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I Shall BLOW YOUR MIND

2010-04-20 · Hank · watch on YouTube · Science & nature · explainer learning

Hank builds up cosmic scale (Earth, the Sun, the galaxy's stars) to the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, where a blank speck of sky held over 3,000 galaxies, and argues that humanity's act of understanding gives us an important place in the universe.

What is said

00:00:00 — Walking the dog, Hank decides to blow John's mind; Earth is huge; knowing its size vs mapping it (self-correction); Columbus

  • ★ While taking his dog for a walk, Hank decided he should blow John's mind today. — 00:00:00
  • ★★ Hank first says Earth's size was unknown until a few centuries ago, then corrects himself: people worked it out long ago with math, though the planet wasn't fully mapped. — 00:00:00 > «That's not actually true. People had figured out how big the Earth was a long, long time ago»
    • number check: a few hundred years ago — speaker_error
  • ★ Hank says 500 years ago Columbus sailed expecting to run into India, not knowing North America was there. — 00:00:00
  • ★ The description credits the folks at BadAstronomy for inspiring the video. — 00:00:00

00:00:29 — The Sun would hold a million Earths; 200 to 400 billion stars in our galaxy

  • ★★ Hank says the Sun is much bigger than Earth, as They Might Be Giants have told John: if the Sun were hollow, a million Earths would fit inside. — 00:00:29 · They Might Be Giants
  • ★★ Hank says our galaxy has at least 200 billion stars like the Sun, maybe as many as 400 billion, since counting them is hard. (hedged) — 00:00:29

00:00:58 — The Hubble Space Telescope; a dot on Hank's hand as the patch of empty sky NASA photographed; 'WTF NASA?'

  • ★★ Hank calls the Hubble Space Telescope the most powerful telescope ever created by humankind. — 00:00:58
  • ★★ Using a dot on his hand, Hank shows the tiny patch of sky NASA scientists pointed Hubble at: empty, with no visible stars, galaxies or nebulae, so some asked why photograph nothing. — 00:00:58 · NASA

00:01:58 — Shutter open for days, again in December 2009: the Hubble Ultra Deep Field shows over 3,000 galaxies

  • ★★★ Hank says they left the shutter open for days, once before and again in December 2009; the result is called the Hubble Ultra Deep Field. — 00:01:58
  • ★★★ Hank says that speck of black sky contained over 3,000 galaxies, every dot in the image a galaxy with billions of stars. — 00:01:58

00:02:35 — We have an important place in the universe: the act of understanding matters more than all the star stuff

  • ★★★ Hank says the universe is big, but he thinks we have an important place in it. (hedged) — 00:02:35
  • ★★ Hank says it took humanity 99.9% of its existence even to understand that we live on a ball of rock circling a globe of plasma. — 00:02:35
  • ★★★ Hank thinks understanding the scope of the universe, the act of understanding itself, is more important than the existence of all the star stuff in it. (hedged) — 00:02:35

00:03:03 — Reactions to the pale blue dot: Hank asks for viewers' in the comments; sign-off

  • ★★ Noting people react differently to knowing we are on a tiny pale blue dot, Hank asks viewers to leave their reactions in the comments ('in my pants'). — 00:03:03 · in your pants

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