• Question: How many stars are there?

    Asked by conor to Craig, Marta, Natalie, Nicholas on 15 Mar 2017.
    • Photo: Marta Varela

      Marta Varela answered on 15 Mar 2017:

      Hi Conor.

      Google says “100 billion”. Here’s an interesting follow-up question. If there are these many stars, how come the sky at night is not completely bright with their light? Can you answer that?

      This puzzled scientists for hundreds of years (actually until the expansion of the Universe was discovered)! If you want to cheat and read the answer, have a look here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olbers%27s_paradox.

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