The Galaxy That Got Too Big - Issue 29 : Scaling
▻http://nautil.us/issue/29/scaling/the-galaxy-that-got-too-big
We can’t help ourselves—we’re crazy about big things. We’ll venture miles out of our way to see the word’s largest rifle (33.3 feet long; Ishpeming, Michigan), high-heeled shoe (6.1 feet tall; New York City), or ball of twine (7.8 million feet unraveled; Cawker City, Kansas). And for what? Spectacle aside, the largest things rarely make much sense. It’s harder, not easier, to fry a tasty egg with the largest frying pan, or drive a screw with the largest screwdriver. In nature, too, size often comes with a cost. it’s elemental: This chart demonstrates how nuclear stability decreases as elements get larger. Ununoctium (element 118), the heaviest element ever made, is near the white circle.WikipediaThe largest element is the shortest-lived In the chemical world, scale defines identity: Add a (...)