So you're standing around the office's World Pasta Day party (which, you will note, is tomorrow), and your friend asks, "Hey, man. How does the size of a galaxy compare to how far it is from other galaxies? What about stars? Are they, relative to their size, farther apart or closer together than galaxies?"

If you're still reading, and keep reading for a few hundred more words, you will be able to say with confidence, "Hey, man. I have the answer to that question."

If the universe were a tennis ball, I would put the multiverse

in my mouth.

Source.

Since the universe, and most of the stuff in it, is so much larger than you are, sometimes it's difficult to conceive of justbig it all is. Comparisons between different objects and distances in space can provide a relative perspective; comparisons between objects/distances in space and everyday objects and distances can bring the point home. Combining the two provides a powerful picture of the scale of the universe.

For this post, I'll pretend that our galaxy, our star, and our planet, in that order, have the same diameter as a tennis ball.

If the Milky Way were a tennis ball,



I'm a tennis ball.

Source.

The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds would be about 4 and 5 inches away.

The Andromeda Galaxy would be 5.6 feet away.

The edge of the visible universe would be 5.6 miles away.

I'm a tennis ball.

Source.

If the Sun were a tennis ball,

The nearest star would be 1200 miles away.

The center of the galaxy would be 7 million miles away.

The Earth would be 0.024 inches across.

Compared to how big they are, galaxies are extremely close together, and stars are extremely far apart.

I'm a tennis ball.

Source.

The Sun would be about 24 feet across.

The Earth would be about half a mile from the Sun.

The Earth would be about 450 feet farther from the Sun than Venus is.

Pluto would be about 19 miles away from the Sun.

Pluto would be half an inch across.

Jupiter would be 2.5 feet across.

Other Thoughts

If the Earth were a tennis ball,If the universe were a tennis ball, everything else would be smaller than it.If you were a tennis ball, you would be round and yellow.