OK, give your friend a dime and have him stand 75-feet away from you, holding the dime so it blots out a tiny portion of the sky. That's how much of the sky is covered by the single image above, taken by the Hubble Deep Field camera in 1996. In this one image are more than 1,500 galaxies. That number is mind-boggling enough, but when you consider a typical galaxy contains 100,000 million stars or so and you consider our sun is just a typical star and each of us is just one of 6 billion people on a small planet revolving around that star. . . well, the picture for me is worth more than a thousand words. I find it captures in a single image the overwhelming awe, mystery, and beauty of the reality we inhabit. I include it on my home page to help me - and others - keep things in perspective.

[More detailed explanation of image.]
[High resolution - and other -versions of image.]

A new Hubble image taken with the new camera came out recently and I commented on it in Natural High, May 12, 2003 - scroll down to "When the words hide the truth."

Greg Stone

Email me: greg@giveyoujoy.net

Updated May 31, 2003