Herschel was probably lauded as the genius of his time regarding studies of the cosmos. It's interesting to see how far we have advanced, technologically, and how much we have learned from his time to the present, a mere two hundred years. It only strengthens my belief that we are so far away from truly understanding the wonders of the universe, how it all began and how it is truly all woven together.
One of my biggest pipe dreams is to actually see a top down view of our galaxy. Perhaps it could happen a few hundred years down the road. Maybe not. But it sure would be great to see, and a coonfirmation of our true place among these various arms.
let’s say that’s possible. and let’s say, you are a distance of 100,000 lightyears on “top” of Sagittarius-A*. you would be looking at about 100,000-130,000 years in the past. and the solar system’s position would be around 120,000 years from where it was.
Even if we’re achieve faster-than-light travel, we would have to account for time dilation/Einsteinian relativity, as time would move so fast on earth compared to the space traveler’s perspective. I’d rather see some sort of technology that would keep the space ship in some kind of time bubble that syncs up with earth, so that we can travel out of the solar system and return to a world that is familiar, and not the world of my great-great-great-great-great grand-descendants.
it couldn't happen even in a few thousand years - you'd have to be waaaaaay out there in space - and then the transmission time for the photo to 'arrive' back to Earth would be thousands of years.
It's a pipe dream all right. But it would be cool. However, if given the choice, I'd rather have a simple, definitive cure for all cancers in my lifetime. Both are pipe dreams of about seemingly equivalent likelihood.
I like Brian Pederson's narration of this episode but, oh, I do love Jeffrey Smith's intro's questions! I love when he asks things and ends with... "Finally, and most importantly..." I miss that part. Thanks SOU for these amazing videos 🤩📡🔭💫🪐✨❤
These scales still blow my mind - I discovered that we were merely in a galaxy of many others in 1997 at school when discussing something with my Physics teacher - watching Star Trek and the fact that even in fiction they were only pootling around the Milky Way just highlighted this further. Humbling in a way 😊
Double props to H. Shapley. He realized that his supposition was incorrect, acknowledged it, and went on to study and confirm the facts. That's actual science, and not consensus or outright dogma.
Really puts into perspective just how small we are in comparison to what's out there. The more I learn about how vast space is, the more fascinated, intimidated, and terrified I become.
This video is instantly suspect as it is designed primarily to promote women astronomers . Nobody would put Henrietta Lovatt ahead of Edwin Hubble .This is ridiculous and shows we now have no concept of the truth .It is dead
Me too. Every time I look up at the night sky I get dizzy just from the knowledge that we’re just floating “out there” and we’re not anchored to anything. As you said, it’s as fascinating as it is terrifying. Then wonder takes over.
Nice work-your video is very informative. We discuss all of these topics in my Introduction to Astronomy course and they're an important part of the history of figuring out our place in the universe and its scale. We also do lab exercises using Henrietta Leavitt's period-luminosity relationship of Cepheid variables as well as try to determine the location of the Galactic center using measurements of globular clusters. A couple of small points: The photo at 8:30 shows the 100-inch Hooker reflecting telescope on Mount Wilson, not the 60-inch reflecting telescope. Also, globular clusters orbit the center of the Milky Way and do cross through the Galactic plane. It's just that those in the plane are hard to see and analyze. Globulars away from that "zone of avoidance" are easily studied. Shapley hypothesized the globular clusters are gravitationally bound to a "center of gravity" that coincides with the Galactic center. He was correct, but his estimate of the Galactic center's distance was off because the widespread distribution of interstellar dust had not yet been discovered. This resulted in Shapley misinterpreting the brightness of Cepheids in the globules and overestimating the cluster distances.
I dont think you did justice to the question that you posed. After Shapley’s research indicating the direction of the centre you did a big jump to Spur of the Orion arm without any explanation. You did mention Gaia but we knew the location much before 2013.
I had the same thought. Ok so we are X distance from the core, how did they put us in an "arm", how was this arm discovered. How did we prove there were other arms and it isn't just one big disc. I thought this video would cover how we determined our X,Y,Z position in the galaxy but it stops before that.
Very well done! However, one thing that's been bugging me is that it takes us on Earth ~19 - 20 hrs to communicate one way to Voyager. Which puts it at a distance of .002 not .02 light years from Earth... the size of the universe is mind boggling!
You are correct. They made a mistake in placing the Decimal Point. I checked this on a Calculator. Light travels at 186,326 Miles Per Second. That works out to about 670,000,000 Miles Per Hour. 19 hours from Earth times 670 million MPH = 12,730,000,000 miles from Earth. 12,730,000,000 miles divided by the Miles in a Light Year (5,869,200,000,000), equals 0.00216894 Light Years from Earth, or, rounded down to 0.002 Light Years. If it's any comfort --- it's been bugging me too!
I've been looking at stars for 46 years (since I was a kid). I love the new discoveries. Some of these things I already knew, like they are soo far away and space goes on forever. It is truly a wonderful existence we are a part of. I feel sorry for flat earthers. The can never appreciate the infinite, and are stuck in a tiny box like past astronomers. I personally know some (and you may too) so I can relate.
In Denmark we also have a "real giant": Tyge (Tycho) Brahe, who in 1572 saw a "new" star, and wrote a book about it (De Nova Stella/The New Star). This is why an exploding and dying star is - still named a "Nova"! He realized that the Universe wasn't as told but he could have been - burned by The Holy Church, at that time, for telling the truth, so he found an intermediate solution, with the Earth still as the Center, but it and the rest of the planets going round the - Sun! And, after his death, all his notes became the basis of his former pupil, Johannes Kepler's later construction of the planets movement as eclipses! The Nobleman, Tycho was very protective of his observations and knowledge, so it wasn't till after his death in his exile, Prag, that his "common" widow gave Kepler access to his papers! The new Danish King didn't want to pay for his exorbitant expenses, so he had to move from Denmark and found a new home in Prag, where he is also buried inside, and with a stone in the floor, in the Tejn Church/Tynsky Chrám. The remnants of his "new star" is still to be seen in Cassiopeia. But the Crater on the Moon which is named: "Tycho" is larger than "Copernicus", because the naming person liked the Tycho Brahe Version more than the Copernicus Version of the Universe! 😁
@@pixeldigger Yes, he lost the end of his nose, during a duel, so he had a nose-looking silver tip glued on, not to look like a pig! Danish Scientists some years ago opened his grave in the Tyin Church in Prag and found some green metal deposits on his nose bone, from those! I think it was also to see if he had actually been poisoned by his own homemade remedies, which we now know was, not so healthy! And he also was an Alchemist, trying to make Gold, but "sadly" in wain. And he didn't use a telescope but only his State of The Art, huge instruments for his observations of the sky. We have papers still describing those.
@@BlackBuck777 Yes, and because the man in "the naming group" liked "The Tycho Model" of the Universe (With the Earth as Center, and the Sun and the planets circling round the Sun, but round the Earth, (as anyone may see)). So the Crater named "Tycho", is larger than the one named "Copernicus"! If you turn the T. model round it becomes the same, but we still must remember that people got, or could get - burned for naming it as a fact, by that time, so Tycho Brahe found a way to get past this! He undoubtedly knew the truth!!
@@davidsheckler4450 I do assume that image to be real, but I will indeed have said "image" rather than "picture" because I'm not certain. You can see the Andromeda Galaxy with the naked eye. Also the Milky Way can indeed be photographed in reality like it appears in that picture or image. The Andromeda Galaxy appears as a little big, but it actually _is_ quite big, in the sky. I do not overlook as _how_ big it will appear together with such a central piece of the Milky Way, in a real photograph. This channel so far impresses me through a quality of its videos which would let appear the scenario of an unnecessary enlargement as a surprise.
@@davidsheckler4450 I could indeed feel urged, given that I often make advances into a creation of utopian fiction. However, the detail of these frames of one Secrets-of-the-Universe video won't so far appear to me as important enough. If our neighbor galaxy is shown too big here (or perhaps even at a wrong place), then you could obtain a similar zooming with it soon appearing as that big also on the basis of a completely genuine photograph. These frames must appear as helpful inasmuch as they give you a glimpse altogether at least close to reality of how our own galaxy and our neighbor are positioned in space, as huge peers within an otherwise largely empty area.
Just imagine some time far in the future we will send a probe with a camera so far out and turn it around to face us and snap the first ever complete photo of our Milky Way galaxy. What a day in history that would be. And will probably be the greatest photo ever taken in Earth history
Huh? How do you figure that will ever happen? How far outside and away from the Milky Way would you have to be to take a picture where you can see the milky way, in its entirety? 1 million light years away? Milky way is about 100,000 light years across.
In much the same manner as the early unmanned Apollo missions, which peered back at Earth, initially capturing it in black and white before transitioning to full-color imagery from afar, humanity was granted its first glimpse of our planet as a celestial object within the solar system. Prior to this, our perspective was limited to observing other celestial bodies such as the moon, sun, and planets, but not our own home. It's conceivable that as our technological prowess advances, perhaps in a few thousand years, humanity may possess the capability to cast our gaze back upon our galaxy, offering a profound new perspective on our place in the cosmos.
For centuries, scientists and astronomers have made breakthrough discoveries dealing with the size, shape, distance, composition, etc., of our galaxy and the universe. Every few hundred years, a discovery is made to disprove earlier discoveries. So, the truth is, what we "know" today could easily be disproven 100 years from now. It's all educated guesswork with few ways to prove or disprove anything. But, I love a good mystery.
I miss being able to see the Milky way in my back yard. My old house was 4 hours away from the city and the night sky was magnificent. Now all I can see is the Moon, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, sometimes big dipper if I'm lucky
I can sympathise being a country boy who now lives in London. Without fail, when I took a mate back to my parents' house and we stepped outside at night for a crafty fag (gasper/tailor made/oh for goodness sake ~ a ciggie) the first words would be Wow what's that? At least we have grown up with it, I imagine that there's maybe even a billion people who have never seen it and never will because they live in cities.
I live on the countryside and when I was a kid you could see thousands of stars at night. Throughout the years there were more and more houses built, street lights added, small farms with reflectors and now we can only see a few dozens of stars... sad...
This makes one think of oneself as fairly insignificant, of course, but we are smart enough to have mapped some of our local space while residing inside it. A neat trick, I think!
It's really super-simple - no trick to it. Imagine being in a tightly-packed crowd of 100 people. You can't see how many people there are, let alone where they are. (I think that's how most people see our galaxy.) Now spread those people out across a football field. Suddenly you can see and locate each of them. That's all there is to it. The space between the hundred billion or so stars in the galaxy is absolutely huge. What about the intragalactic dust? Ok, fill the whole football stadium with smoke. Now you can't see any of the 100 people anymore, until you put on your infrared goggles. That's all we have to do, and it's exactly what we have done to see into the core of our galaxy - look at the infrared spectrum instead of the light spectrum. It's how firefighters locate people they need to rescue when the smoke is thick. It's a simple, common technology that allows us to see and locate the features of our galaxy and our place within it.
Every other animal on this planet does not understand anything outside of earth. I think the comment just meant that we are at least smart enough to map out some of the universe. A “trick” isn’t meant as a magic trick, just the ability of humans to figure out how to map it. You simplify it all you want, of the billions of animals on the planet, only we smart monkeys can figure it out. Give us a little more credit
My question for physicist-astronomers: How do we know that the measurements we take from earth are accurate to objects incomprehensibly far away? For example, we know the properties of reflected light in Earth's atmosphere enable objects that are beyond visible distance to be 'seen' (due to reflections that can be created by a suitably dense water vapor in the air) by people beyond the horizon sight line. In using this example, I don't mean to imply that I think earth's atmosphere would create faulty data. Rather, how do we know that between earth and these far away objects, environmental conditions in the galaxy/universe are so consistent that there is no reason to question our measurements? Doesn't it stand to reason that as soon as we get a different view from a nearby star that we may triangulate things far differently than we see them now? Between cosmic background noise, radiation, dark matter, and the actual not-quite-nothing in the cosmic void, I always wonder why I never hear any qualifications that astronomers could be wrong about our measurements.
Important question! Astronomic findings (like almost all of scientific findings) are questionend a lot. It's just that these things don't really get a spotlight in science-journalism. There is also a lot of uncertainty on many measurements, but here on youtube they often get omitted, because it sounds less cool I guess. Historic findings are also reviewed with newer technology, and sometimes we get different numbers decades later. So nothing is carved in stone here :) Then how can we be reasonably sure about anything? No I'm no expert, but I think a key component is comparison. If we can measure the same thing twice with different methods, and both measurements agree, then it stands to reason that the result is quite credible. Of course it also happens, that we measure a thing with numerous different methods, and they all disagree with each other, so we're not particular sure about these ones. (I think that's the case with the accelerationof the expansion of the universe, but don't take my word for that)
See David Butler's excellent classroom quality series on How Far Is It where he takes us through how things were gradually discovered and how we know, *know* how far things are away from us and so on. It's worth going through the series.
@@gulfy09 That kind of describes most of science. Nobody has seen an electron with their own eyes, but we still can be fairly certain that they exist. Sure, "Space science" is "just" equations on whiteboards and numbers on computers, but with them we were able to build very tangible things - Rovers on mars, satellites orbiting Jupiter, etc. Btw, just for clarification, in science the word "theory" isn't used in the same way most people use it in conversation. A theory is the highest standard for a scientific model/idea. It's not just a "good guess", it's the best describtion of the reality of a given subject we have found so far. (of course, that doesn't mean that a theory is "the truth" for all eternity. Scientific theories are modified or rejected all the time, when we find conflicting data or a better describtion)
It is always interesting for me to watch de sky and curious about it and Imagine and wondering what happens uot there because on earth is usually not nice things to see and to hear recently
Thank-you for producing and sharing this production. Mankind’s understanding of our solar system and our Milky Way galaxy, and our universe which contains billions of galaxies similar to our Milky Way has grown exponentially in the last two hundred years thanks to some very smart people and powerful telescopes.
Finally. I've been trying to understand how astronomers knew the shape of our Galaxy and how they could know our position in it when we are inside of it.
It's because they're hella smart and educated. I never would've figured anything out. Just think about all the stuff that the Mayans and Egyptians, and Greeks figured out without our modern equipment.
I just asked the same question (maybe with a bit more details) elsewhere in this comment section without seeing yours. Hope someone knowledgeable here can clarify.
I am not the expert here but it has been made as simple as I can explain it. Having figured out the distance of the moon from reflective light the astronomical unit of measure is not accurate but very close. Then it went from one planet to the other, Distance to mars. Vessels have been sent out to confirm those distances of measure. Knowing where this planet is in or galaxy will be about 95 percent accurate. As long as we are on one side of the center we can just count the stars and where they are. Looking at the entire shape and size of the Galaxy would be from outside looking in. I don't think they are that accurate as many stars behind the center focal point will not be seen because of the closer ones. Too many speculate, when Science confirms, through multiple identical answers, over the very same question. Tested over and over again, and got the same results. In Science that is Quantified.
Several hundred years ago most humans believed that Earth is the center of the universe, whatever that word meant at the time. Only 100 years ago even the brightest scientists believed that the Milky Way was the only galaxy in the universe. Thanks to all those hard working scientists and engineers, we as a race have achieved unbelievable advances over the time.
It must have been both exciting and overwhelming to discover that we don't even know if there is any limit to the universe and our galaxy is like an atom or maybe even smaller
Hadi tulipofika hivisasa,ukilinganisha na majirani zetu waliotuzunguka CCM km sababu yakuwa naserikali zilizopo madarakani kwa umriwangu mimi wamefanya makubwasana. Nasijaona Chama mbadala hadisasa, Vyama vyakikabila na kidini Mungu atuepushe navyo, Na watz nawaomba tuvikatie vyama hivo kwaajili ya Amani na maendeleo endelevu ya Tz.
Whirlpool galaxys look like a whirlpool cause they are spun up right....but it takes 240 million yrs for earths position in 1x arm of milky way 2 do 1.x a single rotation...therefore the time required and revolutions required for a galaxy 2 spin up is fenomenal
In an infinite universe we can once again realize we are at the center since all points are in the center of an infinite space, it goes forever in every direction from all locations. From this perspective you dear reader are the center of this infinity.
7:17 it's insane how a 'star' that once we thought is within our galaxy is not even a star but a completely different galaxy more than twice the size of our own galaxy.
Damn, this one was a total bummer-and I can’t disagree with any of it. Thank you- it was clearly and concisely presented and can’t be said enough, even though some don’t want to hear it. I love your channel and presentations. Thanks again
How did Hubble know that the variable star was in Andromeda and not in our own galaxy or a galaxy beyond Andromeda? It's amazing how much astronomers have learned on so little information
He used the information we had on the luminosity of the variables vs their period, which Henrietta figured out. With that information astronomers could compute approximate distance to the variable stars. I think that's how we computed distance to variable stars. So if we observed some variable star in Andromeda, and figured out the period of it's variability, we could approximate it's luminosity, and compare it to our observation of it's luminosity to compute distance. I apologize in advance if I explained this wrong.
This was highly informative :-) I reckon this is a part of History of Astronomy 101 courses. Astronomy is a fascinating subject and truly unfathomable.
Why is this video’s quality so far above the others on this channel? I enjoy most of your videos, besides ones where you break down a speculative proposition no professional takes seriously from a paper the media hypes (black hole = dark energy) but this video seems to be written by an entirely different person
It's gonna be one of the greatest joys of my life to discover the boundary of our universe through the endeavour of humble humans. It's quite unlikely though.
Fantastic video, thank you. Thoroughly educational. Stunningly amazing. Kudos to scientists who are now discovering the wonder of our God. All within the control of the Creator. Amen.
I always wondered how we concluded that we are within a spiral-armed galaxy since we are looking edge-on in 2-D. I get the bit about being a disk but not the spiral arms (Perseus, Sagittarius, Taurus arms and Orion Spur etc.). Why/how did we conclude that? Maybe we are within a somewhat uniformly spread bunch of stars on a plane. Is it by (a) observing other galaxies and concluding that we must be like them; but then, there are also spherical, barred and other types of galaxies (b) by measuring distances and they appeared to be clustered in certain distances, like lines, (c) maybe be doing some kind of a maths model based on the density of stars ? Just a really amateur astronomer-wanna-be asking this.
Sure we're looking sideways on at a disk, but it's a disk about 2000 light years thick. I guess in our orbit of the sun we get enough different angles of view to work out the pattern of the stars and roughly our position. Still, it took some amazing calculations to work it out and it wasn't until the mid 20th Century that we got somewhere near the truth.
This is a proper question indeed, as this is not obvious. It took some gathering of all kinds of hints to come to the conclusion that our Milky Way must be a spiral galaxy, resembling other spiral galaxies. There is a reason for the rather late discovery of all of this, whilst mankind has been studying the night's sky for so long. We cannot see the Milky Way from afar, observing ourselves from thousands of lightyears remote, so that we only can make educated guesses, supported by a growing number of observations and deductions.
@@BP-kx2ig That wasn't directed towards the makers of the video. It was meant for those who claim humans are the only intelligent life out there and that life is unique to our planet.
@@deepseadweller687 Of course we will. President Eisenhower talked to space Aliens at Edwards Air Force base. But today, President Biden refuses to talk to illegal Aliens that he has let in through the Southern border.
There are in fact 10.27 million other planets in our galaxy alone supporting life and our galaxy is only one of 200 billion galaxies in the universe. Of course we are not alone. The arrogance of thinking that is equivalent to the naivety of thinking the universe revolves around the Earth.
The thumbnail photograph of our galaxy, showing earth’s correct location in the vast sweep of the milky way’s dazzling giant arms, is breathtaking! Amazing to think that this majestic galactic image was caught on camera from outside the Milky Way itself! I don’t remember that mission but the makers of this first-rate channel do, and they have the courage to post it, even in the face of criticism for what some philistines are calling an “impossibly positioned” space photo-op. They say “preposterous!” But we know better than such malignant doubters. We are the valiant youtube freedom fighters. Where fecal tidbits are our daily bread.
God is good and the first thing, he will say if he sees that you are afraid is "don't be afraid", we should not fear God. True compared to God we are like a tiny tiny atom. But as I said God is good.
I don't think the geocentric universe theory was "a result of our natural tendency to place ourselves in the center of everything," rather it's a result of the observation of the ground being rock-steady and the sky swooshing around it.
rite...god never wants us to find anyone.. probably for our own safety...thats why he kept everything light years away...donno why human is trying to find those 'lil green person' which they will never ever find..
@@roshanshrestha4919 know right the more we advance in technology to match speed to achieve for traveling the more distance from the planet to planet achieve let alone the other galaxy😂
@@vijayb3t Wel you are being very modest. If we achieve speed of light 186 thousand miles per second. multiple by 1000. Will take us 120 years to cross one way Milky Way.. If we achieve speed 25000 faster than speed of light. Will take us 100 years to reach nearest galaxy Andromeda. We are “prisoners “ when comes to space. Only Christians have a hope to reach higher dimension of existence. Rising (Christ) from death gives them hope of life after death. Higher level of understanding Universe and experience in higher form. Maybe then traveling and time wouldn’t be a issue. Life is short,eternity forever.
Respect the brilliant minds who contributed to our understanding of the universe.. Respect the brilliant minds who contributed to our understanding of the universe..
0:01 For many centuries , -humans- *Western folks* thought of universe as a straightforward place. -We- *The West* assumed that our planet, Earth, was the centre of all existence.
@@edithdriver2094 no, at least as far back as the Lotus Sutra, we know that this world is one of trillions. Why don't you read a book before you start mouthing off?
It's truly remarkable how many breakthroughs have occurred in the last 100 years yet we still no so little about what or how the universe is. We have only accepted the existence of other galaxies in the last 100 years. Before then we thought other galaxies were nebula inside our own milky-way.
At 9:56 in the video, you have the sun placed between Sagittarius and Percius Arms, on the Orion Spur. At 10:57 in the video, you have our sun on the inside of the Scutum-Centaurus Arm. Maybe playing into the Mandela Effect crowd huh? Cool video though, gave it a like.
Basically with heavy study and many years of attending some highly prestigious university and many many hours of telescopic and infrared observations plus a whole lot of algebraic calculus and trigonometry equasions
Ever since I was a child of eight, sixty years ago looking up at the night sky while sleeping outside in the summer, I have always wanted to travel the universe independence of physical support and see the wonders without the need for food, air or water or a spacesuit for that matter. Just fly threw the heavens like an angel.
@@bigboss-tl2xrI’ve had a few lucid dreams myself. It’s an unfathomable mystery; how the heck can you be aware that you are dreaming, and yet, somehow you are.
@@oleggorky906 Have to go back to the Australian Aboriginal concept of we are ALREADY in the dream.... So I think it's just about becoming aware, of where we are.
Amazing. Here's an exercise for you. Draw a circle that represents the entire universe. Now where do you draw a smaller circle that represents the observable universe?
The term light year is really enough to blow your mind! First understanding how fast the speed of light is. Then travel at that speed uninterrupted for a year. And he’s talking about 90,000 years of that! Wow we are small
Sorry, I missed the part where you explain how we supposedly 'found our location in the Milky Way'. Was that the actual question you set out to answer? If so, did you just forget to answer it, or...? Thank you.
Cities use to have rings with the homes of wealthy citizens around them, neither too close to nor too far from their centers. It seems that our star circles the core of the Milky Way at a corresponding distance. The Orion Spur could provide a possibility to hop away from here, star by star, like by some well-positioned commuter-train line to a suburb, while it's also not as crowded as the Perseus or the Sagittarius Arm.
I've been saying that we should test the Breakthrough Starshot technology by sending them above /below the galactic plane so we could get a proper photo of the disk.
