I was trying to find some information on the expanding universe and ended up on the NASA website. There I beheld this incredible image. This beauteous cloud has been named 'Puppis A' and it was formed around 3,700 years ago when a massive red star "ended its
life in a supernova, the most brilliant and powerful form of an
explosion in the known universe. The expanding shock waves from that
explosion are heating up the dust and gas clouds surrounding the
supernova, causing them to glow and appear red in this infrared view" (Whitney Clavin, NASA).
How incredible is it?! And how endlessly fascinating and vast is human thought, human life, the life of stars, the spread of our universe and a cloud of dust and gas somewhere beyond our solar system.
I'm reading Bachelard again and appropriately came across this quote from Jules Valles at the beginning of his chapter, 'Intimate Immensity': "l'espace m'a toujours rendu silencieux.' In English, it reads 'space has always reduced me to silence.' Yes, quite.
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