Milky Way

From the Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can change

The Milky Way is our galaxy. It is named for the very bright band of stars that are best seen in the Southern Hemisphere. From there, the bright centre of the galaxy can be seen. In the Northern Hemisphere its edge can be seen. Since the Sun and Earth are about three quarters of the way to the edge, and since there are few stars at the edge, there is a very big difference in brightness.

The name of the "Milky Way" comes from the Latin language, and it is a translation of Via Lactea. This name was taken from the Greek word Galaxia (galax means "milk").

A galaxy is a big group of millions of stars that all orbit around their galactic centre, like planets orbit a star. It probably takes millions of years for a star to go all the way around the galaxy.

These cycles are important, because different areas of the galaxy have more asteroids, that will become meteors if they hit the Earth's atmosphere. Very large ones can do horrible damage - many scientists believe dinosaurs were made extinct by an asteroid that hit Earth about 65 million years ago. About every 30 million years, astronomers believe, the Sun and Earth go through a part of the galaxy that has more asteroids. At this time there is great danger. This is supposed to be coming up soon, either right now or in million years (nobody really knows) - but certainly before five million years.

Another way the Milky Way has affected things is by superstitious belief in astrology. The Incan Empire was created in less than a hundred years because its founders believed that, when the Milky Way moved to a certain point in the sky by stellar precession, time would end. They wanted to be ready. That time was almost exactly when Spain invaded. The Inca did not fight because they believed the Spaniards to be divine justice. Their empire was destroyed and became part of what is now Peru.