2007-03-24 04:32:02 · 7 answers · asked by dardenseed 1 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
It's much bigger than any of these!
Would you like to know how big the Milky Way is? It is estimated at 300,000 light years across. The earth is 8,000 miles thick through the middle. Try these numbers on for size:
Suppose you had a pea about a half-inch thick, about one centimeter. That would make it a larger-than-average pea.
About 1.3 billion such peas, lined up end to end, would about reach across the entire diameter of the earth.
The earth is about 8,000 miles in diameter. Since there are about 6 trillion miles in a light-year (6 million million miles for those who use British periods of numeration) and the galaxy is 300,000 of these light-years across, I calculate the Milky Way to be about 1.8 quintillion miles across.
Dividing 1.8 quintillion by 8,000, I reckon the Milky Way to be about 150 trillion times larger than the earth. Since the United States is only about 500 million times larger than a pea, my quick calculations tell me that it would take 300,000 United Stateses lined up end to end to represent the size of the Milky way compared to the earth, if earth were the size of a pea.
If the earth were a pea, the Milky Way would be far larger than the United States. It would be more on the scale of a solar system, a disc reaching beyond the orbit of Saturn almost to Uranus!
2007-03-24 04:36:33 · answer #1 · answered by Anne Marie 6 · 2⤊ 1⤋
NO.
The Milky Way Galaxy is a disk that is 1,500 Light Years wide and 15 Light Years thick. it contains about 200 Billion stars just like our Sun. The center of the disk contains a mass of densely packed stars which are so close to one another that the center seems to glow a solid white color. Several arms spiral out from this central disk of stars, and our sun is located on one of those arms about 1/3 the way out from the center. The whole thing is slowly twirling around and we are a part of it..
2007-03-24 08:02:19 · answer #2 · answered by zahbudar 6 · 0⤊ 2⤋
According to scientist the milky way is infinity it has no end, and the earth 'is' the size of a pea compared to the sun and the universe it self.
2007-03-24 04:41:34 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋
The milky way is huge.
So if you want to use truck tire to represent the milky way, then i would say that earth is represented by a hydrogen electron.
2007-03-24 04:40:50 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hi, No. More like the size of the US.
2007-03-24 04:35:28 · answer #5 · answered by Cirric 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Basically thats a great way to put it, there are lots of solar systems in the milky way, we're just a small cog in a giant wheel.
2007-03-24 05:20:55 · answer #6 · answered by tennman012000 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
more like a truck
2007-03-24 04:35:18 · answer #7 · answered by Whitt 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋