The Universe: Your Cosmic Address
NOTE: the Universe project recently changed. The older version is still available.
Where do you live? Your home or your school has an address: a street, a city or town, and a country. When someone wants to send you a letter, they give your address, so that your mail carrier knows the letter should go to you. For example, the address of the astronomy building at Johns Hopkins University is:
3701 San Martin Drive
Baltimore, Maryland 21218
United States of America
Question 1. What is your school's address? |
But does this address really describe where you are? Imagine extending the address out to bigger and bigger divisions, until it becomes a "cosmic address" that includes your continent, planet, galaxy, and universe. So the "cosmic address" of the Johns Hopkins astronomy building would be:
3701 San Martin Drive
Baltimore, Maryland 21218
USA
North America
Earth
The Solar System
The Milky Way Galaxy
The Universe
Question 2. What is your school's cosmic address? |
The last step of the cosmic address is the largest division: the universe. The universe is actually everything and everywhere. Every star and every galaxy we see is part of the same universe. The universe is a really big place!
Just how big is the universe? Click Next to find out.
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