What Is The Night Sky

No matter how far you go in your sophistication as an amateur astronomer, there is always a fundamental moment to which we all go back. It's the first moment we went outside where you could really see the universe really well and you took in the night sky. For the townspeople, it's a revelation as if we've discovered aliens living among us. Most of us are not aware of the vast panorama of lights that dot a clear night sky when there are no city lights to interfere with the view. Surely we all love the advanced experience of studying the sNo matter how far you go in your sophistication as an amateur astronomer, there is always a fundamental moment to which we all go back. It's the first moment we went outside where you could really see the universe really well and you took in the night sky. For the townspeople, it's a revelation as if we've discovered aliens living among us. Most of us are not aware of the vast panorama of lights that dot a clear night sky when there are no city lights to interfere with the view. Surely we all love the advanced experience of studying the sky using binoculars and telescopes of different sizes and powers. But I'm sure you can remember as a kid the first time you saw a fully displayed clear night sky with all the wonderful constellations, meters and comets and the points of light never too many to count. Seen far exposure. The best way to recapture the wonder of that moment is to go out into the country with your own child or someone who has never had this experience and be there in that moment when they gaze up and say that very powerful word. Only one who can summarize the feelings of looking at that glorious sky. That word is "wow". Perhaps the most extraordinary fact about what the child is seeing is that it is most difficult for them to understand what is above them and what it represents. The fact that almost certainly, almost every point in the sky is another star or celestial body much larger than Earth, not by two or ten times but by factors of hundreds and thousands, can be a mind-blowing thought for children. . Children have a lot of trouble imagining the size of the Earth, nothing more than in a vast area like outer space. But when it comes to astronomy, we do better when we plunge into a deeper and deeper level of awe at what we see in the night sky. Some surprising facts about what babies are seeing can add to the swans already in front of them as they gaze up at the sky. Facts like… * Our Sun is part of a massive galaxy called the Milky Way which contains one hundred billion * Our Sun is part of a massive galaxy called the Milky Way which contains one hundred billion stars like or larger than it. Show them that a hundred billion is 100,000,000,000 and you'll definitely see something jaw-dropping. * The Milky Way is one of tens of billions of galaxies, each containing billions of stars. In fact, the Milky Way is one of the smaller galaxies. * If you wanted to cross the Milky Way, it would take you 100,000 years. But you can't get there by running the speed limit. You would have to travel five trillion, eight hundred million miles per year to exceed that high speed. * Scientists calculate that the Milky Way is 14 billion years old. The effect that we see on the star today is not at that place, but we see the light of that star left behind thousands of years ago, which means that our universe is infinite, it has no limit. These little fun facts about the origin of the universe and the possibility of space travel or if there is life on other planets should get a pretty enthusiastic discussion. You can challenge the kids to calculate that if each star in the galaxy supports nine planets and if only one of them is habitable like Earth, what are the chances of life on one of them? I think you'll see some real excitement when you try to play those numbers up. This type of discussion can be fun, exciting, and full of questions. Don't be too quick to shut down their fantasies as this is the birth of a lifelong love of astronomy that they are experiencing. And if you were in that first moment when they looked up at that night sky, you'll re-experience your own great moment when you were a kid. And it may spark a renewed enthusiasm about astronomy in all of you again. Explore more aboutastronomy in all of you again.

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