so I finally finished watching all 3 books of Avatar and I’m a little obsessed with Appa.
i learned a while ago that the whole "most of the stars we see in the sky are actually already dead because they're so far away that we're seeing them as they were thousands of years ago" thing is a myth because stars live so long that it's unlikely many, if any, of them have burned out yet, but i'm still glad that myth exists because there's just something about the thought of the sky as a graveyard of stars that gets to me
It’s interesting because one day that will be true for some people in some planet out there, but we are so young, the universe is so young, that we live in a time when we get to see more stars born than we ever will see die. There’s poetry in looking up and seeing a star graveyard, but I think there’s also poetry in looking up and seeing a star nursery.
Like, momento mori but also momento vivere
we live in a time when we get to see more stars born than we ever will see die
fucks me up that by total coincidence the sun and moon's size difference is exactly matched to their difference in distance from us, thus making our beautiful total solar eclipses where you can see the silver threads of the sun's corona possible because the moon just covers the sun completely
The stars (literally) aligned just right for this experience to be possible. It's likely that aliens don't have this
The moon is also absolutely gargantuan by moon standards. It isn't the largest moon in the solar system, but it is BY FAR the largest in comparison with its planet. Ganymede is the largest satellite of Jupiter and the largest moon in the solar system. Its diameter is only about 3.8% of Jupiter's. Titan's radius is 4.4% of Saturn's. Callisto and Io are the next largest in the neighborhood, with 3.4% and 2.6% the diameter of Jupiter respectively.
Our moon is number 5. It is smaller in direct comparison to the above moons. The diameter of the moon is 3475 km. That is a full 27% of the diameter of the Earth. More than a quarter. That's ridiculous. It's unheard of. The universe is large enough that the word unique probably doesn't mean a lot, but this might be about as close as you get.
This has had a huge impact on our planet. Other things aliens might not have are significant tides. One of Mars's dumpy little potatoes wouldn't be able to move oceans the way our moon does.
Our moon has also stabilized our axis to a massive degree. Without her up there our axis would wobble all over the place and our climate would be far more chaotic. Aliens might not be quite so lucky.
I guess what I am really trying to say is that the moon is extremely cool. I like the moon.
Just want to add that the reason we have such a large moon is because a whole planet crashed into proto-Earth. Theia (the planet) and Earth got so superheated by this collision that their component cores fused and the impact jettisoned a lot of material into space. That massive amount of jettisoned material became our moon. So Earth and the moon have very similar composition. This does not seem to be a common method of lunar formation.
what if the answer to the fermi paradox is that life cant exist without a moon like luna
I got a serious beef with the Fermi paradox. There is no Fermi paradox. There stopped being a Fermi paradox once the first radio telescopes went up, and we began to get a true sense of the sheer scale of the universe.
Space is big, empty, and loud. Sunspots can cause enough interference to affect global communications. We’re not even loud enough to talk over our own sun. On our own planet. We can barely communicate with Voyager, and we know exactly where it is and what its signal sounds like.
The Fermi paradox is like doubting the existence of Belfast, because you stood on a windy New York beach shouting towards it and didn’t get an answer.
I just had a discussion with my friend about fanfiction and how we tend to assume that women are the writers without any actual proof. Then I said, hey, I know fanfiction written by gay and trans dudes. But then I remembered, wait, I think I know one writer who just must be cis het based on his work. Anyway, all writers, be honest, who are you?
Please reblog if you're interested in the results.
If you have ever written any fanfiction, tell me your identity, pls
cis het woman
cis queer woman
trans het woman
trans queer woman
nonbinary person
cis het man
cis queer man
trans het man
trans queer man
other/prefer not to tell/see the results
Oh please answer this poll, it might be semi-representative if the number of responses is high enough
sure i'll reblog that
the video isn’t loading for me, I’ll have to trust you on that
worst college experience actually was people seeingme use tumblr and say 'haha oh i used to use tumblr we could follow eachother' and i open their blog and its like 700 artic monkeys band gif grunge images pastel moodboards and im sitting here hands folded like you are about to learn our uses of this site are wildly different and i just posted a photo of a buff man in a g string
i wouldnt lie online
2016-2021 Toyota Land Cruiser
Finally, a worthy foe for Plinko Horse
Taffy Puller Cow
reblog to taffy a cow
I'm really glad that it was stereotypical Barbie in the movie that went through her identity crisis because I think it shows just how hard literally every women has it when it comes to beauty standards.
Stereotypical Barbie is supposed to be this absolute beautiful woman but her body is going through changes (pretty minor ones at that) that make her sad even though she's still very beautiful. The movie itself even makes a joke about how having a character played by Margot Robbie call herself "not pretty" was a bit ridiculous. The beauty standards that all women have to go through are really extreme and even women like Stereotypical Barbie can't achieve them.
