Ontology of the Sun could be pondered by checking where its physical size stands, on the cosmic scale. |
Question:
What would be the size of the Sun, if the Milky Way was the size of a basketball?
Answer:
We can do this by scaling the Milky Way's diameter down to the size of a basketball and then finding the corresponding scaled down size of the Sun.
The diameter of the Milky Way is approximately 100,000 light-years. A basketball has a diameter of roughly 0.24 meters.
Now, let's find the scaling factor:
Scaling factor
= (Diameter of basketball) / (Diameter of Milky Way)
≈ (0.24 m) / (100,000 light-years)
1 light-year = 9.461 × 10¹⁵ meters
100,000 light-years = 9.461 × 10²⁰ meters
So the scaling factor is approximately 2.535 × 10⁻²².
The diameter of the Milky Way is approximately 100,000 light-years. A basketball has a diameter of roughly 0.24 meters.
Now, let's find the scaling factor:
Scaling factor
= (Diameter of basketball) / (Diameter of Milky Way)
≈ (0.24 m) / (100,000 light-years)
1 light-year = 9.461 × 10¹⁵ meters
100,000 light-years = 9.461 × 10²⁰ meters
So the scaling factor is approximately 2.535 × 10⁻²².
Scaled diameter of Sun = Actual diameter of Sun * Scaling factor ≈ 3.527 × 10⁻¹³ meters
So, if the Milky Way was the size of a basketball (0.24 meter in diameter), the Sun would be approximately 3.527 × 10⁻¹³ meters in diameter. This is smaller than the smallest atom, the Hydrogen atom (Diameter is 10-10 meter) and that's a pointer to the ontology of the Sun... |
And that brings me to a poem I wrote many years back, pondering human ontology.