It's truly mind-blowing to think about.  According to scientists, there are more stars in space than grains of sand on earth.  In fact, there are about 10 times as many.

Think of 7 followed by 22 zeros.  Or, in simpler terms, 70 sextillion.  That's how many stars were calculated to exist by a team of stargazers based at the Australian National University.  Using two of the world's most powerful telescopes, one at the Anglo-Australian Observatory in northern New South Wales state and one in the Canary Islands, 10,000 galaxies were pinpointed, with the detailed measurements of their brightness taken to calculate how many stars they each contained.

After that, the number was multiplied by the number of similar sized strips needed to cover the entire sky, and then multiplied again out to the edge of the visible universe.  If it seems somewhat complicated, it kinda is.

In any case, according to Dr Simon Driver, who spoke at the General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union meeting in Sydney recently, the number of stars could be infinite.

One's world view, of course, affects the way he or she views this information.  As for TA, we see it as evidence for an awesome, all-powerful Creator Lord, and we predict that no matter how powerful the telescopes become, and no matter how technologically advanced man progresses to be in the distant future, all he will find is, yes, more stars.

Nessie Fans Say TV Version A Mistake
by Jonathan Drake
S: This Is North Scotland (7-22-03)

Fans of Nessie, the infamous Loch Ness Monster of world-renown, have launched an full-scale attack on the BBC over a model of the beast which is to star in an upcoming television program.

"We knew the BBC was going to do something as they visited the loch twice," said Gary Campbell, president of the Official Loch Ness Monster Fan Club.  "They have tried to model Nessie on a plesiosaur and that's wrong - the whole thing is a waste of licence payers' money.  There's no way that the Loch Ness Monster is a plesiosaur.  Loch Ness was only formed 10,000 years ago.  The plesiosaur has to come up to the surface of the water to breathe so it would often be seen if it was the monster.  Nessie only comes up to the surface by accident because of the wave phenomenon in Loch Ness which drags things up from the loch's bottom."

In truth, Campbell's comments are rather absurd, considering thousands of people have described Nessie as looking like a plesiosaur.  To simply blow off the idea that Nessie is a plesiosaur is almost akin to blowing off Nessie itself, something incongruous to a president of a Nessie fan club.

Interestingly, even director Dave Stewart said, "The only creature Nessie could be is a plesiosaur."

In any case, the show's producers claim the computer-generated beast, modeled on a fish-eating dinosaur, is more lifelike than the creatures featured in the series Walking with Dinosaurs.

The show, certainly, will be neat to watch.

China Sea Monster Resurfaces
S: Farshores (7-15-03)
Originally Publish: Reuters Via The Sydney Morning Herald

China's legendary 'Lake Tianchi Monster' has surfaced anew, with local officials reporting sightings of as many as 20 of the mysterious and unidentified creatures in a lake near North Korea.

Sightings of the strange beast - China's version of the 'Loch Ness Monster' - date back more than a century, but like Scotland's famed "Nessie" reports vary and remain unconfirmed.

On the morning of July 11, several local government cadres caught sight of a school of mysterious creatures swimming through the lake in the Changbai mountains, in northeastern Jilin province, the Beijing Youth Daily said.

"Within about 50 minutes, the monsters appeared five times," it quoted one of the officials, provincial forestry bureau vice-director Zhang Lufeng, as saying. "At times there was one, at times there were several. The last time, there were as many as about 20."

He said the creatures, two to three kilometres in the distance, appeared only as white or black spots. But from the ripples in the water, he and others determined the spots were "living beings".

Officials were not reachable for comment.

In 1903, according to local records, a creature resembling a huge buffalo with a deafening roar sprang out of the water and attempted to attack three people before one them shot it in the belly six times. The beast roared and disappeared back into the water.

A more recently documented sighting compared the head of the monster to that of a human - except with big round eyes, a protruding mouth and a neck 1.2 to 1.5 metres long. It also had a white ring separating its neck and torso and smooth, grey skin.

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