Barron of Blog Wife, Kids, and the Pursuit of Happiness

Perspective (With Respect to Time)

It's good to keep a proper perspective about how big the universe is. It is also instructive to remember just how old the universe is as well.

Carl Sagan popularized the idea of compressing the entire history of the universe since the beginning of time into a single calendar year as a way for us humans to better relate to the vast numbers involved. Here is a nice version of that calendar (each month is equivalent to a little more than 1 billion years):

You can see a more detailed example, with all of the various eras and more human-scale events, here.

Perspective (With Respect to Space)

Perspective is important, so you get a two-fer today.

First, the relative sizes of our planets and various stars. The largest celestial body in the previous pane is the smallest in the next pane:

Second, our place in the universe (click to make gigantic). The previous panel will always be in red in the next panel:

Now go out and have a great day, you teeny tiny speck of carbon on a minuscule rock floating midway down one spiral arm of a typical galaxy among billions.