If the distance from the earth to the sun is taken as one inch so that the scale of the universe is reduced six trillion times, the diameter of the solar system across Neptune's orbit is five feet and the distance of one light-year comes out almost exactly equal to one mile. The nearest star to the five-foot solar system would be four and a third miles away; the most distant known object would be two hundred and twenty thousand miles away, and the extent of the visible universe would be three hundred thousand miles. On the same scale the diameter of our sun would be about one hundredth of an inch and the diameters of the giant stars Antares and Betelgeuze would be four inches and two and three-fourth inches respectively. To see the earth we would need a microscope.
TABLES
TABLE I
THE PRINCIPAL ELEMENTS OF THE SOLAR SYSTEM