Open-mouthed in front of the universe, together

“We are stardust.”

when the astronomer Carlo Sagan As he uttered that famous phrase, he reminded people that much of the matter in our bodies was created inside stars a long time ago.

I wanted people to know that we are wonderful and that our story is also wonderful.

Human history took an interesting new turn when we traveled back 13 billion years.

After more than two decades of design and planning, NASA released the first image from the James Webb Space Telescope on Monday, revealing deepest infrared vision of the universe which has never been seen.

This new deep-field image is much more detailed than previous images captured by the Hubble Space Telescope.

Once again we stay she gasped before the universe.

Although there are some stars that interfere in the image, almost every point in the image is a galaxy.

To get an idea of ​​the scale, if we could hold a grain of sand with our arms outstretched to the sky, that point is the size of an eye.

It’s a small portion of our universe, filled with thousands of galaxies, each with billions or trillions of star systems and each with its own planets.

On Tuesday, NASA released even more images from the telescope, including views of the Carina and Southern Ring Nebula, as well as notable clusters of galaxies.

The world watched as the images were shared.

Moments like this are extraordinary, not only because such powerful telescopes are few and far between, but also because collective experiences are, at least the positive ones.

This is his own feat, and that’s what space exploration does:

reminds us of our inherent connection.

Seeing images like these can also provide a deep sense of insignificance:

they offer a sense of proportion and make us realize how small we are on a large scale.

United by our bodies and our planet, we use telescopes, rovers, planetary missions and the like to extend our reach beyond our little cosmic neighborhood.

With these first images, Webb ushered in a new era of exploration.

The telescope has many missions, but perhaps the most notable is fix the space to seek evidence of life.

It does this by observing the atmospheres of exoplanets, those planets whose orbit revolves around other stars.

Our universe is full of dust and gasso scientists need infrared light, a wavelength that allows us to bypass that annoying material, to see through it.

With its ability to peer deep into the universe, the telescope will aim to solve mysteries in our planetary systems, including our solar system, according to NASA:

“It will look beyond, to distant worlds around other stars, and probe the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it.”

Deep-field images show a still moment in time:

galaxies wrap around each other, darting over each other and tearing apart their dusty, star-studded arms in violent choreography.

Stars are born and give birth to new solar systems full of planets; galactic brilliance splashes across the screen as if smudged by a cosmic brush.

Every pinpoint of light in that image, every swirling band of color, contains what could be trillions of planetsmany of which are like ours.

“Part of us knows that’s where we come from. We can’t wait to go back, ”Sagan said.

Maybe that’s why we feel so amazed looking at the ocean or contemplating images of the cosmos.

Telescopes allow us to access ancient times, the early days of our history and the big questions we have been asking ourselves since the beginning of human history:

How? How come? We are alone?

The human being is a explorer by natureand unsurprisingly, as soon as we got to explore the stars, we did.

For thousands of years, humans have carved stars in rocks and painted constellations on cave walls.

We looked up, echoing a cosmic gaze that is an integral part of our bones, our blood and our history.

When we look up, we look at ourselves.

Sagan once said, “We are the means of making ourselves known to the cosmos,” and this could not be more true.

We want to understand why we are here and make sense of a world where meaning is often difficult to decipher.

Telescopes like this remind us that, despite our specific challenges on Earth, possibility of connection still existing.

Now that the Webb telescope is up and running and sending out amazing images, not only can we keep asking the tough questions, but maybe someday we’ll have the answers.

Understanding our environment in this way means understanding ourselves.

Looking at the cosmos is looking through our history.

Those spotted, swirling and strange galaxies are part of our past.

It’s one we may have less access to, but it’s just as important.

Yes, we are stardust, and perhaps much more.

We are not just humans tied to a blue rocky planet in a galaxy.

We are the universe calling us to return to our home.

The boundary of a nearby star-forming region in the Carina Nebula. Captured by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, this image reveals unprecedented areas of star birth for the first time. (NASA via The New York Times).

Shannon Stirone is a science writer dealing with space issues.