Imagine that you could represent the entire humd through thousands of years of history and science T contain the story you would tell about how we've lea in a vast universe Milky Way Galaxy Universe
race living following pages Earth s place V Our place in the universe as we know it today Earth is a planet the third from the Sun in our solar system Our solar system is one of more than 100 billion star systems in the Milky Way Galaxy Our galaxy is one of more than 100 billion galaxies in our universe Solar System not to scale Earth
Thousands of years ago when I was a small child I began to try to make sense of the world around me One of my earliest memories was seeing the star filled sky at night resting like a dome upon what appeared to be a flat Earth Naturally I thought this vision represented reality and wondered what the Earth itself might rest upon and what might lie beyond the stars CO WE Ea sta S pr pa of pa Sun's path on bu December solstice th Sun's path on June solstice Sun's path on equinoxes
Our internal The idea of a flat Earth covered by a dome shaped sky was mmon among ancient people because it seems to explain what see in our daily lives After all if you ignore hills and valleys the rth seems flat as you look toward the horizon and at night the seem to fill a great dome extending down to the horizon in all ections The Sun always rises in the east and sets in the west but its path varies with the seasons This diagram shows Sun ths on special dates for latitude 40°N which includes the cities New York Madrid Istanbul Baku and Beijing The Sun's th changes with the seasons in a similar way at other latitudes with differing angles relative to the horizon and tilting toward north for locations in the Southern
