NOVA examines how a simple instrument, the telescope, has fundamentally changed our understanding of our place in the universe. This tale of human ingenuity involves some of the most colorful figures of the scientific world Galileo, Kepler, Newton, William Herschel, George Hale and Edwin Hubble--leading up to today's colossal telescopes. Now, at the center of an international space race, a new generation of ever-larger telescopes is poised to reveal answers tolongstanding questions about our universe--and, in turn, to raise new questions.