As I traveled through the universe, from one end to the other, my perspective began to shift. It starts slowly showing you larger objects and continually grows and continues for what seems like hours. The fact that it takes light one hundred thousand years to get from one end of the universe to the other is extremely crazy. This gives you an idea about how big the universe truly is.
The universe contains multiple suns, stars, planets, and numerous various objects we study. The universe is so big and so broad we haven’t even come close to seeing or exploring a piece of it. There are so many possibilities of different types of planets we haven’t seen, galaxies, stars, and life forms. It isn’t the craziest idea that life could be out in the universe that we are unaware of.
The way the Earth was determined to be round is amazing to me. The fact that a guy took a stick and put it into the ground in two different places and measured the shadows. This blows my mind that so many hundreds of years ago a man was so intelligent he figured this out so simply. It took people of newer eras to use technology and extreme math to determine the circumference of the Earth. These measurements have only confirmed the measurements from the ancients. This is one of the most interesting facts in this episode.
One aspect of Carl Sagan’s series I enjoy is the discussion of the first astronomers and what they did and how they did it. This was interesting to me as it was more than just basic space talk, it was more explanations and facts and ideas they believed. I am looking forward to learning about more objects in space and how they move and work together in the universe in future episodes.
The beginning of the video was very hypnotizing. It makes you feel as if you are so tiny and insignificant to the entire universe. When you take a step back and put the universe into perspective it almost feels unimaginable. How can we be just one tiny planet in the midst of so many others? How can I, a single person, be important in a universe this big? These are some of the questions that went through my head while watching Carl Sagan’s first cosmos series video named the shores of the cosmic ocean. The numerous facts and ideas presented in these videos was intriguing to me. Stay tuned for next weeks episode named “One voice in the cosmic fugue”.
The Cosmos Series 