[removed]

It might help if you take a pair of binoculars as well. Once you find it in binos looking in the same direction naked eye can help. And as mentioned, averted vision helps too. Dark skies are necessary, of course, as are dark adapted eyes.

Finding it isn’t a problem. It appears twice as large as a full moon.

The problem is that it is too dim to see with the naked eye. You need optical assistance.

Until your race needs to leave and move on to new worlds, and you realize that for your race to continue to new worlds you'll have to chase your galaxy down.

Still sounds badass but no doubt stressful to appreciate the scope of.

[removed]

[removed]

[removed]

And we thought Callisto was a dead, boring world. Now we know it has auroras. And perhaps an undercrust salty ocean. Oh, and it might be the place receiving the least amount of radiation that we could potentially reach and colonize (compared to Mars, Ceres, Europa and Ganymede).

[removed]

[removed]

Edit: adding to the comment of someone mentioning size because that is what makes it an interesting target for a basic camera.

This isn't quite the same as seeing it with your own eyes. A digital camera that can do a 10s or so exposure with a delay on a cheap tripod can get you a picture in less than ideal conditions for naked eye viewing. The delay is because I am going cheap, so don't have a remote, which gives time for vibration from pressing the button to die out.

And being so big (and fuzzy), no need for zoom which makes it fairly easy to aim in the general right direction, and end up in frame.

[deleted]

Full-body sensory insertion into a graceful atmosphere and orbit-capable cetaceoform avatar would be rather fun, I reckon.

I find it mind-blowingly incredible that we're effectively conducting rudimentary geology on remote bodies in our solar system, but while intelligent life on earth is largely absurdly vulgar at the present time, I'll allow myself a chuckle at the "Keck Observatory"

It is incredible to think what the view would be like. I'm guessing the moons would be virtually always in daylight when in-between Jupiter and the sun - like a full moon x 10,000. When on the farside - it would be spectacular seeing the other moons and the massive planet. Just need to figure out how to survive the radiation.

Your images are consistently great but this one is just stunning.

Can those results be extrapolated to a hypothetical Mars with an Earth-like atmosphere though? The atmospheric composition is quite different between Mars and Earth, after all.

It's going to be hard to see with much light pollution, and it certainly won't look like what you see in pictures. Under your average surburban sky (Bortle 4-5), it'll look like faint smudge with averted vision.

Recommendation would be to use binoculars - you'll know you found it if you see a bright spot with a halo around it, kind of like an out-of-focus star: that's the galactic center. You're unlikely to see any spiral features without a larger telescope and without long-exposure photography.

Andromeda's apparent magnitude of 3.4 is deceiving because that's the overall integration of _all_ light across an area 6 times bigger than the moon. Its surface brightness outside of the galactic center is pretty dim. That's why it's much, much easier to see a star with a comparable apparent magnitude, since the star is essentially a point.

Am I supposed to ask “Hey what is a star?” Because I feel like all questions I ask no matter where they get removed.

[removed]

Best night vision is just a bit off the center of your view. Like a couple of thumb widths at arm's length.

Yes I can still rant about the garbage example given in the title

Did you read the linked release at all?

[removed]

The warmest parts of the Martian surface are like the coldest places on Earth. Also the atmosphere is 95% CO2 and very little oxygen. Ordinary plants would not survive.