Astronomy/Cosmology for the innocent.

[sackville d]

It's the scale of it that I find hard to visualise: 100,000,000 stars in just one part of one galaxy!!! Quite staggering really.

@Andy in Sig I know you asked for suggestions of books but here is a great series on Youtube by David Butler.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpH1IDQEoE8QWWTnWG5cK4ePCqg9W2608

 

[sackville d]

I think a trip to a sandy beach might put it into some perspective a bit better.
I think I can remember Carl Sagan saying about grains of sand and the number of stars in the universe.

Staying on the beach,if the sun was reduced to the size of a grain of sand and our nearest neighboring star,Proxima Centauri was also reduced-to that scale the distance between the two would be four miles.

 

[SteveF]

Apologies if shared already.....

 

[Andy in Sig]

@Andy in Sig I know you asked for suggestions of books but here is a great series on Youtube by David Butler.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLpH1IDQEoE8QWWTnWG5cK4ePCqg9W2608

Thank you for the tip and indeed to everybody else for all the other views, all of which I have logged. My copy of The Evolving Universe is on its way. I'll start looking at other material once I've had a go at that.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

Apparently there are more stars in the universe than there are grains of sand on all of the beaches on Earth.

There are also more atoms in a tablespoon of water than there are stars in the universe.

It all makes you feel very insignificant.

Only if you're not @Markymark .

 

[Andy in Sig]

Just to let anybody who might be interested know: the book by Prof Longair (Our Evolving Universe) is proving very good indeed and it's hit the button as far as my requirements are concerned. I've just done black holes and the Hubble constant. I would never have thought that the closest you can orbit a black hole without getting sucked in is just 3 km out and it can't be as frightening as cycling round a 90° bend at the bottom of a steep hill (although that last hypothesis is mine and not the prof's, so I'm open to being corrected).

 

[captain nemo1701]

Not bragging but my front room is big enough for a starship & the Andromeda galaxy

 

[Fnaar]

I'm fascinated by it too*, but have little real understanding of physics. If you want to do some listening as well, Radio 4's The Infinite Monkey Cage is very good, and entertaining too.

*Miss Goodbody recently told me "A heavenly body will soon be moving across Uranus". I still haven't forgotten that night, and the lard stains won't come out of my suede chaps..