The Astrology of Space - Matrix Software

The Astrology of Space
Chapter Six: The Galaxy
Spiral Arms
Many distant galaxies appear to us through
telescopes to have a lovely vortical or spiral structure.
For over a century, astronomers have assumed that
our Milky Way is also a spiral galaxy, although this
has been difficult to prove. We are embedded within
our galactic plane and surrounded in all directions by
an apparently chaotic distribution of stars, clusters,
nebulae, and dust clouds. It has been only since the
1950's that we have understood what the spiral arm
structure of our galaxy looks like.
At this point in time astronomers have distinguished
three major spiral arms this side of the galactic center.
The Sun seems to be about 1,000 light years from the
central part of a spiral arm that includes the Orion
Nebula, the Coal Sack, and the North American
nebula – the Carina-Cygnus arm. An outer spiral arm
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