Celesta - Earth's Cousin!

Yesterday I was on my evening walk in the neighboring park. It was 8pm and the Sun was still shining brightly. I was thinking as to how the sun-set time increases as summer approaches and how it slowly decreases as winter approaches. And this phenomenon has been happening for eons. And it also stuck me that this movement of the time is a perfect sine wave. Every year it gradually increases as summer beckons and decreases at almost the same gradient as winter arrives. Other than possibly small deviations, this pattern has been the same for ages. A clean parabolic up and down curve along time. And all this with no planned design. My thoughts then strolled across the other fundamental constants in the universe. The acceleration due to gravity being approximately constant across the globe. The escape velocity being constant. The seasons being constant. The temperatures showing constant patterns. The distance of moon from earth is constant. The distance of earth from Sun is constant. The speed of earth's rotation is constant. Its revolution is constant. So many constant values in this universe which does not change in random.

One might say, all these fundamental values being constant are the only reasons life thrives in this planet. And I said to myself it’s gotta be too coincidental for all of this to have happened naturally. To the extent that humans know, there can't be a more-conducive place in this whole universe than our own earth. But yet again, universe is too big to be scaled by our technology or by our knowledge. For all we know, we might have another galaxy with similar planets like ours and there might still be life. Or even humans. And they may have formed later than us. Or earlier than us. What if that happens?

Let’s say, for a moment there is a galaxy called 'Coffee Way' like our own Milky Way. And let’s say there is a planet called 'Celesta' in the galaxy. And if 'Coffee Way' has a solar system and if that planet was formed precisely around the same time as ours (around 4.5 billion years ago) there is every possibility that life exist in 'Celest'a today. And life might mean humans too. And that leads to the fact that those humans might have grown scientifically and technologically just about the same level as ours. That being said, if 'Coffee Way' is more than few trillion light years away from our own galaxy, it is too far to be seen by any of our most powerful telescopes. And we would be too far for them to track us. This very fact only supports the concept that 'Celesta' might exist and we are totally unaware yet. But, day after day or in fact minute after minute, our technology/knowledge is consistently growing. One day, we'll reach farther than we can today and we may find that 'Celesta' does exist. And sooner or later, 'Celesta' might find us too. And for all we know, 'Celesta' might have people who communicate just like we do. I mean, using languages.

Initially we'd appear to be aliens for them. And they would for us. But once we understand, it’s gonna be non-stop fun. There can't be a better break-through for our space research than this. We can explore that part of the universe which would be completely new. Though one can never tell how far the universe goes beyond that, it'd be like having a watch-tower farther than we can reach. Collectively, Earth and Celesta can be a powerful combination because of their celestial positions. We can have nice knowledge-exchange programs, vacations, visits, onsite-offshore models across planets. That'd be the coolest thing! And my imagination says there might be a few other such planets, where life exists. Though it all sounds too hypothetical, this can’t be denied totally. Maybe it’s too improbable to have humans exist elsewhere, but it is highly likely that life exist. Just that we can’t see them yet.

The park by then had almost grown dark. The sun had sunk. I knew its time for me to go home. And continue my mundane lifestyle - browse, eat, call and sleep. As I walk back, I silently keep my fingers crossed, for one day we might hear about 'Celesta' in the news. Or maybe 'Zest'. Or maybe 'Yoquest'. Whatever. We'd know only as time and our knowledge advances.

Till then, imagination is ecstacy, I say!