What does astronomical mean? That word is part of our vernacular yet I feel we don’t give it the due it deserves. If you look at the definition from the Oxford dictionary you will find:
1. Relating to astronomy.
‘astronomical observations’2. informal (of an amount) extremely large.
‘he wanted an astronomical fee’
But what is extremely large? Really, really large 🙂 Just kidding of course, but I think these terms do not illustrate the proper meaning of the word.
To provide context of how astronomical our known galaxy is, the nearest visible star, Alpha Centauri, is 4.37 light-years from our solar system. However, light-years, like astronomical don’t convey their enormity.
Let us suppose you were an astronomical human and to your astronomical-self the sun were the size of pea… you are huge :). If you were that large and the sun was the size of a pea and you wanted to go visit Alpha Centauri… you’d have to travel 125 of your astronomical miles (200km) to reach it. Imagine that. You are so large, the sun is the size of a pea, yet the distances of the galaxy are so large that even in your astronomical size getting to the next visible star would take you days walking and hours driving.
So next time you say, “that’s astronomical…“, make sure you really mean it.
