Elizabeth J McGrath’s talk titled, “Using Distant Galaxies as Cosmic Time Machines”, provided an area of scientific research and discovery that I personally have absolutely zero background in. In reflection of Dr. McGrath’s talk, I realized that my Colby education has very much provided me with a taste of a multitude of different disciplines. Graduating in two weeks, I feel rather grateful for my liberal arts degree. This seminar has provided a look into the “presence of the past” across many different platforms: literature, biology, history, economics, ecology, sociology, anthropology, anatomy, poetry, physics, and astronomy (to name a few). I have come to know that in order to understand and truly see anything in this world, it is most advantageous to examine it under many different lights and many different concepts of thought.
This seminar has dominantly sparked a sense of imagination in how I understand the modern world. I consider myself well versed in psychology, anthropology, biology, and sociology looking at the courses I have fallen in love with at Colby. But, in retrospect, I know that it is the courses I have been encouraged or required to dabble in that will suite me well as I go forward in the world and become an adult of contemporary society. I know that this subject may stray from the topic of Prefessor McGrath’s talk, but I felt this was a vital reflection as I looked back at this seminar as a whole.
More specifically related, I find the concept of light perception from earth to planets and stars to be particularly fascinating, and even mind-blowing. The concepts of the speed of light and light-years have forced me to question what it really is to “see” something at all. If I am “seeing” the light that was produced be a star that exists (or existed) in actuality 4+ light years away, how can I ever be certain that what I think I am “seeing” even is real? If it takes 4.36 years for light from the closest star to even reach the surface of the earth, what is perceived as the existence of a star is actually 4.36 years old. Therefore, that star may not even exist by the time it is “seen” by the beholder.
Astronomy provides a basis for what is perceived to not be necessarily true. This thought allowed me to wonder whether seeing is therefore always believing or knowing that something is real. The knowledge that each time I look up to the sky I am seeing light that was very literally created in the distant past provides a whole new layer of perception. Professor McGrath’s talk regarding the time travel of astronomy was a topic I had never allowed myself the time or chance to think about. A student asked whether her area of research is difficult because it isn’t tangible. I am thinking that even knowledge that is tangible may not always be as it appears, even if you can hold it in your hands.