Facts about the universe you might not know
There are plenty of facts that might keep your mind very busy late at night - most of them are yet to be discovered.
From all its unimaginably large, to all its incredibly small components, the universe is an astonishing place. As humans who have only existed for a split second on the “cosmic calendar” (the time frame from which the universe began, until now) – we have so much more to learn about it.
You might think you know enough about the cosmos, but there are plenty of facts that might keep your mind very busy late at night. Most of them are yet to be discovered by our very young human civilisation.
1. We are always moving at incredible speeds.
Nothing and no-one is ever at rest. Our Milky Way galaxy rotates at an amazing 225 kilometres per second, while also flying through the cosmos at 305 km/s. Add those figures together, and you’ll be blown away to know that, in only a minute’s time, you will have travelled nearly 20 000 kilometres.
2. There are 10 billion trillion stars in the universe.
This number can also be written as ten to the power of 22. That is a LOT of stars. As the universe is always expanding, even more stars are being born as you read.
3. Neutron stars are the heaviest objects in the known universe.
A neutron star is created during a supernova (the implosion and death of a star) and is the densest object that we know of so far. One sugar-cube-sized piece of a neutron star would weigh around 100 million tons – the weight of a mountain.
4. We are all made of stars.
Ever wondered what you are made of? Well, we are all composed of star stuff. At the beginning of time, matter started to be, and from that matter, everything else came to be, including all humans, animals, plants, objects and stars. Ever wished you had something in common with your cat, a beautiful flower or a hermit crab (for those days you just can’t stand to leave the house)? Well, you do! You are the crab, and the crab is you – we are all stars.
5. Our galaxy is currently colliding with another one.
Our Milky Way galaxy is on a collision course with the Andromeda galaxy – it is destined to happen. But don’t lose sleep over it – the impending impact will only take place in another three billion years.
6. Mysterious black holes
Black holes are vacuums in space with such intense gravitational pull that not even light can escape them. That’s right – they swallow light, too. It is theorised that, at the other end of every black hole, there lies a whole different universe with its own unique dimension, matter, version of time and laws of physics. For a tiny human, this is a very hard concept to comprehend.
We must never think we know all the facts about the universe, and we must also never assume they’re all true. Us humans believe we are the only life that exists in such an enormous universe – which just indicates how much we still have to evolve and learn. Our knowledge is barely the tip of the iceberg.
References:
Carl Pettit – www.thefw.com, www.quora.com
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