There was a time when the Earth was considered the majority of the Universe, with a roof overhead with stars in. Later Gallileo expanded reality enormously to include the solar system. Later we discovered the solar system was lost in a corner of a vast galaxy, outside of which was nothing much but some little clouds. In the 1920s it was realised the little clouds were other galaxies and the Universe was a vast sea of scattered galaxies. The big bang theory put a finite size on this Universe and that was considered to be finally the whole of reality, with nowhere else to look.

But now we have increasing hints that our whole universe is an insignificant bubble in a much vaster domain. There is some very exciting work going on at detecting the effects of parts of that domain entirely outside of our Universe, as described in an nice article on the arxiv blog.

Interesting article.  It is hard enough to fathom the vastness of just one universe.  So I guess their saying we live in a "multi-verse"? 

Everything in this universe appears to be cyclic.

Is that article supporting the "Membrane" theory? Or something else? Both?...lol

I have seen the membranes depicted as "sheets", like it was lying in one plane, But the bubble shape makes for a more elegant solution. And if nothing else, our universe is certainly elegant.

My head hurts now.

Mark

P.S. Anyone see any Geminid fire balls?

Excuse my ignorance , what is a Geminia fire ball ?