Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Utterly insignificant

So, today was my birthday.  I hate, nay despise birthdays.  Just another year closer to death.  At least it wasn't as bad as last year's birthday.  Still depressed as hell.

Would you like to feel insignificant too?  Click on the image below to view a pan-and-zoomable image of a portion of our Milky Way galaxy.  The image contains a billion stars.  Did you hear me?  A billion (with a "b") fucking stars.


Phil Plait over at Bad Astronomy wrote about this image as well.  What's so special about our galaxy among the hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe?  Nothing.  What's so special about our star among the hundreds of billions of stars in our galaxy.  Nothing.  What's so special about me among the billions of people who've ever lived on Earth?  Nothing.

On the scale of the universe, we are completely and utterly insignificant.  Sweet dreams.

Posted by Steven Schimmrich at 10:34 PM

4 comments:

  1. AnonymousApril 18, 2012 at 6:50 AM

    Happy Birthday Steve! Think of it as one year closer to retirement.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Steven SchimmrichApril 18, 2012 at 8:42 AM

    I don't want to retire, I like my job!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Garry HayesApril 18, 2012 at 2:39 PM

    Happy birthday anyway! Think of it as congratulations for traveling another 300 million miles or so around the sun without falling off...

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousApril 21, 2012 at 9:42 PM

    A birthday is the first of another 365 day journey around the sun, enjoy the trip.

    ReplyDelete

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