Paradox, right? How can we see a star if it might already be gone?

Is that even possible? Yes.

Why?

A star can explode as a supernova and stop existing, but its light keeps traveling to us for millions of years. Until this light stops arriving we still see it as “alive”. We are not seeing the actual star, we are seeing the light it sent a long time ago.

Every point in the Universe has its own present.

Other planets also see Earth in the past

If a civilization was 65 million light years away and was looking at Earth right now, they would see dinosaurs. Even though for us they are long gone.

And if a planet was 2.5 million light years away, so they would only see the first humans.

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Fascinating, right?

We only see the observable universe, only the part from which light managed to reach us in 13.8 billion years.

Beyond that, there might be anything, but we will never see it.

Even if there is a civilization 50 million light years away, we see it only the way it was 50 million years ago. Real-time contact is impossible. No matter how much we want it. It’s physically impossible because:

light comes too late. It doesn’t show the present, it shows the past.

We will never know what is beyond the edge of the observable universe.

We will never know what is happening “there” right now.

Final Thoughts

And I don’t know if that’s sad or beautiful.

But I like the thought that we live in someone’s past and someone’s future at the same time.

We will always stay here like light and even when we are gone, someone out there might still see us, the way we see those who lived before us.