The Lightyear Paradox

The cosmic comedy of misconceptions! On both ends of the IQ bell curve, we find people who think "it takes lightyears to travel through a galaxy" - blissfully unaware that a lightyear measures distance, not time! Meanwhile, the enlightened middle (literally crying with frustration) understands that a lightyear is approximately 5.88 trillion miles - the distance light travels in one Earth year. It's like saying "it takes miles to drive to California" - technically you're covering miles, but you're measuring the wrong dimension, you beautiful space cadet! The galaxy is indeed many lightyears across, but time and space aren't interchangeable... unless you're approaching a black hole, in which case, well, that's a whole different meltdown!