“Hoyle's enduring insights into stars, nucleosynthesis, and the large-scale universe rank among the greatest achievements of 20th-century astrophysics. Moreover, his theories were unfailingly stimulating, even when they proved transient.” UniverseStarsCenturyTheoryAchievementEndureInsightScales20th CenturyTransientLarge ScaleAstrophysicsGreatest Achievement Author:Fred Hoyle
“That was how divorced from the human scale modern warfare had become. You could smash and destroy from unthinkable distances, obliterate planets from beyond their own system and provoke stars into novae from light-years off... and still have no good idea why you were really fighting.” YearsHumansStillsIdeasLightFightingStarsModernPlanetsDistanceScalesGood IdeasWarfareProvokingDivorcedUnthinkableModern WarfareLight Years Author:Iain Banks
“The destruction of this planet would have no significance on a cosmic scale: to an observer in the Andromeda nebula, the sign of our extinction would be no more than a match flaring for a second in the heavens: and if that match does blaze in the darkness there will be none to mourn a race that used a power that could have lit a beacon in the stars to light its funeral pyre. The choice is ours.” IfsDoeLightWould BeUsedChoicesHeavenStarsRaceDarknessPlanetsDestructionAstronomyScalesSignificanceFuneralCosmicLitObserversExtinctionMournBeaconsAndromedaNebula Author:Stanley Kubrick
“People behave differently to TV stars and film stars; it's to do with the scale of the medium. Film stars get hushed awe, TV stars get slapped on the back. Neither is good for you. Famous people don't hear the word 'no' enough.” PeopleEnoughFilmStarsTvsScalesMediumsBehaveAweFilm Stars Author:Tom Hollander
“The Apollo pictures of the whole Earth conveyed to multitudes something well known to astronomers: On the scale of the worlds - to say nothing of stars or galaxies - humans are inconsequential, a thin film of life on an obscure and solitary lump of rock and metal” WorldHumansWellsWholeEarthFilmStarsKnownRocksScalesMetalsSolitaryMultitudesObscureWell KnownGalaxyApolloLumpsAstronomersInconsequential Book:Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space Source: Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space
“...Which brings me to the Hubble Space Telescope's newest images. If it's wonder that you're looking for, and mystery, don't just scan the photographs. Stop and think about them. Try to imagine the scale. The Earth is just a speck of dust on one distant whirling tentacle of the Milky Way galaxy, which contains billions of stars. A 'collision' of galaxies seems unimaginably large - and yet it is something scientists long ago imagined... The imaginings of pseudoscience are feeble by comparison.” IfsThinkingWayTryingLongSeemsEarthStarsSpaceWonderImagineMysteryEvolutionScientistPhotographBillionsScalesDustComparisonLong AgoGalaxyTelescopesCollisionSpecksPseudoscienceMilky WayTentaclesHubbleHubble Space Telescope Author:Mark Bowden
“I went to the librarian and asked for a book about stars.... And the answer was stunning. It was that the Sun was a star but really close. The stars were suns, but so far away they were just little points of light.... The scale of the universe suddenly opened up to me. It was a kind of religious experience. There was a magnificence to it, a grandeur, a scale which has never left me. Never ever left me.” KindLittlesBookLightUniverseLeftStarsReligiousAnswersSunScalesFar AwayLibrarianGrandeurStunningMagnificenceReligious ExperiencePoints Of Light Author:Carl Sagan