The Briefing Room
General Category => Science, Technology and Knowledge => Topic started by: mystery-ak on April 29, 2014, 02:20:41 pm
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http://sploid.gizmodo.com/if-you-put-every-living-human-on-a-pile-it-would-only-1569188500?utm_campaign=socialflow_gizmodo_facebook&utm_source=gizmodo_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow (http://sploid.gizmodo.com/if-you-put-every-living-human-on-a-pile-it-would-only-1569188500?utm_campaign=socialflow_gizmodo_facebook&utm_source=gizmodo_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow)
If you put every living human on a pile, it would only take this space
Jesus Diaz
Today 9:11am
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--qnzpccpC--/c_fit,fl_progressive,w_636/epqwzw8rawswwt1qdwdu.jpg)
According to the always entertaining Vsauce, this is the volume that the entire human population would take if you put everyone on a pile in the Grand Canyon. We are just a bunch of ants, yet we have managed to transform the entire landscape of Earth.*
* Even if you took all of humanity across all the ages—an estimated 106 billion—the piles—about 15 of these—wouldn't cover the Grand Canyon. Not even a significant fraction.
(http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--n1X9I4zn--/s9y2eb8pfruhnmr6jivc.gif)
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Wow, that's hard to believe. Now take that pile and put it in relation to the size of our sun! Now, compare it to the size of the universe! The magnitude of what we are part of blows your mind!
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I seen the same type of graphic once on our landfills - showing how if we were to empty every landfill in the United States (or maybe it was the planet) and dig one big hole to put it all in, the size and dept of the hole would be far smaller than we would thnk it would be - and but a spot on the whole globe.
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Wow, that's hard to believe. Now take that pile and put it in relation to the size of our sun! Now, compare it to the size of the universe! The magnitude of what we are part of blows your mind!
There are 300 billion stars just in the Milky Way, which is a relatively small galaxy. There are just as many galaxies in the known universe, each having countless billions of their own stars. Most of the stars have at least a handful of planets orbiting them as well. If Earth like conditions were 1 in 10 billion, there would still be billions of potential Earth like planets out there. I don't understand how some people can even entertain the idea of us being the only life in the universe.
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Also, that pile would seem a lot bigger if you were actually standing in front of it. haha
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Also, that pile would seem a lot bigger if you were actually standing in front of it. haha
Or in it!
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Hitchhiker's guide
always bring a towel.
The machine is not functioning correctly. Instead of showing me how small I am, it shows me that I am the most important thing that has ever happened since creation. Thank you.
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There are 300 billion stars just in the Milky Way, which is a relatively small galaxy. There are just as many galaxies in the known universe, each having countless billions of their own stars. Most of the stars have at least a handful of planets orbiting them as well. If Earth like conditions were 1 in 10 billion, there would still be billions of potential Earth like planets out there. I don't understand how some people can even entertain the idea of us being the only life in the universe.
It's a little more complicated than that. It takes almost perfect conditions to create life as we know it. The planet's elements and chemical compounds have to be in the right proportion, the planet has to not only be in the right position but have the right amount of axial tilt and rotation, and then there's the issue of time. Planet Earth is in the middle of a two-billion-year window in which complex life has been able to thrive. A billion years from now, the Sun will be too hot to support life on Earth and anything left by then will die.
Could there be life elsewhere out there? Perhaps. Intelligent life as we know it? Certainly not within each other's reach.
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It's a little more complicated than that. It takes almost perfect conditions to create life as we know it. The planet's elements and chemical compounds have to be in the right proportion, the planet has to not only be in the right position but have the right amount of axial tilt and rotation, and then there's the issue of time. Planet Earth is in the middle of a two-billion-year window in which complex life has been able to thrive. A billion years from now, the Sun will be too hot to support life on Earth and anything left by then will die.
Could there be life elsewhere out there? Perhaps. Intelligent life as we know it? Certainly not within each other's reach.
It's probably a good thing that intelligent life on one planet generally cannot reach other intelligent life on another planet.
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Hitchhiker's guide
always bring a towel.
The machine is not functioning correctly. Instead of showing me how small I am, it shows me that I am the most important thing that has ever happened since creation. Thank you.
Why would you say the machine isn't functioning correctly? It's not capable of telling you what to think of the results, it merely presents the results - the data - it's up to you to draw your own conclusions. For example, as far as I'm concerned it's simply an interesting statistic; the data doesn't make me feel one way or the other about my, or our, position or role on Earth or in the Universe. But that's just my take.
For example, cats will catch and eat bunnies. That's a simple fact. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing depends on whether you're a cat or a bunny; data itself is neither good nor bad, it simply is.
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It's a little more complicated than that. It takes almost perfect conditions to create life as we know it. The planet's elements and chemical compounds have to be in the right proportion, the planet has to not only be in the right position but have the right amount of axial tilt and rotation, and then there's the issue of time. Planet Earth is in the middle of a two-billion-year window in which complex life has been able to thrive. A billion years from now, the Sun will be too hot to support life on Earth and anything left by then will die.
Could there be life elsewhere out there? Perhaps. Intelligent life as we know it? Certainly not within each other's reach.
I don't believe we have or ever will make contact with other life in my lifetime. The conditions for life are rare, but when considering the vastness of the universe it is almost impossible that there is not other life out there. The elements that create life are the most common in the universe. It is not unreasonable to think that there is some form of life in most places where life could potentially exist. Scientists speculate that there might even be life in our own solar system on the frozen moon Europa.