4 ms·

So true :). Here's an equally amazing zoomable picture of the Milky Way: http://www.eso.org/public/images/eso1242a/zoomable/ http://www.eso.org/public/images/es

• TeMPOraL 12y ago
  Zoomed to max and my mind was blown. What immediately came to my head was: imagine if each of those shiny points in this cloud is an atom. Our whole civilization is nothing more than a surface irregularity on one of "electrons" orbiting one of those dots. Both drives home the sense of scale, and lets one marvel at the recursivity of patterns at different scales in the universe.
  • mikeash 12y ago
    This stuff gives me an unreasonable fear of getting lost. If you had some magical hyperdrive ship and bumped the controls with your elbow at the wrong moment, you'd never find your way back home.
    • lmm 12y ago
      Just take a pulsar map, like the one on the voyager golden records.
    • dmd 12y ago
      That happens frequently to people in Pohl's Heechee Saga. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heechee http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heechee
• saganus 12y ago
  This is impressive! Edit: We really can't be alone in this universe.