First thoughts on the World Wide Telescope…
Looking up and out through the night sky, we encounter the entire universe as it is now and as it was – closer and closer to the beginning of spacetime. Past Earth’s moon, a mere 240 thousand miles away, the orbit of Neptune, 4.46 billion miles from the Sun, to the nearest stars, which are light-years away, to distant galaxies that stretch our vision hundreds, thousands, and millions of light years toward the zone where the big bang radiation begins nearly 14 billion years ago – we gaze simultaneously through time and space.
Recalling so many years at the lenses of binoculars, open-tube reflector scopes, and my trusty Celestron 8 telescope, I nearly froze my fingers during the coldest clearest winter nights to catch a glimpse of Saturn’s rings or the Orion Nebula. I recall as well the ecstasy of feeling my direct connection to the universe at large.
And now, knowing what I know, aware that I am witnessing the infinite becoming of the entire universe within the instant of an eternal present – in which I am not simply the watcher but also the watched – I am moved to point a finger toward the final ineffable source of all that is true and beautiful in Nature. Join me in this journey. The whole astonishing universe is who and what you are!
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WWT in an interactive whiteboard
Roy Gould on WWT at TED
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Download – World Wide Telescope
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Image: Microsoft World Wide Telescope, composite image, 2008 by TFD
