I’m sure you must have come across an image of the Moon at some point in your life. This bright ball that lights up our night sky has many origin stories. Some say, it split away from the Earth as a result of a giant impact between Earth and another astronomical body. Others hypothesize that the debris from this collision drew together (giving credit to gravity) forming the Moon. Some suggest that the Moon may have formed elsewhere and was drawn or ‘captured‘ into the Earth’s orbit. Its clear that the origin of the Moon is yet to be accurately understood by Science. But what’s most fascinating to me as I look at those images are – the many craters found on the surface of the Moon. These ancient scars tell a story, a story of the innumerable hits the Moon has taken during its life so far. These craters remain forever imprinted on its surface, as a testament to its history. It is a story far ancient than the origin of mankind itself.

Bruised and Battered a Billion times!

It’s true, the Moon may have been battered a billion times. But it bears or rather wears the scars beautifully on its surface. A Moon with a rather perfectly smooth surface covered in Moondust would be far less intriguing (I think!). This white globe has been indented a several billion times, yet it remains beautifully hung up among the stars. Believe it or not but years of meteorite-crashing and comet showers have now made it possible for us to behold the beauty that lies in this black and white world.

Got time to look up?

I do not know how many of us realize this but every time we look up to the stars from the surface of the Earth, we are actually gazing into the Universe. Looking at the shimmering dots in the sky, we think we are looking at the stars but we are actually looking at light that left those stars reach the Earth a few Billion light years ago. We see those stars not as they are right now, but as they were, Billions of years ago. That’s the job of an Astrophysicist. They look back in time, until they can look at the beginning of time itself. So it is with us, we get to peak into our Universe’s past every time we look up. We have constant access to the wonder of Space which is laid out billions of light years wide for our observation. All we need to do is look up and marvel at its infinity.

What about Earth’s craters?

Coming back to Craters… it is not just the Moon that has them. Craters are a common phenomenon in the Universe. Interestingly here on our planet, they are far less in number. When compared to Mars (300,000 craters) and the Moon (too many to count), the Earth has just 128 confirmed impact craters. How fortunate is it that the Earth has an atmosphere, water and planets like Jupiter and Saturn that are believed to play a role in shielding our planet from the havoc meteors and comets create elsewhere. Quite fortunate, aren’t we?

The Question of LIFE

The history of the Universe shows us that it is a hostile place to be. Meteors and asteroids bombard the heavenly bodies. Temperature extremes on some worlds make life unimaginable. Yet here is this Blue planet, blooming with life. This question seems to be staring us in the face – “is Earth the only planet that was in itself capable of bringing forth and supporting life? Or,

Is our solar system and in fact the whole Universe immensely fine-tuned and plays a definitive role to make life possible on this one planet? Let’s talk about this in the next post. Meanwhile, gaze outside your window and look at the Moon. It has an important lesson to offer. Scars have a way of making things more beautiful than they could otherwise be.