If you want an accurate depiction of distances in space I recommend this link.

https://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem.html

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So light from say Betelgeuse takes about 620 years to reach us as you know. But due to the time dilation of travelling at relativistic speeds from the point of view of the photon the journey is near instantaneous. Wangs all the way from Betelgeuse smack bang into my retina in the blink of an eye.

I learned something thank you.

That's definitely an oldie but a goodie. +1

Pinching some from cgp grey:

• if the sun went supernova and you donated a nuclear bomb in front of your face, the supernova would still be brighter
• a supernova is so big even the neutrino flux at earth-sun distance would be lethal

Would probably be more accurate to say the moon is tidally to the earth. Also, the reason the moon is tidally locked is more to do with the gravitational interaction between the two bodies rather than its origin.

I agree with you. Some people think they can comprehend the universe I guess… 🤷🏼

There are more trees on Earth than stars in the Milky Way.

There are more galaxies in the universe than grains of sand on earth… that one always blew my mind.

Within the definition of "comprehension" as "the capacity for understanding fully," I do indeed assert that distances in space fall beyond anyone's full grasp. At an intellectual level, certainly one can discuss such measurements and manipulate devices accordingly, but they fall beyond human intuition and evolutionary experience.

There is an astronaut proverb [per Cmdr. Chris Hadfield] "There is no situation so bad that you can't make it worse."

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1. A Quasar has a super massive blackhole in its center. The beams that radiate from it churn out massive radiation more intense than our sun.

2. Blue Giants are massive stars...more massive than our sun. They use up their fuel quickly. There is a blue giant in the constellation Orion

3. Stars can go into Hyper-Nova.

The assumption that it’s beyond comprehension to everyone.

CGP Grey has a great video on this. Not only is Mercury the closest planet to Earth, but it's the closest planet to every other planet in the Solar System. The definition they showcase in their video is a time-average of the distance, since obviously the Earth can be much closer to Venus and Mars at any given moment than to Mercury - but those planets also spend much longer at the opposite end of the Solar System.

r/unexpectedHGTTG

I hoped I’d find this here.

On average Mercury is the closest neighbour to all other planets in the solar system.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SumDHcnCRuU&feature=youtu.be

https://physicstoday.scitation.org/do/10.1063/PT.6.3.20190312a/full

There are giant, naturally occurring lasers in space (technically they're masers): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astrophysical_maser

Space is big. Really 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, but that's just peanuts to space.

Due to Time Dilation caused by gravity the Earth’s crust is 3 years older than the core.

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