A closer look
Light travels at approximately 186,000 miles per second, meaning the photons from distant stars hitting your eyes tonight have actually been traveling through the freezing vacuum of space for millions of years. When you look up at the beautiful, romantic night sky, you are literally just observing a massive graveyard of optical illusions, as many of those stars have likely exploded or died ages ago. We are basically watching the cosmic equivalent of a prerecorded television broadcast, admiring celestial bodies that stopped existing long before humans even figured out how to harness fire. So next time you wish upon a star, just remember you are projecting your deepest personal desires onto the ghostly afterimage of a dead sun that cannot even save itself, let alone fix your awful credit score
