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See the original image at livescience.com

Cosmic Finger Taps Milky Way's Shoulder

livescience.com — As if reaching out with a come-hither motion, a giant gas finger emanating from two neighboring galaxies has hooked into the starry disk of the Milky Way and is pulling all three galaxies closer...But then new Hubble Space Telescope measurements revealed the clouds are paying our galaxy a one-time visit rather than being its lunch.

Who dugg this? Made popular Feb 9, 2008

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46 Comments

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  • Jesse, on 02/09/2008, -0/+29"As if reaching out with a come-hither motion.."
    Time to leave the observatory, buddy.
  • inactive, on 02/09/2008, -1/+23The milky way is being fingered. Oh great.
  • avengingturnip, on 02/09/2008, -2/+24Alternate title - Magellanic Clouds give Cosmic Finger to Milkyway
  • SpaceParanoids, on 02/09/2008, -1/+16"Show us on the doll where the galaxy touched you."
  • ydt89, on 02/09/2008, -0/+14It's crazy how big stuff in space is.. It's amazing really.
  • gwhardyiv, on 02/09/2008, -2/+15Noodly appendage.
  • Absinthminded64, on 02/09/2008, -1/+12For the love of God nobody pull that finger!
  • lex0nyc, on 02/09/2008, -0/+10Think about all the energy something like that has in it, we could travel between galaxies by riding in it. We just have to find a way to reach it before it drifts too far from our galaxy.
  • SantaClauz, on 02/09/2008, -0/+9Living up to your name I see.
  • tillerman00, on 02/09/2008, -1/+9"Upon viewing the spectacle through the telescope, scientists unanimously agreed that three fingers were visible, and there were in fact two in the pink, one in the stink."
  • browny1978, on 02/09/2008, -0/+8Possibly a "Hyperspatial express route" - did anyone not see the planning charts on Alpha Centauri
  • lex0nyc, on 02/09/2008, -2/+10Dude, that's our ride out of this ***** hole!
  • mcrumley, on 02/09/2008, -0/+7It's not a picture, it's from an animation by John Rowe Animations. It's in the caption under the photo in TFA.
  • Subriot, on 02/09/2008, -3/+10It's amazing that, in reality, we're seeing this galaxy as it was 100,000+ years ago.
  • medalian1, on 02/09/2008, -3/+10Candy bar!!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd7nDgHSjK4
  • stavrogin2, on 02/09/2008, -1/+8It'd be nice to have a "You Are Here" dot. I want to know where my place is in the great cosmic fisting.
  • SantaClauz, on 02/09/2008, -2/+9What I've always wondered is, how do we get pictures of OUR own galaxy like this? Wouldn't something like this have to be taken by something that was outside of our galaxy? Like, I can't take a picture of the outside of my house when I'm inside of it...

    Anyone know how its done?
  • bacio, on 02/09/2008, -1/+7i always thought that they did a graphical design of what it would look like, based from what they have already seen.
  • albotasinc, on 02/09/2008, -1/+7My head just exploded.
  • HydrogenOxide, on 02/09/2008, -1/+7That's no finger
  • Mr.Gone, on 02/09/2008, -0/+6Wait, wait. Do you mean to say that you think that the picture they have on that page is an actual image from the hubble? The tag at the bottom "Credit: John Rowe Animations" didn't tip you off?

    Here's an actual image. Ain't Science wonderful.
  • BigBallistix, on 02/09/2008, -0/+4The "finger" in the title gives you all sorts of ideas, what with the long, lonely nights with bearded old men. I'll sleep soundly tonight =)
  • jamesmudgett, on 02/09/2008, -0/+4yeah, but then i read about dna and nanotech and this just redefines how i can think about myself as having any size in space at all really.
  • Bisclavret, on 02/09/2008, -1/+5Barack Obama.
  • TremorX, on 02/09/2008, -2/+5The Milky Way isn't so bad, we just live in the more run-down, rural area.
  • positron, on 02/09/2008, -1/+4Academic journals have described it as a shocking discovery.
  • Elranzer, on 02/09/2008, -0/+2I remember when Digg use to be nothing BUT stories like this...
  • skorange, on 02/09/2008, -2/+4Ahem, "giant mirrors"


    But seriously, I'm curious too
  • 68024, on 02/09/2008, -1/+3Aw come on now, you can't be serious! Of course it's not a frikkin photo!
  • tsunamisteve, on 02/09/2008, -0/+1Digg Swarm: Cosmic Edition
  • samy293, on 02/09/2008, -0/+1Reminds me of spider story on digg the the other day...
    http://www.livevideo.com/video/06AE76DF50894BC49FB ...
  • the13thzen, on 02/10/2008, -0/+1Interstellar galaxy docking.
  • 3tcp, on 02/10/2008, -0/+1Alien scrapbooks. This picture has books and swords all around it to show that this is where humans live.
  • inactive, on 02/09/2008, -1/+2Yeah our farthest space probe is Voyager 1, and it's only made it outside our solar system so far (9-10 Billion miles away), which itself is like a speck in one monstrous arm, of our monstrous galaxy. So like I said above, all pics of our galaxy are just artist representations based on those galaxies we HAVE seen...

    Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_probe
  • albotasinc, on 02/09/2008, -2/+2It TOTALLY matters. We just found out something about the universe that we were completely wrong about. This means that galaxies have the potential to evolve, and possibly combine into one LARGE galaxy. It ALSO proves that the universe that we're currently living in isn't in its evolved form. Pretty mind blowing stuff, my friend.
  • bizland2, on 02/09/2008, -0/+0haha, i didnt even have to look at the video, lots of memories there xD
  • 3tcp, on 02/10/2008, -1/+1Too late man, look at the ruler that happened a long time ago.
  • inactive, on 02/09/2008, -4/+4Nah, we've never seen the Milky Way, evah. All the pics of our galaxy you've ever seen are artist representations based on galaxies we HAVE seen...
  • Thejoe88, on 02/11/2008, -0/+0I'm gunna fingerbang bang you into my life
    Girl, you like to fingerbang and it's al-right
    Cuz I'm the king of fingerbang, let's not fight
    I'll just fingerbang, bang you every night!
  • zohaibusman, on 02/09/2008, -2/+1quite amazing arm. very nice
  • jcamp08, on 02/09/2008, -1/+0Amazing how things are out there, almost seems unreal
  • residentweasel, on 02/09/2008, -4/+0Ummmm, and since when did the Hubble become a deep space probe OUTSIDE of our galaxy??
    Seems that this is just a load of crap to me, and someone using photoshop
  • junjin03, on 02/09/2008, -6/+1the finger is actually mac os 10.5
  • shogun545, on 02/09/2008, -8/+2Sorry guys, I unzipped my pants again. Could ya please stop staring at my Cosmic Wang?
  • noahgelman, on 02/09/2008, -8/+1if its a one time thing does it really matter then, honestly? i dont want to be mean, but this is Digg, we can get stories that are a little better on the front page.
  • inactive, on 02/09/2008, -21/+4Ron Paul.

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