How Far has Humanity reached into Universe?

For thousands of years, we have been interested in our Universe. The earliest known working telescopes appeared in 1608 and this allowed us to gain more knowledge about planets and our solar system, and make new discoveries. Before the 17^th century, it was considered that the earth was flat and we were the centre of the cosmos.

Revolutionary astronomer, Galileo Galilee, was the first to discover that that the earth was round and, along with other planets, it revolved around the sun. Astronomers also observed comets with sparkling tails, and meteors or shooting stars appearing to fall from the sky. This began the history of space travel.

Space trip

Humanity is a fledgling spacefaring species, with only a tiny percentage of people who have traveled into space. Imagine you had arbitrarily great technology, limitless energy, and the ability to accelerate as close to the speed of light for as long as you wanted. Would you be able to reach the most distant galaxies, the leftover glow from the Big Bang or anything beyond the limit of what we can see today?

Not only are all of those things off the table, but the farther we travel into the future, the more our presently observable Universe becomes inaccessible. In only a few tens of billions of years, even the cosmic legacy of our creation – the Big Bang – will be inaccessible to us, as well as any galaxies beyond our own at all.

Most people throughout history have lived their whole life on our tiny rock, but how far have those select few explorers gone?

How far into the void of space have we extended our reach? Watch the video below to find out!