On Marriage and the Evolution of Stellar Bodies

Some mystical religious sects believe that the stars we see in the sky are actually highly evolved souls. These stellar objects are merely way-stations for souls on their cosmic spiritual journey.

We live in our humble human bodies. Our souls use our bodies as vehicles to evolve and to perfect themselves. But souls continue to evolve through many lifetimes in different bodies in their quest towards union with the Godhead. We are but sub-souls of the larger Solar Soul. Someday, when our souls are more spiritually evolved, we too will be suns and stars and live our lives as cosmic deities.

It is easy to dismiss such beliefs as superstition and mystical mumbo-jumbo. But just for the fun of it, let's suspend our disbelief for a moment and examine the physical evolution of stars more closely.

Astronomers tell us that stars are in many ways like human souls. Stars have lifetimes. Even the star that we know best, our Sun, will not live forever. One day it will burn out all its fuel and turn into a bloated stellar body called by astronomers as a red giant, engulfing all its inner planets including Earth. Fortunately for puny souls like us, hitching a ride on the solar merry-go-round, the lifetime of stars are measured in billions of years.

Other stars, depending on their initial mass follow different evolutionary paths: some have enough mass to collapse into neutron stars or white dwarfs; some go all the way to become black holes. Some die in a spectacular fashion: exploding in a furious burst of cosmic fireworks called a supernova.

The evolution of stars are chiefly governed by the macro-physics of gravity and the micro-physics of quantum mechanics. Matter accumulate and collapse under the pull of gravity and produce heat which generates chemical and nuclear reactions--resulting in that glorious display of twinkling lights in the night-sky, the beauty of which has inspired lovers and poets throughout the entire human civilization.

The reason why I am writing about such astronomical phenomena is because I am inspired by the conversation I had today with my good friend Steve at the Matrix Pub in Phileo Damansara: One of the things we discussed was how a married couple is like a binary star.

You see, stars are not solitary creatures. Even they are "married". Astronomers estimate that about half the stars in our night-sky are binary star systems--which are actually pairs of stars that orbit around a common point, like two children running around a maypole.

The two stars in a binary system both exert gravitational pull, forcing themselves into a "compromise" orbit around one another. Some of these binary systems are unstable, with one star denser and heavier than its partner, causing stellar matter to be sucked from one body to the other. X-rays, and cosmic radiations are emitted in the process. Sparks fly.

Obviously binary star systems do not last forever. They are but temporary states in the overall scheme of cosmic evolution. Pulled by the gravitational attraction of the denser partner, they collapse, often into a black hole. Some binary star systems are more evenly balanced and they could last longer.

A good marriage is like a perfectly balanced pair of binary star. Neither star exert an overly "selfish" gravitational pull towards the other. They revolve around one another almost in a state of dynamic equilibrium. But unfortunately such binary stars systems are rare indeed.

Now, what kind of a star are you?