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It took centuries, but we now know the size of the Universe
The sheer scale of the cosmos is hard to imagine, and even harder to put an accurate figure on.
The sheer scale of the cosmos is hard to imagine, and even harder to put an accurate figure on. But thanks to some ingenious physics we now have a good idea of just how big it is..
“Let us go rambling about the Universe.” This is the invitation that American astronomer Harlow Shapley gave to an audience in Washington DC in 1920. He was taking part in the so-called Great Debate with fellow scientist Heber Curtis on the scale of the Universe.
Shapley believed that our Milky Way galaxy was 300,000 light…
Source: BBC – Earth – It took centuries, but we now know the size of the Universe