Brain Cell vs. Simulated Universe…how small are we??

Alex: i love the compariso..but have a slightly different take on it
its got nothing to do the the “size”(how huge or how miniscule) factor..
there actually isn’t any form or properly delineated space..its all about the inter-connections and energy that flows..whether be it the synapses between neurons within the cell or the galactic energy transmissions!
u are as small as u make urself be or as gigantic as u imagine!
i mean all life forms are mere borrowed energy and so we remain after death..its mere transmission!
i loved these lines from Avatar wherein the character of Dr. Grace had beautifully summarized the same:
“I’m not talking about pagan voodoo here – I’m talking about something REAL and measurable in the biology of the forest.
What we think we know – is that there’s some kind of electrochemical communication between the roots of the trees. Like the synapses between neurons. Each tree has ten to the fourth connections to the trees around it, and there are ten to the twelfth trees on Pandora…That’s more connections than the human brain. You get it? It’s a network – a global network. And the Na’vi can access it – they can upload and download data – memories – at sites like the one you just destroyed.”

thats my opinion by the way..open to contradictions!:)
(love the pics btw)

awesome pair of pictures. I’ve long felt that god is the energy field of the universe – that “singularity” at which science breaks down, blown up. thus god is everywhere, in everything, and we’re all connected. I mean if you zoom in close enough, there would be no way to tell the difference between the atoms in my ass, the pants I’m wearing, and the chair I’m sitting in. just fields and energy.

This crosses over into my thoughts on the “what do you think about when you stare at the stars” thread, and the idea that the ratio of empty space to stuff inside an atom is similar to the space:stuff in the universe as a whole.

And Alex: do things get smaller and smaller with no end? I believe they do. As long as science keeps looking, they’ll keep finding smaller bits of “stuff”. Or at least, they’ll convince themselves that they have.

@Alex. The beliefs that are solidified when I see this picture are, That consciousness is what the universe is about. That everything is connected together, everything creates one. That god is a very probable reality for ME, and that god may or may not be there, but chances are he isn’t even aware of us! Could be though, but he might look at us like little cells.. That we could be gods in ourselves. We could host many many life forms inside our own bodies. Thats why your thoughts matter, and your actions even more. Imagine if all this was true, and god committed suicide? Imagine if he harmed his body with nasty chemicals? It goes on and on with me. I believe the universe to be a bigger construct of the human brain, and the human brain to be a bigger construct of a cell, and a cell to be a bigger construct of a particle..and on and on and on.

I always saw this, and people’s response to it, as a sort of confirmation bias or Apophenia (the experience of seeing meaningful patterns or connections in random or meaningless data). People tend to see what they want to see and be less critical of things that affirm their pre-held beliefs or hypotheses. That’s not to say we should just write it off as coincidence, it’s thought provoking, and it definitely sparks some interesting debates, but skepticism has a very important place in learning and understanding. Science needs skeptics.

@alex. There is far more ‘fact’ in science fiction than I personally imagined before I started to learn more. I love Star Trek, and It’s a shame so many people I know absolutely hate the show. But yes, I believe our thoughts actually do manifest in the real world. we can’t rightfully tell, since there are so many thoughts on the earth that never go accounted for. All life in the universe must contain thought, and all that thought is what dictates the universe itself. It’s a double negative where in itself, both are nothing, but together they create something positive, and tangible.

To you probably.

I’ve always thought about this. What if our universe is just a part of the bigger picture? This totally reminds me of the ending of men in black.

Check for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJOVUF-HaDw

@Alex B I completely agree, that’s why I said we shouldn’t just write it off, but some skepticism would do us well. But people look at this and completely revamp their outlook on the universe but if we step back it’s just a slice of a rat’s brain and a SIMULATED guess as to what the dark matter distribution in our universe MAY look like.

http://www.mpa-garching.mpg.de/galform/virgo/millennium/

reading anymore into it at this point, is detrimental in my mind.
Live long and prosper

@Anon, You’re right in that sense, but it is mindblowing because it’s not what you would expect!.
@alex. Yes I believe the expansion is happening. I look backwards at it. If we are part of a larger body, then what was the big bang? What happens when a child is born? You go through this massive expansion of learning and understanding in the first year or so. That to me is the big bang. It sets the foundation. The rest will have to expand. Things always expand afterwards. Towards death things expand again more dramatically, but in a different way. It is death. We don’t know what happens after death, so its hard to even theorize how that plays into the rest of the picture. But the similarities between the life of the universe and that of a human is hard to ignore.

*edit* dark matter= learning, and expansion of awareness.