Computer Animations as Astronomy Educational Tool: Immanuel Kant and the Island Universes Hypothesis

Abstract

Development of astronomy is based on well defined, watershed moments when an individual or a group of individuals make a discovery or a measurement that expand, and sometimes dramatically improve our knowledge
of the Universe. The purpose of the Scientific Visualization project at Cal State Los Angeles is to bring these moments to life with the use of computer animations, the medium of the 21st century that appeals to the generations which grew up in Internet age. Our first story describes Immanuel Kant’s remarkable
the Island Universes hypothesis. Using elementary principles of then new Newtonian mechanics, Kant made bold and ultimately correct interpretation of the Milky Way and the objects that we now call galaxies.