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An Epitome of Jainism shoot from one corner of the universe to the other in one samaya, provided it does not meet any collision. This is the maximum velocity possible in Nature just as, according to Einstein, the velocity of light is the limit. At each successive collision the velocity is reduced. The maximum age of a star is given as a little more than one palya (=4:13 x 1016 years), showing that in the life-cycle of a star there are stages of infancy, puberty, old age and death corresponding to the modern idea of the evolution of a star. The modern view is that a star starts its career in the form of cold cosmic dust, gradually and steadily contracts and heats up to very high temperature, then flares up as a novae or a supernovae giving out enormous bright light, leaves a residue (called a white-dwarf star) which is dark and thus disappears from view.
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