This Is A Light-Nanosecond!

less than 1m read

·Nov 10, 2024

I trimmed my beard yesterday, so I'm feeling a bit like a baby today. But look at the trimmings! Specifically this one that is 2.4 fortnits worth of beard growth. How do I know? Well, because of this tool I made. This about 5 years ago to free people from the tyranny of standard units. It measures in weird units like beard fortnits, the typical length of beard grows every 2 weeks.

It's also got light pico seconds, how far light travels in a trillionth of a second. If you didn't get one 5 years ago but you're subscribed much later this year, three boxes from now you'll get one in a special Legacy box we're making. The entire ruler is exactly one light nond long. This is how far light travels in a vacuum in 1 nond.

Everything I see from this distance, I'm seeing as it was a billionth of a second ago. It's a reminder that you live in the past because light has a finite speed. You do not see things as they are; you see the universe only as it was. Also, you're going nowhere if you fall asleep tonight in the same bed you woke up in this morning. Your average velocity for the day will be zero.

Meet an Imagineer Who Built a Wish | Podcast | Overheard at National Geographic

Warren Buffett: Buy These Inflation-Proof Businesses

View All

Who Was the First Person to Reach the North Pole? | National Geographic

Who was the first person to reach the North Pole? You might think it was Robert Peary or Frederick Cook. However, the title could actually belong to an African-American explorer named Matthew Henson. In 1866, only a year after the end of the Civil War, H…

Long term economic profit for monopolistic competition | Microeconomics | Khan Academy

We have already thought about the demand curves for perfect competition and monopolies and the types of economic profit that might result in. In this video, we’re going to focus on something in between, which we’ve talked about in previous videos, which i…

This Duck Has a Foot Growing On Its Head - Smarter Every Day 25

Hey, it’s me Destin. This week I’ve been in the lab, or my garage, working on my thesis. So, I’m trying to finish it, so I can’t give you an awesome video this week. To hold you over, I’ll give you some video of when me and my daughter went to the fair an…

Animal Storm Squad: Saving Pets From Natural Disasters | Nat Geo Live

Karissa: Almost three years ago, my life changed. A powerful EF-5 tornado ripped through Moore, Oklahoma, which, tragically, killed twenty people. That day, my friend Dave Holder, he’s a Meteorologist, and he called me about forty-five minutes after the t…

Cosplay, ILLUSIONS, and Pacman: IMG! 7

If Pac-Man was a real living organism and party time—wait, what? [Music] We start today like I start every day, wrapped up in covers. Oopah brought us some great bedspreads. This one would make me feel less lonely. This one’s great for parties, and this…

Climate Change Through Bill Nye’s Eyes | Nat Geo Live

So I just to talk briefly about me. I took one class as an elective from Carl Sagan, a long time ago. What he was talking about was something he a phrase that he loved: Comparative climatology. So we compared the climate of Mars with the climate of Venus …

This Is A Light-Nanosecond!

More Articles