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Monday, September 20, 2010

We are space travelers...

We are space travelers, and Earth is our space ship.

Here on earth the average human walking speed is approximately 3 mph (which depends upon a number of factors such as height, weight, terrain, surface, effort and fitness,) not only are we moving upon the earth, but the earth is spinning upon its axis which is 23 degrees from true north, at approximately 1,041.6 mph. The earth is orbiting our sun at approximately 67,000 mph. As the earth spins and orbits our sun, the sun also moves at approximately 155.342 miles per second in its own orbit in our galaxy which is moving at approximately 372.822 miles per second through its own trajectory in the universe.

The truth is, the actual location of “here” which was present at the moment I pressed these keyboard letters is far distant from the “here” as I read this again, and as you are reading this now. We are always moving through space, space we’ve never been through before. This is true and we are, whether we appreciate it or not, whether we know it or not, constantly unfolding and discovering new space as we ride upon out space ship called Earth. Even as we move through new space in this moment which has now just passed, we continue to move on and on, never stopping, always going. We truly are on a journey with no specific destination known to us, but on a trajectory which moves us on and on.

If we could somehow be removed from our current limited human beings perspective upon this planet and then somehow adopt another perspective with a grander view, we could see our movement through space, we might perceive a trail through space reaching back to when the earth first came into being. We are always at the leading edge of this trail. Considering the spin of the earth and our orbit around our sun and the sun’s movement through the galaxy, the path wouldn’t be a straight line, but rather a spiraling coil which appears fairly consistent in spin and trajectory.

With the knowledge of an astronomer, and a mathematician, a graphic representation of our movement through space could be generated, and we’d see we have never traveled through the same space we’ve been through before.


Here are some number to consider when contemplate our traveling through space.
(I got this information by doing search on the web.)

The earth is tilted 23 degrees from true north. (This is what causes our changing seasons.)
The earth’s circumference at the equator is approximately 25,000 miles.
The spin of the earth is approximately 1,041.66 mph.
The earth rotates around the sun at approximately 67,000 mph.
The axis of our galaxy rotation is 117 degrees from the earth’s rotational axis
Galactic south pole = 27 degrees southern latitude on earth.

Earth orbit in km/s = 30 km/s
Sun’s orbit in km/s = 250 km/s
Galaxy’s average velocity to the universe = 600km/s

To put some of these numbers into a context that might be more meaningful for you, I’ve rounded the numbers up to the nearest whole number:

The distance from San Francisco, California to New York, New York is approximately 2914 miles by land travel taking a relatively straight course.

If you travel from SF to NY at the speed the earth is spinning, it would take approximately 2.8 hours to make the trip.

If you travel from SF to NY at the speed the earth orbits the sun, it would take approximately .04 hours to make the trip.

If you travel from SF to NY at the speed the sun orbits our galaxy it would take you approximately 19 seconds to make the trip.

If you travel from SF to NY at the speed the galaxy’s average velocity, it would take you approximately 8 seconds to make the trip.

While the earth is spinning at 1,041.66 mph, and the earth is also orbiting our sun at 67,000 mph, and our sun is also orbiting or galactic center at 559231.2 mph and our galaxy is moving at about 1342159.2 mph, you can see we are streaking through the universe at phenomenal speeds.

So, we truly are space travelers. Even the ancient beings who first inhabited this planet were space travelers upon the space ship called Earth.

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