# Two galaxies colliding ..photo
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [March 18, 2009, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869 "2009-03-18T12:22:28Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Indian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indian)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/1 "2009-03-18T12:22:28Z")
Awesome photo .🙂 taken by NASA’s spitzer space telescope.
[Story](http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2009/03/17/1840386.aspx) from msnbc.
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### Author:  [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/2 "2009-03-18T19:46:50Z")
Cool! I recall reading that that’s going to be us and the Andromeda Galaxy in a couple billion years, and that in all probability, the galaxies will pass right through one another without any stars colliding.
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### Author:  [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/3 "2009-03-18T19:50:38Z")
> [@matt\_mcl](#):
>
> Cool! I recall reading that that’s going to be us and the Andromeda Galaxy in a couple billion years, and that in all probability, the galaxies will pass right through one another without any stars colliding.
Wouldn’t the various energies of the galaxies play mayhem with one another?
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### Author:  [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/4 "2009-03-18T19:54:48Z")
> [@mswas](#):
>
> Wouldn’t the various energies of the galaxies play mayhem with one another?
Pretty much. Individual stars probably won’t collide, but their gravity will throw the structures of both galaxies out of wack.
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### Author:  [@KlondikeGeoff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KlondikeGeoff)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/5 "2009-03-18T20:16:47Z")
> [@matt\_mcl](#):
>
> Cool! I recall reading that that’s going to be us and the Andromeda Galaxy in a couple billion years, and that in all probability, the galaxies will pass right through one another without any stars colliding.
Damn, something else to worry about!
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### Author:  [@Interconnected\_Series\_of\_Tubes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Interconnected_Series_of_Tubes)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/6 "2009-03-18T22:33:52Z")
I **always** save photos like this when I can find them. They all go into a folder named “perspective,” since that’s precisely what thinking about them yields.
Stuff like this blows my mind, every single time.
The universe is so frigging cool.
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### Author:  [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/7 "2009-03-18T23:08:58Z")
> [@KlondikeGeoff](#):
>
> Damn, something else to worry about!
Fortunately, I was lucky and heard about it a long time ago, so I was able to clear my calendar.
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### Author:  [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)
#### Post date: [March 18, 2009, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-galaxies-colliding-photo/489869/8 "2009-03-18T23:16:05Z")
> [@matt\_mcl](#):
>
> Cool! I recall reading that that’s going to be us and the Andromeda Galaxy in a couple billion years, and that in all probability, the galaxies will pass right through one another without any stars colliding.
Well, maybe not. We can measure the redshift to determine the motion component towards or away from us, but the transverse component is all but unmeasurable over the relatively short timespan over which we’ve been able to observe it. IOW, we know it’s moving generally towards us, but it could just as easily be in orbit around us (really a mutual orbit, but I digress) as be on a true collision course. Given the uncertainty of our measurements, the former is much more likely.