Let me begin this spiel about biological diversity by mentioning micro-organisms. Every time you walk on the ground, you step on billions upon billions of micro-organisms. And yet no two micro-organisms are exactly alike. Micro-organisms live in the soil, on rocks, inside roots, buried under miles of Earth, in compost piles and toxic waste and all over the Earth's surface. Micro-organisms are found in boiling hot springs and on frozen snowfields. Micro-organisms live in homes, in schools and on statues. Many millions of moving micro-organisms make a living out of munching manure in the soil. Each gram of soil may contain up to 1,000,000,000 or more micro-organisms. That's as many micro-organisms in a single gram of soil as there are people in all of China, the most populated nation in the world! Not only are there many micro-organisms in soil, there are many, many different species of micro-organisms in soil. Some scientists estimate that each gram of soil may contain 10,000 different species of micro-organisms! That's more biodiversity in one gram of soil than all the different types of mammals in the entire world. That's also more than all species of bacteria that have been catalogued (around 5,000)! And not only that, but there are also countless dust-mites on every particle of dust and, once again, no two of them are exactly alike. Your eyes cannot see them because they are of a microscopic size. The biological diversity even on this Earth alone is so vast that it can never be fully described. All descriptions are, by necessity, incomplete. Biologists have estimated that the present number of macroscopic species on Earth ranges from 2 million to 100 million species, with a best estimate of somewhere near 10 million. I believe that due to the infinite immensity of all the material and spiritual worlds, no species anywhere ever becomes truly 'extinct'. Their existence merely moves elsewhere. The Earth is absolutely teeming with lifeforms. Even in what people consider to be the most hostile and extreme places, lifeforms still hang on in there. High temperatures, no oxygen and extreme coldness - these are all conditions that lifeforms on Earth can tolerate. Many of them even thrive in those conditions. It is even speculated among biologists that deep within the Earth's crust is a vast ecosystem of primitive bacteria nurtured by a reservoir of hydrocarbons of unimaginable size, much of it untapped. Our knowledge about forms of life on this planet is obviously limited. Yet the knowledge we do have is mind-boggling. There are more than 4,500 species of mammals. There are about 9,700 species of birds. There are much more than a million species of insects that we know about, so much so that there are approximately four million ants per person on this entire planet. This is amazing. Even chickens outnumber us! And all these forms of life interact with one another in such precise and intricate ways. If we simply looked at the animals of the desert, we would be amazed at their variety. There are bright and colourful birds such as the hooded oriole with a vivid yellow body and a sharp black mask on its face. There are dull coloured birds, such as the curved bill thrasher that blend into their surroundings. And all kinds of birds in between - the roadrunner which races along the desert floor, using its long tail as a rudder for maneuvering, only flying when absolutely necessary, and the Gambels quail, which stay together as a family unit all summer long, crossing the road with Mama in front, all the little chicks scurrying behind and Papa bringing up the rear. And birds that soar in the summer sky. Not just one kind of soaring bird but five or six different species of hawks, two kinds of vultures, eagles and at least four different species of owl. They are beautiful to watch as they catch a thermal and soar with almost no movement of their wings. The sight of them is undeniably majestic. What beauty! What variety!
And that's just the birds. Rodents of all shapes and sizes burrow in the ground and build elaborate nests of twigs among the cacti. Mammals, such as coyotes and mountain lions, deer and javelina wander the desert, following the design of God. Lizards, ranging in size from the tiny gecko to the large and venomous Gila Monster and snakes - huge and dangerous like the diamondback rattlesnake and small and delicate like the banded sand snake, all move along the desert floor, soaking in the warmth of the Sun. And strange and wondrous insects and spiders, like the tarantula, the black widow spider, several varieties of scorpions, centipedes and millipedes. The ground is alive with these creatures, but you have to meticulously look for them to find them. And God's proverbial hand was involved with each and every one of them. Infinite variety doesn't just apply to animals. How many species of fungi are there in the world? How many species of plants are there in the world? Just in the desert, the variety is amazing - special plants adapted to live with limited water and scorching heat. It's not one kind of cactus; it's dozens. And in a lush rain forest, plants are so abundant and varied that they live under and on top of each other. You cannot imagine the number of different shades of green until you've looked at a hillside covered with trees. And then, by God's wonderful grace, many of those greens change to yellow and orange and vivid red. How many kinds of fruit are there in the world? I wonder if anyone has tried them all. I strongly doubt it. Such variety in appearance, texture and taste.
What about the sky? We know it is a perfect structure that protects and provides for us. And the clouds in the sky - there are so many varieties of clouds - powerful storm clouds and gentle drifting lines and shapes. They are part of the 'adornment' of the sky, providing beauty and enjoyment as you watch them slowly or quickly drifting by. And, of course, they bring the blessing of rain. No two snowflakes are exactly alike, nor are any two leaves on a tree exactly alike either. God has made each and every single thing in His/Her/Its Creation unique. Of that there is no doubt.

Humans

Worlds

I broadly define the word 'world' as 'an experience in a particular point of space and time'. In that sense, every person lives in their own unique mental, emotional, moral, intellectual and spiritual worlds which also overlap with the worlds of others. Worlds can encompass a small range of phenomena such as an ant colony or the sum-total of human experience. A world can even be beyond our ability to comprehend, as the adult world is to a child of only three years.
Each of these kinds of world is very real and there are others still that we can scarcely imagine. We perceive an insignificantly tiny portion of the physical world around us. When I look at an object like a flower and perceive its colour or texture, this is not its essential quality. The eye cells of a honeybee do not perceive the same wavelengths of light that you and I perceive and so a bee will have a completely different range of experience of the flower and will 'see' it in ultraviolet wavelengths. Humans cannot see ultraviolet light. A bat would experience the flower as the echo of ultrasound. We cannot hear sounds in frequencies as high as a bat can. A chameleon's eyeballs swivel on two different axes so we can't even remotely imagine what a flower looks like to a chameleon! Quantum physicists speculate that there are even dimensions (perhaps an infinite number of them) which interpenetrate all other dimensions. And not all of these dimensions are necessarily thought to be spatial either. In his article 'Parallel Universes' from the magazine known as 'Scientific American', Max Tegmark discusses the probability that our universe is only one of an infinite number that populate a 'multiverse' of infinite extent. Indeed, he identifies four distinct types of 'multiverse', each of which is populated with an infinity of universes. One type contains universes that differ only in their initial conditions, another contains universes that differ in the constants that govern nature (such as the strengths of the fundamental forces), a third arises from the so-called 'Many Worlds' interpretation of quantum mechanics and the last consists of universes that can vary radically in the laws of nature themselves.
And these are only physical universes. What about 'spiritual universes'? Science is not currently equipped to discuss such a possibility. It's mind-blowing in absolutely every way.