Look Who it Was Random video

Universe of Wonders

277 views · Published 14 January 2010 · 0:41 · Indexed 11 October 2026

Channel: Paul Nathan · 2010 · Music

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A selection of images from the Hubble Space Telescope along with a short composition of mine ;-). The Hubble Space Telescope was and ESA / NASA joint effort launched by NASA into a high orbit in April 1990. It is truly one of the greatest pieces of equipment ever built by mankind and has opened a window far back into our Universe.

Do we perceive the universe as beautiful because we are a product of it and it is a simple matter of familiarity, or is there a deeper reason why everything in this universe from the smallest to the largest scales is both functional AND beautiful? Of course, first it is necessary to define beauty.... in the context of nature, I would say that beauty is a combination of elegance, symmetry and fractal structure - things that lie in the region between order and chaos. Note that elegance and symmetry are also hallmarks of feminine beauty, in my opinion.... Now, if all this is the result of interactions amongst fundamental particles that are governed by a set of simple rules (the laws of physics and nothing else), then this leads to the questions of how and why are the rules such that there may be function AND beauty in the Universe. The function is a necessity, but what about the beauty? Is it the signature of "The Rulemaker", or is beauty a mere human concept that amounts to nothing more than familiarity due to having evolved inside this Universe? Even if the latter is true, why did we evolve this concept? Why do we even study the stars? To gain knowledge and understanding, yes, but why do that? To learn where we came from, how we got here and where we are going. It is because we hope that we are something special, or part of something special rather than a pointless product of chance (as the nihilists would have you believe), or because we are feeling the tug of destiny amongst the stars. Think, have vision! Will we really still be confined to this planet in a thousand years time? Man looked to the stars thousands of years ago to try and determine the future - astrology. They had the right idea, but wrong approach. Now we look to the stars with the scientific method and look at what we have learnt, and will continue to learn! The great mystery of dark energy and dark matter I hope will hold the secrets of gravitation and the clues to how to control gravity and generate antigravity. Do you really think that rockets that burn fuel or accelerate ions and chuck it all out the back to accelerate a body via Newton's 3rd law are going to be the only form of space propulsion forever? The truth is out there.

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