625 Sextillion Worlds Out There

Thank you Mr. Sylvester Goh for this BBC video on the Universe

Amazing view of Universe captured **

The Hubble Space Telescope has produced one of its most extraordinary views of the Universe to date.

< http://www.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/news/science-environment-19728375 >

My thinking after seeing the video, and to share my thoughts with others is this:

 I wonder why man on this infinitesimal earth fight each other over property, wealth and all sorts of political and other temporary powers when there are approximately 250,000 million stars (suns)  in each galaxy.

That’s not all. There are as much galaxies in this Universe, as there are stars in each galaxy. It is estimated there are about 250,000 million galaxies in our known Universe.

Each star harbors about 10 Earth-like planets in each stellar system like in our own Solar System.

In short, there are approximately:

(2.5 x 10 ¹¹) x (2.5 x 10 ¹¹)   x 10 = 6.25 X 10 ²³ = 625 x 10 ²¹ or 625 followed by 21 zeros (625 sextillion) worlds existing out there for over a period of 20 billion years as the Age of this Universe.

Why do we then want temporary chicken-feed power and wealth in this extremely small world?

Why don’t we look up among those stars, and try to inherit an eternal world out there?

But there is definitely no place in heaven for any person who fights and kills each other for whatever reason, wanting only earthly power while they are still temporary in  this world. My still small voice tells me this is absolutely for sure.

Give up everything we have in this temporary world, and invest on eternal peace and happiness out there among the stars. That would be far, far more meaningful and eternal.

Unfortunately, most of us  are  spiritually blind and imprisoned by our  own faith and conviction that we can no longer can see, or allowed to see for us to break away free from this bondage.

Humanity is like a frog in a well with blinkered vision

Maximum Human Life Span

A number of biological and medical articles have been written on the life span of humans over the ages.  Comparisons have also been made with the life spans of other plant and animal species.

 
However, no one  so far has written anything comparing biological scales of our human existence with the physical age and dimensions of the Universe in which everything, including all living things  has to be part and parcel of this cosmic existence.

 
Let us have original thinking by comparing the maximum biological  life span of a human to that of the Age of the Universe and other physical entities like light and or a hydrogen atom. All have to be  scaled down proportionately for comparison since we shall use  time as the common denominator that is shared by both physical and biological systems.

 
Let us have a look.

 

If the Age of the Universe determined at 20 billion years were to be telescoped into a 24 hour day, then the maximum  life span of a human of 120 years will exist for only (24 x 60 x 60) seconds / 20 billion x 120 = 5.184 x 10 ^-4 second or 0.0005184 of a second

 

The speed of light in a vacuum is 299 792 458 m / s. or nearly 300,000 km per second.

 

In other words, our maximum life existence on Earth is sufficiently long for light to travel only up to 155412.41 metres or just 155.412 km.

 

Another easier way to understand is, our maximum life span has sufficient time for a speeding car travelling at 120 kph to move just (120 km x 1000 m x 100 cm x 10 mm) / (60 min x 60 sec) x 0.0005184 = 17.28 mm

(Light is 8993773.74 times faster than a 120 kph car)

 

Bohr radius has a value of 5.2917721092(17) × 10⁻¹¹ m which is the radius of an unexcited hydrogen atom. In other words, the diameter of a hydrogen atom at ground state is 1.058 x 10^-10 metres. 

If you were to line up hydrogen atoms side-by-side in a straight line, and if you were to walk across them at 5 kph (1.3888 metres per second), you can only cross 1.3 x 10¹⁰ or 13,000 million hydrogen atoms each second, or 68,00,000 of them in 5.184 x 10 ^-4 second before your life vanishes.  

 

Another way of expression, before you can even cover a distance of  0.72 millimeters,  your journey in life has already ended.

 

That, I am afraid is the maximum time you have on Earth if the Age of the Universe at 20 billion years were to be shortened to just a 24 hour day.

 

Does that mean anything to you? 

 

1.       The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away (Psalm 90:10).

2.       Whereas you know not what shall be tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appears for a little time, and then vanishes away (James 4:14).

3.       With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day (2 Peter 3:8).

 

4.       All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players:

They have their exits and their entrances 

(As You Like It: William Shakespeare)

-          jb lim

 

 

Queen Elizabeth II A face-to face Encounter in India. But not Prince William in Malaysia

The ever popular Queen Elizabeth of Great Britain and her grandson Prince William and Princess Kate

Queen Elizabeth is undoubtedly the most popular queen in the world judging from the crowd that queued up early in the morning on Thursday,  13 September 2012 to buy up all the stamps that were all sold out within two hours of opening of post office in Gombak where I went to buy the stamps.  I thought there will be no rush since Malaysia received her independence from the British on August 31, 1957. But by the time I went, it was a little too late.

I did not expect Queen Elizabeth is still on the mind of even many  younger Malaysians judging from the popularity of the commemorative stamps sold, and the huge crowd that went to see her grandson and his charming wife at KLCC the next morning.  The crowd was so huge, that I hardly managed to have a look at the royal couple.

The only consolation was,  I  met and came face-to-face with Queen Elizabeth herself in India half a century ago. This was how I met Queen Elizabeth herself.

I was in India then as a student in the early 1960’s, It happened Queen Elizabeth made an official State visit to India sometime in January 1961.  

I was then invited to a reception in New Delhi by the British High Commission as a Commonwealth student representative from Malaysia. I was the only Malaysian student among the Commonwealth countries invited to meet the Queen.  That was 51 years ago

The Queen was a very charming and a very elegant 35 year old lady when I first saw her. That was some 8 years after she was crowned Queen of the United Kingdom, and Head of the Commonwealth.  

I too then was just a 22 year old student at the Muslim University of Aligrah. I really do not know how the British High Commissioner in New Delhi managed to get my address to send me a very nice white invitation card to meet the Queen of England. I kept the card for many years after that.

It was such a rare honour for me to meet the Queen of England. After she shook my hands, I did not want to bathe or wash my hands for 3 days.

Little did I realize that a few years later in 1964 I went to the University of London to do my postgraduate at a college named after her - Queen Elizabeth College (QEC) in Campden Hill Road, in Kensington, London  W8.  QEC was historically part of King’s College (KC) London, and has now being taken back by King’s College as part of the University of London.

 

But today half a century later, I could not even get to see Queen Elizabeth grandson Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, and his beautiful wife, Catherine Middleton, Duchess of Cambridge.

I was there at the KLCC Park since 9:30 a.m. with a small crowd then. The crowd swelled to such enormous magnitude by the time he royal couple arrived, that I could only have a fleeting glimpse of them from their backs when they arrived about an hour later, and when they left.

What an irony, to be able to meet their grandmother Queen Elizabeth as a young student, but now retired  after having gone through a much more matured life,  I don’t even get a chance to have a glimpse at the Queen’s  grandson.

The nearest opportunity for me in recent years was to be invited to the British High Commission Residence at Jalan Langgak Golf, in Kuala Lumpur on two separate occasions at an Alumni gathering of the University of Reading where I also do my postgraduate degree, besides at the University of London.

But there was no Princess Catherine and her Prince Charming around, but just a tea reception to meet Professor Gordon Marshall, the former Vice Chancellor before Sir Bell took over as the current VC of the University of Reading, England. 

Dr JB Lim