Velvet Oblivion - Part 1

Essay for Writing 121

Velvet Oblivion

Introduction to Space Research: 

It's human nature to question the meaning of existence and existence itself. This is the essence of what makes us human beings. At some point in life, one must stare up at the night sky and contemplate what actually lies beyond the angelic and familiar vivid, silver spheres that have illuminated the night sky for billions of years. The desire to know the unknown is within us all, even if we have accepted that a conclusion might never be reached, it's still a part of humankind to attempt to understand the universe's greatest mysteries through science, philosophy, religion, or whatever form of explanation seems to bring a sense of peace and understanding to one's mind.  

We must learn to share inspiration through wonder. Space contains limitless questions which can be answered in even more limitless amount of ways. This is one of the many reasons behind my passion for space. My initial questions to conclude my research with will be is the universe expanding? and will it ever have an end? So without further ado, I began the journey through deep space research with home, our own solar system. From there my searches will expand just like the borders of our universe might. 

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope

Authors of starchild are Joyce Dejoie and Elizabeth Truelove. In the article, they addressed the quesion: does our solar system orbit something? 

This article describes our solar system's position in the Milky Way Galaxy. Truelove and Dejoie state that our solar system is moving at "an average velocity of 828,000 km/hr. But even at that high rate, it still takes us about 230 million years to make one compete orbit around the Milky Way." They also explain the position of where our solar system is by reference to star constellations such as Orion, Perseus, and Sagittarius. Our galaxy is what's known as a spiral galaxy due to its shape, but the Milky Way galaxy is a special type of galaxy. 

We have what's called a "barred spiral galaxy" which means that stars cluster together in a line across the center of the galaxy instead of just having a bulge of nuclear gas in the center. Yet we still orbit around the bar of stars on the arm of Orion 28,000 light-years away from the center of the galaxy. 

Starchild was the beginning of my path to space research. After I learned that the whole solar system orbits around something, I had to find out what that exactly was. What made up the mysterious "Galactic Center" that we orbit after hundreds of millions of years? Next I searched for what lies at the center of the Milky Way Galaxy? 

Credit: Dejoie, Joyce , and Elizabeth Truelove. "StarChild Question of the Month." StarChild. NASA, n.d. Web. 18 Feb 2014. <http://starchild.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/StarChild/team.html>.

Stephen Hawking

 

Hello Readers! Hope your night is going well -

I'm currently reading A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking. It's an incredible book that discusses theories on life, the universe, space, time, etc. I highly recommend it!

I've had many questions over the first two chapters so I e-mailed my chemistry professor about a few of them - let me know if you have any observations, answers, or questions!

First I've noted that the general theory of relativity is just a unified description of gravity (large scale things) and quantum mechanics is the mathematical interactions of energy and matter (incredibly small scale things.)

Stephen Hawking states that quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity cannot coexist. One theory always disproves the other.

My thought is this.. Earth orbits the sun because of the sun's gravity (due to the general theory of relativity). But subatomic particles don't have to follow the laws of gravity. Electrons are negatively charged and the nucleus is positively charged so that's how electrons can "orbit" a nucleus. A nucleus doesn't have to have some sort of gravity to keep its electrons, right? So why can't quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity coexist? Quantum mechanics doesn't really depend on what laws the theory of relativity have to offer. Do they?

The Rosette Nebula

Questions that I'll probably address in future posts... 

1. How fast do galaxies move through space? Is it anywhere close to the speed of light? 

2. Is there something at the center of the universe that everything orbits (galaxy clusters). 

3. Looking into Dark Matter and the God Particle. 

4. Do astronauts age faster than humans on Earth do? 

5. Upcoming: Stephen Hawking will describe his theory behind the end to the universe because there is a beginning point to it. 

Some facts that I thought were really interesting! -

1. The nucleus of an atom and its electrons that orbit it is proportionate to a football field and a grain of rice. So picture a grain of rice in the middle of the field, that's how much space (in relationship) to the nucleus of an atom has with its electrons! We're mostly made up of space.
2. If two galaxies collided not one single star would hit one another. They would pass through each other.

Thanks for reading guys!
Please leave comments or share this post if you'd like.
Happy star gazing! 

Sagittarius A-Star

Welcome to Atmosphere42 also known as Electromagnetic Radiation which is just a fancy science word for light, this is my science blog. I've loved space and science ever since I was a little kid so I decided to start a blog about it with my free time in college. 

I'm a first year student attending a university to double major in Biology and English. I'd love to become a high school teacher to teach both subjects. If you want to know more about myself just comment below! My first post is just an introduction about our galaxy. Don't wanna talk your ear off or anything so I'll keep it short.. Happy Reading! Feel free to ponder the existence and the meaning of your life while you scroll through my posts. 

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We revolve around the sun, so what does our sun orbit? Sagittarius A-Star. 

By the time it takes you to finish reading this sentence our entire solar system will have traveled 12,500 miles per hour around the supermassive black hole named Sagittarius A-Star in the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. One orbit takes 200 million years. 

Say the average person lives to be around 82 years. 

That's 4.1 x 10^-7% (or .00000041) ... a blink in the time of the orbit. 

Science can tell us that we are a blink in time. 

But hopefully some of us share the belief that humans are eternal. What makes you eternal?

The Milky Way View From Space

A Diagram of Our Milky Way Galaxy