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Wanna discover what's out there? Help the cause.

  • Thread starter xvart
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xvart

Doing it wrong until I do it right.
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Any astronomy buffs out there? I just found this clip at CNN and checked the sight out. To summarize, since there are millions upon millions of galaxies that have been photographed but not described you can help the cause and view some pictures and classify the galaxies.

Check it out!

xvart.
 
thats pretty cool, not sure if id trust just anyone to classify though
 
The site talks about how any that have significant disputes between all the "reviewers" are then flagged and reviewed by a "professional." As far as I can tell every photo you view is random so after a while there will be lots of people who have viewed the various galaxies; therefore, if say, 500 people think one galaxy is a spiral and 10 think it's a elliptical the program probably sorts it into the category of spiral. However, if it was more like 200 think one way and 300 think another way then it would be flagged and then reviewed.

I'm sure they have (or will implement) some safeguards before publishing any information. Additionally, any data they do gather will be explained in their methodology and when looking at the big picture (percentage of galaxies that are X, Y, or Z) the data will not be off by more than a factor of ten; which by most standards would be sufficient for practical purposes. I mean, we are talking about millions of galaxies!

xvart.
 
I registered and started out. I got 13 out of 15 correct on the trial.

It so cool to look at different galaxies like that.
 
I got 13 out of 15 correct on the trial.

That's how I fared on the tutorial, too! All the pictures are really neat even when they are totally pixilated and zoomed in too far. It's fun when you actually run across a "merging" one! I wonder if I'll ever see the same galaxy twice? Or if I do will I even notice?! lol.

xvart.
 
That was pretty cool. Very interesting. But it got boring fast.
 
there are millions upon millions of galaxies

I've been trying to wrap my brain around this for the past half hour, and failing. MILLIONS of galaxies, so many that we cannot even begin to know them all...

I feel kind of ...puny and insignificant?
 
If the universe is infinitely large, and ever expanding, is there also an infinate amount of matter or will the universe expand until all matter is so far away from each other, everything slows and thus cools, or will it then reach a "breaking point" and then collapse in upon it's self?
 
  • #10
I've been trying to wrap my brain around this for the past half hour, and failing. MILLIONS of galaxies, so many that we cannot even begin to know them all...

I feel kind of ...puny and insignificant?

Those MILLIONS I was referring to was only the pictures they have in the database. There are tons more out there! I think I may have posted this here before, but speaking of feeling small and puny: the fastest traveling spacecraft that humans have made is Voyager 2. It travels at 50,000 km/hr which means it could go from NY to LA in less than four minutes. If we sent this to the nearest star besides our sun it would take 9,250 years to get there! And that's just one of the millions or billions of stars in the Milky Way galaxy. Chew on that!

xvart.

edit:
If the universe is infinitely large, and ever expanding, is there also an infinate amount of matter or will the universe expand until all matter is so far away from each other, everything slows and thus cools, or will it then reach a "breaking point" and then collapse in upon it's self?

If you've ever read Ishmael by Daniel Quinn you should check out his graphic story about the universe collapsing back on itself, as you mentioned, Clint. It's called The Man that Grew Young and essentially everything is backwards. You are dug out of the ground as a feeble old person and taken to a hospital to be revived by machines and then "grow" younger, eventually discovering and reuniting with your mother at "birth." It's pretty good if you like Quinn's philosophies, but I suppose that is a topic for another thread.
 
  • #11
Man I wanna read that book, Ive always thought what it would be like if thats how it worked. Ill have to look it up, I love philosophy type things, make ya think!
 
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