremyarussell
With all this out there it leaves one to wonder, when will the aliens finally
get here?

But really, if we evolved from chaos and minerals (so far that's the best
explanation anyone's given me.) Then somewhere on some of these other planets
are sentient creatures looking up going, "I wonder if there are other sentient
creatures out there?"

~~~
swalkergibson
No doubt! It is exceedingly egotistical to think that we are the only life-
forms in this vast expanse.

Also, this image seems like a good use of the iPad 3 retina display...

------
andys627
Ask a scientist: Can you see black hole lens effect in this?

------
DanBC
I love that image. It's very hard for me to begin to comprehend the numbers
involved.

See also "animated scale of the Universe" from NASA.

(<http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120312.html>)

~~~
boyter
That is pretty impressive. I wish there was something like this that showed
travel between two points, say earth and Alpha Centauri, but at lightspeed or
faster with a timer in years at the bottom like an odometer. I imagine that
would impart a greater sense of scale for myself.

------
ajays
I don't understand one thing: how can they keep the telescope stable and
focused so accurately on one spot in the sky, without any jitter? The Earth is
rotating at 360 degrees/24 hours, which is about 0.25 degrees per minute. This
17000 pixel image covers 1.2 degrees, which means the light is sweeping across
this sensor at 60 pixels/second as the earth spins.

How can they move the telescope so accurately that a sensor pixel picks up
light from the exact same spot in the sky for an extended duration of time?

~~~
analyst74
I think you just answered that, right before asking it.

~~~
ajays
So you're saying that we have the ability to make sure that a pixel on the
sensor is collecting light from the exact same spot in the sky for an extended
amount of time? Taking into account (among other things) the rotation of the
earth, the shaking of the ground, the wind, the changes in the atmosphere's
temperature and humidity and god knows what else?

That's pretty f'in awesome!

------
losvedir
To put this image in further perspective, take a look at this link[1]. It blew
my mind as I had the universe and observable universe all mixed up
conceptually. For instance, the universe was _not_ a point at the big bang:
only the observable universe was.

[1] <http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~wright/infpoint.html>

------
BCM43
Torrent of the large jpg file:
<http://thepiratebay.se/torrent/7134685/The_universe_(JPG)>

------
tuacker
If you want a more interactive look at the universe go here
<http://htwins.net/scale/> (Flash but so so worth it)

~~~
grn
You may also look at an alternative version at <http://htwins.net/scale2/>

------
squarecat
Composite of the ESO image with Blue Marble 2012: <http://flic.kr/p/btoRfL>

------
sethbannon
The world needs more images like this to inspire the scientists and
adventurers of tomorrow.

------
batista
Reading into the article I got a huge urge to re-read the Foundation series
(and maybe get into that prequel I never got into).

------
st0p
Makes me feel very small.

------
username3
Amazing. All those galaxies and Earth is the only one with life.

~~~
elorant
Well if another galaxy has life in it we'll probably never find it.

~~~
sneak
Not with that attitude, we won't!

~~~
elorant
Dude, it's not about the attitude, it's about the numbers. The closest galaxy
is four million light years away. Unless there is a major scientific
breakthrough in the eons to come that will allow us to travel at speeds 100
times the speed of light there is practical no way to make such a trip. Even
with a speed like that and taking under consideration the special relativity
which says that time for those traveling will be passing a lot slower than for
the rest of use, you'd need at least a millennium to do such a trip.

~~~
kls
So you don't try to short cut the laws of physics you fix the weakest links,
the biggest one being the longevity of humans. It is realistic to think that
given enough time we will be able to replicate organic machines with electro-
mechanical ones. Someone somewhere is going to volunteer to upload themselves
into one of these machines and we blast them off into space. In the end we
always seems to achieve the dreams of the human spirit, 9 times out of 10 they
are never the way we envisioned we would. Take flight, early man envisioned
wings like a bird and not machines like a plane, but in the end we achieved
flight something many people said would never happen, that I am sure of. I
think we will achieve intergalactic travel, but it will be nothing like what
we envision it to be today, something will come out of left field that will
enable it. The challenges are daunting but so was flight at one point in human
history.

~~~
kamaal
Exactly! in the future, One can build robots or artificially intelligent
machines that can travel and make some decisions on themselves. Such machines
will not need most biological conditions needed for organic life to survive.
So can live in many hostile conditions.

They can also clone themselves mining the resources and energy available at
anywhere they land.

Such machines can colonize the space.

~~~
kitsune_
I personally think the chances are high that humanity will simply self-
destruct before it can achieve anything like this.

~~~
kls
I think the actual feasibility of man made annihilation is smaller than what
it is made out to be by the media and entertainment industry. The two most
popular ways that are highlighted are nuclear war or bio-engineered pathogen.
As far as the first one goes, nuclear war will only eliminate the population
centers and irradiate everything, there would be survivors and they would
adapt to the conditions.

The second, a pathogen, is just as unlikely to get every last one of us. A
virus with a 100% kill rate is highly unlikely. Look at Ebola, while
weaponized Ebola would get a great deal of us it's kill rate is somewhere in
the 90%'tile, I don't know the exact number but I know it is high and I
believe that it is the highest. 10% of the earth population is still allot of
people. Even if it is less than that, somewhere their will be a group of
people that for whatever reason are resistant to the pathogen.

The only thing that I think is a real threat to our existence today, is a big
piece of something floating around out there, deciding to slam into us down
here. I don't think we have the capability to do it to ourselves. I heard
someone say that it is likely that we will keep resetting ourselves back to
the stone-age at a certain mark in technological progress, which I think is a
little more feasible, but I personally believe that mans desire to cull
different people is self regulation for whatever reason.

