The size of God's universe.

[Busby]

Just over one year ago astronomers announced that the number of galaxies in the universe had newly been estimated at two trillion.

2,000,000,000,000

A jump from Hubble's estimated 100 billion plus.

If each galaxy has 100 billion stars - based on the number of stars estimated to be in our galaxy and each star has say, 8 planets, then we are dealing with numbers well beyond our comprehension. Our sun is 1 million times the mass of Earth and there are suns out there which we know are 1000 times larger than our sun.

I cannot imagine that God, one god let it be said, although said to be everywhere, can manage to keep all of this under control. It would seem that there could well be lesser gods in a descending order - as in some eastern philosophies - a god for each galaxy, a god for each solar system, a god for each sun, a god for each planet and so on. We have Gaia for our planet it is said, maybe each Earthly continent has a guardian just as each of us supposedly has a guardian angel.

Maybe there are gods for animals, plants, minerals, viruses and all the rest. Who knows.

However it may be that these numbers are truly staggering while simply reflecting the immense capabilities of the human mind.

I live near an airport and often watch the A380 taking off. It occurs to me every time that this aeroplane is in the hands of a pilot. It's just that it's really under the control of a small mass of jellylike substance called a 'brain', something about the size of an upturned pudding bowl living in the dark, that is depending upon five senses to know what it is doing and where it is going. And yet these five senses lead the brain to see a massive universe outside itself - as a reflection in the eyes.

Something is around us which really needs explaining.