Objects of a macro-cosmic mind
October 1, 2011 at 7:39 am
(This post was last modified: October 1, 2011 at 7:40 am by Welsh cake.)
I wanted to share a conversation I had with a co-worker I met up with recently. Honestly not sure where this thread should go, it can't go in atheism, religion (its not addressing a deity) or the science boards, so my apologies in advance if it should go in off-topic subforum. 
My co-worker (a pantheist) has been compartmentalising his beliefs more than ever lately. One month he believes in the 'absolute' or Godhead, the next he's essentially an atheist, lacking belief in any god-like being. While believing in a cosmic consciousness, he regards it as natural evolution of reality, or greater state of existence, rather than a deity. It seems he had an "epiphany" last week. Yesterday he showed me an image he was eager to share:
![[Image: TAT23.jpg]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=i537.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fff335%2Frogrossm%2FTAT23.jpg)
I recognised the image on the right almost immediately as the 'Millennium Run', the computer simulation of how matter in the Universe evolved over time. However, I hadn't seen the particular picture on the left of a mouse brain cell structure that mirrored the cosmos next to it until now. He seemed enthralled that one structure is mere micrometers wide while the other is billions of light-years across. He wanted to involve me in a little thought experiment musing that if we compare the observable universe to a mouse's neuron, a small part of its tremendous body, then we go right down in magnitude into superclusters, to galaxies, to neighbouring star systems, and we'd finally reach tiny us on our tiny planet in an insignificant tiny solar system.
I thanked him for showing me this weird and wonderful image, though told him fractal objects and dimensions are nothing new. They're easily found just about everywhere in nature. We don't have to go very far to find natural objects displaying self-similar structures over an extended finite scale like river networks, ramification of tree roots and systems of blood vessels for example.
Nevertheless with said image he's convinced himself the Universe is but a tiny part of a bigger living being and everything, all particles of matter and all the forces are homogeneous in the sense that everything in reality is the same - all consisting of the same kind that's alive and possibly conscious of itself and even us. He made an analogy and literally imagined the Universe as simply the mouse's cells, the basic unit of this macrocosmic life-form. The billions or trillions of cells can be likened to the Multiverse, neurons and synapses all form the brain, the center of the mouse's nervous system. Finally we have the Omniverse which is the mouse itself and totality of every single cell, organ and system in its body, the whole 'macrorganism' in its entirety. While he was talking he showed me a link to a site for an appreciation of size which I liked very much:
http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/b...lls/scale/
Reflecting upon this I said we're, for all intents and purposes, infinitesimal as far as this 'massive organism' is concerned. He said maybe yes maybe no. He then borrowed from a statement from the Internet associated with the image saying that we are existing inside a "conscious fractal loop of patterns that repeat indefinitely". Truthfully, I was a bit taken back and didn't quite know what to say in response because I could appreciate where he was coming from. He was arguing the universe itself is merely a basic unit of life at another fractal and/or Hausdorff dimension. While we may be pathetically small as far as the demonstrable universe goes, if we're inside a recurring spatial dimensional loop we're both infinitely small and large when we study the subatomic realm and particles of matter making up our very being. They also behave like solar systems. We might not just be a tiny insignificant part of a grand macro-verse, but also unbelievably enormous and significant to the countless micro-verses that may exist inside our minds and dependant upon us. I joked and said we better not drink alcohol anymore then. I then asked then what were we in the bigger picture mere micro-organisms?
He made it clear he wanted to avoid usage of the terms "Micro-organism" to describe organisms too small to be seen by the unaided eye and "Macro-organism", organisms that can be seen with the naked eye because we're discussing the possibility of life so insanely-vast it can't be seen with the naked eye. No different if a single-celled bacterium was to acquire sentience and now is trying to work out what plain of reality does it exist in. Instead he used the more preferable term "macrocosmic" to describe life on this scale while we fall into the realm of the "microcosmic". I granted this as it seemed more appropriate to use those labels if we're going to be talking about such different systems and states of almost unfathomable measure.
Going back to my question he said it was not unreasonable to say we were so small, we weren't even considered “real” in the strictest sense. I was a little perplexed and asked him what he meant. He said he'd studied brains in vats and holographic/simulated reality models in philosophy. If we really existed inside a colossal being's neuron, we may be just an electrochemical process. We are the manifestation of its creativity and nothing more. We are objects of the mind - its mind. He stated he knew nothing about its motives, intentions or personality, merely that it was obsessed with emergent structures in nature and sacred geometry. Abstract thoughts that can easily poof into conscience thought and right back out again, as if we never were. The atoms of our being are merely electrically charged and most of their volume is empty space. We’re part of an existentialist nightmare. Our lives and thoughts are merely a process between inputs and outputs, the black box theory of consciousness giving rise to the illusion of "I" onset by the sheer intelligence and faculties of this great thinking mind. It's so crazily complex it can give rise to imaginations and dreams inside that become self-aware in of themselves.
My colleague wanted to go even further and contemplate upon macrocosm and microcosm patterns. I incredulously asked him if he actually thought we’re all inside a gigantic mouse. I quoted the hyper-intelligent pan-dimension mice from Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He laughed and said it's not necessarily a 'cosmic rodent' we're inside of. That was merely an analogy as he knew nothing else about the hypothetical organism in question he wanted to talk about, apart from the similarity of the Universe and the mouse brain cell. Although he thought it funny that if it were a mouse and we’re but a small part of its imagination or consciousness/sentience at work, the fact that it would allow lowly numerous mice, easily preyed upon, to manifest as tinier objects of its own mind, much smaller than us, shows it has a very strange (even wicked) sense of humour. He said though if it were an intelligent macro-cosmic mouse deliberately including "mice" into its imagination it would be parallel to Terry Pratchett's ficitional Discworld god "The Creator of XXXX" who includes kangaroos in every place he creates because they apparently serve as some kind of signature.
While it was a fun discussion I was losing patience with his "wishful thinking" at this point. He was making one point after another and addressing too many topics. This conversation I put up here is a mere summary, it actuality it dragged on forever and I asked him to cut to the chase and just tell me if he was presenting this 'giant mouse', this 'macrocosmic living being' as merely another pantheistic argument for the existence god. He responded and said he didn't even know. Well, I obviously couldn't respond to that either as it has no scientific meaning in any case. He said again he didn't know if it's a mortal or immortal creature. It really depends if its neurons regenerate or not. If they don’t one of the hypothesises for the ultimate fate of our universe is that it expands and eventually suffers heat death. It essentially "dies". While this giant mouse or macro-organism or whatever may live for a ridiculously long time like 1 or 2 duotrigintillion years or so, it will finally succumb to biological death and us along with it, even if the memory of all its imaginative thoughts is preserved somewhere else in its brain or not, according to him, we would be utterly dependant upon this thing to survive, to exist.
Also, while he could speculate it contains an incalculable number of universes inside it, one of those being ours, it still wouldn't make it infinite by any means. Transfinite perhaps, but not infinite. It may not be the totality of all that is if it's merely penultimate in the sense that it's an evolved being and exists and lives on another final dimensional plane, the 11th dimension if you suppose.
He finished by mentioning this mega-being's ontology may or may not be the 'Holy Grail' that is the Theory of everything that scientists seek to understand and hope will be realised in their lifetimes. He told me not to take everything he said too seriously (wish he told me that at the start) and thanked me for listening to his speculation and ramblings about the cosmos. I said I didn't mind as I humoured him for the most part but he addressed many topics that I was ill-prepared for and couldn't really get a word in. I should have quit while I was ahead but I guess politeness and mutual respect for my co-workers is my Achilles' heel. Now all I have to show for it is a whopping headache.
My co-worker (a pantheist) has been compartmentalising his beliefs more than ever lately. One month he believes in the 'absolute' or Godhead, the next he's essentially an atheist, lacking belief in any god-like being. While believing in a cosmic consciousness, he regards it as natural evolution of reality, or greater state of existence, rather than a deity. It seems he had an "epiphany" last week. Yesterday he showed me an image he was eager to share:
I recognised the image on the right almost immediately as the 'Millennium Run', the computer simulation of how matter in the Universe evolved over time. However, I hadn't seen the particular picture on the left of a mouse brain cell structure that mirrored the cosmos next to it until now. He seemed enthralled that one structure is mere micrometers wide while the other is billions of light-years across. He wanted to involve me in a little thought experiment musing that if we compare the observable universe to a mouse's neuron, a small part of its tremendous body, then we go right down in magnitude into superclusters, to galaxies, to neighbouring star systems, and we'd finally reach tiny us on our tiny planet in an insignificant tiny solar system.
I thanked him for showing me this weird and wonderful image, though told him fractal objects and dimensions are nothing new. They're easily found just about everywhere in nature. We don't have to go very far to find natural objects displaying self-similar structures over an extended finite scale like river networks, ramification of tree roots and systems of blood vessels for example.
Nevertheless with said image he's convinced himself the Universe is but a tiny part of a bigger living being and everything, all particles of matter and all the forces are homogeneous in the sense that everything in reality is the same - all consisting of the same kind that's alive and possibly conscious of itself and even us. He made an analogy and literally imagined the Universe as simply the mouse's cells, the basic unit of this macrocosmic life-form. The billions or trillions of cells can be likened to the Multiverse, neurons and synapses all form the brain, the center of the mouse's nervous system. Finally we have the Omniverse which is the mouse itself and totality of every single cell, organ and system in its body, the whole 'macrorganism' in its entirety. While he was talking he showed me a link to a site for an appreciation of size which I liked very much:
http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/b...lls/scale/
Reflecting upon this I said we're, for all intents and purposes, infinitesimal as far as this 'massive organism' is concerned. He said maybe yes maybe no. He then borrowed from a statement from the Internet associated with the image saying that we are existing inside a "conscious fractal loop of patterns that repeat indefinitely". Truthfully, I was a bit taken back and didn't quite know what to say in response because I could appreciate where he was coming from. He was arguing the universe itself is merely a basic unit of life at another fractal and/or Hausdorff dimension. While we may be pathetically small as far as the demonstrable universe goes, if we're inside a recurring spatial dimensional loop we're both infinitely small and large when we study the subatomic realm and particles of matter making up our very being. They also behave like solar systems. We might not just be a tiny insignificant part of a grand macro-verse, but also unbelievably enormous and significant to the countless micro-verses that may exist inside our minds and dependant upon us. I joked and said we better not drink alcohol anymore then. I then asked then what were we in the bigger picture mere micro-organisms?
He made it clear he wanted to avoid usage of the terms "Micro-organism" to describe organisms too small to be seen by the unaided eye and "Macro-organism", organisms that can be seen with the naked eye because we're discussing the possibility of life so insanely-vast it can't be seen with the naked eye. No different if a single-celled bacterium was to acquire sentience and now is trying to work out what plain of reality does it exist in. Instead he used the more preferable term "macrocosmic" to describe life on this scale while we fall into the realm of the "microcosmic". I granted this as it seemed more appropriate to use those labels if we're going to be talking about such different systems and states of almost unfathomable measure.
Going back to my question he said it was not unreasonable to say we were so small, we weren't even considered “real” in the strictest sense. I was a little perplexed and asked him what he meant. He said he'd studied brains in vats and holographic/simulated reality models in philosophy. If we really existed inside a colossal being's neuron, we may be just an electrochemical process. We are the manifestation of its creativity and nothing more. We are objects of the mind - its mind. He stated he knew nothing about its motives, intentions or personality, merely that it was obsessed with emergent structures in nature and sacred geometry. Abstract thoughts that can easily poof into conscience thought and right back out again, as if we never were. The atoms of our being are merely electrically charged and most of their volume is empty space. We’re part of an existentialist nightmare. Our lives and thoughts are merely a process between inputs and outputs, the black box theory of consciousness giving rise to the illusion of "I" onset by the sheer intelligence and faculties of this great thinking mind. It's so crazily complex it can give rise to imaginations and dreams inside that become self-aware in of themselves.
My colleague wanted to go even further and contemplate upon macrocosm and microcosm patterns. I incredulously asked him if he actually thought we’re all inside a gigantic mouse. I quoted the hyper-intelligent pan-dimension mice from Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He laughed and said it's not necessarily a 'cosmic rodent' we're inside of. That was merely an analogy as he knew nothing else about the hypothetical organism in question he wanted to talk about, apart from the similarity of the Universe and the mouse brain cell. Although he thought it funny that if it were a mouse and we’re but a small part of its imagination or consciousness/sentience at work, the fact that it would allow lowly numerous mice, easily preyed upon, to manifest as tinier objects of its own mind, much smaller than us, shows it has a very strange (even wicked) sense of humour. He said though if it were an intelligent macro-cosmic mouse deliberately including "mice" into its imagination it would be parallel to Terry Pratchett's ficitional Discworld god "The Creator of XXXX" who includes kangaroos in every place he creates because they apparently serve as some kind of signature.
While it was a fun discussion I was losing patience with his "wishful thinking" at this point. He was making one point after another and addressing too many topics. This conversation I put up here is a mere summary, it actuality it dragged on forever and I asked him to cut to the chase and just tell me if he was presenting this 'giant mouse', this 'macrocosmic living being' as merely another pantheistic argument for the existence god. He responded and said he didn't even know. Well, I obviously couldn't respond to that either as it has no scientific meaning in any case. He said again he didn't know if it's a mortal or immortal creature. It really depends if its neurons regenerate or not. If they don’t one of the hypothesises for the ultimate fate of our universe is that it expands and eventually suffers heat death. It essentially "dies". While this giant mouse or macro-organism or whatever may live for a ridiculously long time like 1 or 2 duotrigintillion years or so, it will finally succumb to biological death and us along with it, even if the memory of all its imaginative thoughts is preserved somewhere else in its brain or not, according to him, we would be utterly dependant upon this thing to survive, to exist.
Also, while he could speculate it contains an incalculable number of universes inside it, one of those being ours, it still wouldn't make it infinite by any means. Transfinite perhaps, but not infinite. It may not be the totality of all that is if it's merely penultimate in the sense that it's an evolved being and exists and lives on another final dimensional plane, the 11th dimension if you suppose.
He finished by mentioning this mega-being's ontology may or may not be the 'Holy Grail' that is the Theory of everything that scientists seek to understand and hope will be realised in their lifetimes. He told me not to take everything he said too seriously (wish he told me that at the start) and thanked me for listening to his speculation and ramblings about the cosmos. I said I didn't mind as I humoured him for the most part but he addressed many topics that I was ill-prepared for and couldn't really get a word in. I should have quit while I was ahead but I guess politeness and mutual respect for my co-workers is my Achilles' heel. Now all I have to show for it is a whopping headache.
