If the sun's light reaches Earth every 8 minutes or so, does that mean that the star's light that we see every night was from a billion years ago? I mean I heard somewhere that it will take us billions of years to reach the nearest star with the speed of light.
2006-07-27 21:28:56 · 13 answers · asked by HeIsVigilante 2 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
THe nearest star is around four light years away. So it would take us only four years at the speed of light, or around 20 years at 1/5 the speed of light. Its keeping alive till we get there that is the problem.
When you look into the sky you are actually seeing the past. The stars would have moved by now.
PS: Actually the nearest star to us is the sun (8 light minutes) but that;s trivial. Proxima Centauri is 4.2 light years away. Alpha Centauri is 4.3 light years away.
2006-07-27 21:32:39 · answer #1 · answered by blind_chameleon 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The nearest star is Alpha Centauri and it's about 4 light years away...so it would take 4 years at the speed of light. But yes, light from some of the farthest stars does take billions of years to get here.
2006-07-27 21:34:51 · answer #2 · answered by The Man In The Box 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You are correct that it takes light from the Sun 8 minutes to reach us. The next nearest star is Proxima Centauri, a companion of Alpha Centauri. Light takes 4.3 years to reach us from there. The distances to stars and galaxies vary. The closest stars are in our own Milky Way Galaxy. Near it are two small galaxies called Magellanic Clouds. The Andromeda Galaxy is the nearest large one. Light takes millions or billions of years to reach us from some sources. There is a limit to the size of the Observable Universe. Beyond that limit, we cannot see anything.
2006-07-27 21:52:08 · answer #3 · answered by miyuki & kyojin 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Sure, we are seeing the light that was given off by some stars billions of years ago, and many of them would have went super nova by this time, but we won't know about that for a long time. However, the bright star Sirius which lies close to the constellation Orion is only 8 light years away, so its light is only 8 years old when it reaches us
2006-07-27 21:36:57 · answer #4 · answered by David A 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It would take approximately 4 years at the speed of light to reach our nearest neighbor,not billions.Some of the light we see are planets,stars and other galaxies.Its only recently that we have been able to look that far into space via the Hubble telescope and Keppler observations and see the vastness of our universe.
2006-07-27 21:39:49 · answer #5 · answered by Professor Riddle 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
That's right! When we look at the sky, we are actually looking at the past.
And though this doesn't relate to your question, I wonder if it chills you just as much as it does me... Analogous to the concept of light travel, if anything is moving towards us at a velocity greater than light, it would reach us before the light does, which is to say, it will be invisible.
People argue that faster than light travel is not possible, but in reality there are more than one ways in how it can be made possible under circumstances. For instance, if two bodies are travelling towards each other at the speed of light, the relative velocity would be greater than that of light, as a result they can never see each other, not even while they collide. Besides, black holes are known to generate acceleration that can create velocities greater than that of light.
Chilling, isn't it?
2006-07-27 21:47:50 · answer #6 · answered by ngt_765 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
NO NO NO.
All of the stars we see with the naked eye are in our own galaxy, so the stars you see would be less than 1000 light years away.
There are only about 3000 stars that you can see clearly (from the southern hemisphere (less in the northern)) with the naked eye. Nearly all of them are less than 500 light years away.
We can see two other galaxies with the naked eye, but to your eyes they are a fuzzy luminous cloud. Again, they are not billions of light years away.
2006-07-27 21:43:03 · answer #7 · answered by mofuonamotorcycle 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hubble captures images from far far away, more exactlly light from very far regions of Universe. As light need time olso to go from emitter to a given point, scientists belive that light and pics captured by the telescope are from bilions (30 , 40) years ago, more exactelly close to the begging of Big Bang.
2006-07-27 23:08:03 · answer #8 · answered by stoica_szilard 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
yes. alot of the stars we see right now have long ago burned out.
2006-07-27 21:30:40 · answer #9 · answered by tami 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You are correct.
Alan Moore once wrote that "All we get to see of stars are their old photographs."
2006-07-27 22:58:25 · answer #10 · answered by Sean 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋