Galaxies Playing by Their Own Rules
How do you know that something is old? Often, it based on personal experience, culture and reports. Sometimes it is simply relative. That book on the shelf with the yellowed pages from 1916 seems old when compared to current books, but it is not very old to someone who examines biblical manuscripts . The old man hobbling across the street in Kingston, New York is 84 years old, and he looks it, but he does not look "old" to people in some other cultures. (I've been told that I do not look my age, despite my Mark Harmon-like graying hair.) Looking old can be relative as well as subjective, often relying on some kind of standard of measurement. NASA/STScI; S. Allam and team; and the Master Lens Database, L. A. Moustakas, K. Stewart, et al (2014) How does the earth look "old"? How does the universe look "old"? And how does a galaxy look "young", "old" or "mature"? These kinds of things have standards of sorts, bu