Light Pollution

"Light Pollution" according to National Geographic:

Light pollution, or artificial light at night, is the excessive or poor use of artificial outdoor light, and it disrupts the natural patterns of wildlife, contributes to the increase in carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere, disrupts human sleep, and obscures the stars in the night sky.

[ayukir]

It's called light pollution, which they didn't have back in the days.

[raymondsmit]

In 2005 when I was five years old I lived in middle of rural outback Queensland, Australia in a small mining town. My dad took my younger brother and I out to the airport several kilometres out of town to look at stars.

Back then it was a lot smaller than it is today, the town was less developed and expanded, far fewer mines with them being much further away from town, and the airport was tiny and shut off all lights at night.

We lied down on the gravel of the airport carpark and as I looked up it was the brightest, most detailed and colourful night sky I’ve ever seen till this day. We stayed for a while watching meteors go by. I can remember it clearly till this day. I maybe biased overtime due to memory but the colours I saw I don’t think I’ve seen since just incredibly vivid and vibrant with the galactic dust and gas clearly silhouetted aswell as revealing its transparency.

My dad is a hobby astronomer, but very knowledgeable on the sky and would always point out things like stars or planets. When I was 16 we went out to try his new telescope. At this time a lot more mines have popped up encompassing more of the area, with that the town expanded leading to the airport growing drastically. Once only accomodating small propellor passenger planes with small gravel roads and only outside seating areas, to a large airport with a 2-4 acre concrete carpark accomodating Boeing 737s and larger. It operates through the night causing a lot of light pollution.

We had no option but to attempt to drive further out of town, we ended up finding a nice recently cleared out area and decided to setup up there.

Despite our efforts we could still see the faint glow of the distant mines, it was enough to be noticeable and have an overall effect on the contrast of the night sky. It was a wonderful time anyway the telescope was outstanding; it was just sad to see the fading beauty of it. I haven’t seen a sky as dark as even that night since as I now reside in a city.

There’s something very special about being able to experience that view in its entirety, it’s like you can almost touch the stars. We all need that just like feeling and breathing the air. It’s innate to us, it’s part of us.

[koltonhenricksen]

1) the universe is expanding from the origin point. (Newtons law and all that, no drag in space)
2) light pollution is a thing
3) it's been billions of years since those stars started burning. Who's to say that they haven't become white dwarfs by now.

[alexanderhorter]

Earth is not just moving around the Sun but the solar system is moving around a black hole in the middle of the Milky Way. so we probably moved away from the stars. That's my thought on it anyway.

[iscenemario]

Either we devolved as humans, or a more advanced civilization existed. Does anyone have other ideas?

[royrauch]

Some scientists say the other star groups are moving away from each other and now have moved farther away than could be seen decades ago....OR SOME EXTRATERRESTRIAL BEINGS DID IT....what makes more logic?

[ThatAutisticGuy]

It was a different time back then. When you. Could actually see it.
Grandma Uk and grandpa Rock would tell cousin Granite the stories that got passed down to us. From Granite. To Uktu and uncle skadoosh.

[Fanbter]

no it's named light pollution, so some research

[spideysilent_]

Light pollutionq and universe expansion