I know they help us see further away but I just can’t picture in my head how they work.
Especially when people talk about building bigger to look at galaxies 8 plus billion light years away, surely we’re not looking that far distance wise we’re just catching the light at the telescope so if the light has taken that long and traveled to us surely it’s just as close now as the light from our sun that took 8 minutes so wouldn’t a pair on binoculars work just as well?
In: 1
1. Earth’s air causes the scattering of light from space – hard to get perfect pictures – especially if the amount of light you’re capturing is very little in the first place.
2. Binoculars have two lenses – one at the end and one near your eye – each one messing with the light a little bit. Space telescopes are reflecting telescopes (thanks Isaac Newton for the idea!). These are FAR superior – they reflect light better than lenses magnify light. The reflection gets captured in an amazing digital camera with almost no distortion and we get the pictures.
3. Space telescopes are MASSIVE. The giant mirrors can gather up more waves of light than a little set of binoculars can.
Add these three things up and they amount to a GIGANTIC difference in image quality from a reflecting space telescope and regular ol’ binoculars.
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