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“Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality. When we recognize our place in an immensity of light years and the passing of centuries, when we grasp the complexity, beauty and subtlety of life, then that rushing feeling, that sense of euphoria and humility combined, is definitely spiritual. “- Carl Sagan “The Demon-Haunted World”.
By learning about the Universe, I have felt these spiritual moments as I better understand my connection with the larger whole. Like when I first learned that I was literally made of the ashes of stars: the atoms in my body have spread into the eternal aether from supernovae. Another spiritual moment was seeing this image for the first time:
A neuron in the brain juxtaposed with clusters of galaxies and their connected filaments of matter and dark matter. The similarity is immediately clear. The implication? You may have a whole universe in your head. But the similarity between the images could simply be a case of apophenia – perceiving the similarity where it doesn’t actually exist. After all, how can these two things be similar given the large difference in scale between them? But what if beyond the visual similarity between the networks of neurons in the brain and the networks of galaxies in the Cosmos, an objective measurement could compare how similar they really are? This is what Franco Vazza (astrophysicist of the University of Bologna) and Alberto Feletti (neurosurgeon of the University of Verona) set out to discover by combining the two disciplines for a publication in “Frontiers of Physics”.
An intergalactic link
The human brain is literally one of the most complex structures known in the Universe, which itself is the largest of all complexities. Your brain has around 80 billion neurons, the cells that process input from the senses and send signals to your body through the nervous system. Neurons are also networked, communicating with each other through connections called axions and dendrites. There are about 100 trillion connections between neurons that form the neural network that creates who you are.
– Patrick Hsieh CC BY-SA 4.0
The Universe is also online. While we can think of space as objects separated by vast tracts of … well … space, that’s not quite the case. The Universe we see with our scientific equipment is referred to as the “Observable Universe” approximately 90 BILLION light years in diameter and containing hundreds of billions to a few trillion galaxies. These galaxies, like our Milky Way, collections of billions of stars, are grouped into clusters of galaxies. Our Milky Way is part of the “Local Group” which contains the neighboring galaxies Andromeda and Triangulum, as well as 50 other galaxies. Those galaxies are themselves part of a larger group called the Virgo Supercluster. The space between the groups and the clusters is not empty but rather hosts filaments that connect both ordinary and dark matter that span millions of light years. In this way, the Universe can be thought of as a gigantic network of clusters of galaxies all interconnected in a similar way to the neural networks in the brain. That network is called the Cosmic Web.
A universe within a universe
The quest to find quantifiable similarities between the two networks originated in a partnership between neuroscience and astrophysics. Using techniques and tools from both disciplines, Vazz and Feletti examined these two networks to find quantifiable similarities beyond the perceived visual similarity. Were these networks comparable, and if so, what does that mean?
The researchers used 4-micron thick slices of the human cortex, the outer layer of the brain that is responsible for processing language, sensory information, thinking, memory and consciousness. These were compared to 25 megaparsec-thick “slices” of the Universe (1 parsec = approximately 3.26 light-years) taken from a computer-simulated volume of 1 million megaparsec cubes of space. The slices of the brain and the Universe are relatively comparable in thickness, since they are both 27 orders of magnitude of different sizes.
– Vazza F and Feletti A (2020)
Depending on the scale, the sections were examined: the similarity in the structure was not always evident. But with 40 times magnification in the brain tissue, the researchers began to see similarities in structure. The 40x magnification represents a scale of 0.01-1.6mm in the brain and 1-100 megaparsecs in the universe. Here, the neuronal network appears as clusters of galaxies. Furthermore, the similarity of the networks can be objectively measured and compared using two techniques. The first is the “network degree centrality” which measures the length of network connections and the degree of connectivity in a given network. The nucleus or center of a neuron has a radius much smaller than the length of the connecting axions and dendrites. Similarly, galaxy clusters have a radius much smaller than the length of the connecting filaments. The second method to objectively compare both networks is the “clustering coefficient” which quantifies the amount of structure adjacent to each connection node (neuron or cluster of galaxies) and compares this structure with a random point within the network. This comparison contrasts organization and randomness in both networks.
By applying the techniques to these scales, Vazz and Feletti found “remarkable” similarities between the brain and the Universe. They also found that the networks were more similar to each other than other biological and physical structures, including tree branches, cloud formation dynamics, or water turbulence. These other structures are fractal in nature. Fractal patterns repeat themselves and look the same regardless of the scale you look at them. Conversely, the Universe looks completely different on smaller scales than on larger ones. Galaxies and solar systems do not resemble the cosmic web they create. So the brain also no longer resembles the neural network when viewed at different scales. The scale itself could be important to the creation of these structures in terms of how they organize themselves.
The researchers conclude their findings “I hint that similar network configurations can emerge from the interaction of completely different physical processes, resulting in similar levels of complexity and self-organization, despite the dramatic disparity in the spatial scales of these two systems.” In other words, networks like the brain and the Universe can share a similar structure while being completely different in size and formed by different processes (gravity vs biology). Yet it is possible that something caused both of them to evolve and grow in similar ways.
The researchers noted two other interesting similarities between the brain and the Cosmic Web. The first was the composition ratios. The brain is made up of 77% water while, likewise, the Cosmic Web is made up of approximately 73% dark energy. Water and dark energy are not part of the network itself, but are considered “passive material” or passive energy. The presence and relationship between passive material / energy could be relevant to the way these networks are formed. A second fascinating similarity is that the amount of computer data needed to map models of the simulated Universe is comparable to the theoretical storage limits of the human brain’s memory. 1 to 10 Petabytes (1 Petabyte = 1000 Terrabytes) of data are needed to simulate the evolution of the observable Universe at scales where the Cosmic Web becomes evident. Estimates of the total memory capacity of the human brain are around 2.5 petabytes. A human being could therefore theoretically store a good part of the structure of the observable Universe … inside their brain. Or, even more surprising to consider, the Cosmic Web could theoretically store data from a lifetime of human experiences.
farthest galaxies ever imagined. – NASA / ESA
In addition to the similarities, there are differences between the cosmic web and the brain. Although the brain samples used came from the cortex, the whole brain is not uniform. Different parts of the brain are structured for different purposes while a key feature of the Universe is its uniformity in almost all directions. The links between neurons in the brain serve for the transmission of sensory information while the links in the Universe only transmit energy and matter. Vazz and Feletti hope their research will inspire the development of more powerful algorithms to uncover even more similarities between the brain and the Universe. Perhaps we will learn the conditions that cause two networks born of completely different processes to look so closely alike.
We have heard Carl Sagan describe how our bodies are literally made of stars. We are now beginning to understand that our brains can also be shaped like them. A whole universe of connections is in your mind – a universe within a universe – and one capable of reaching the other that gave it birth. Billions of neurons touching billions of stars, certainly spiritual.
More to explore:
The real images of the simulated universe used in the research: https://cosmosimfrazza.myfreesites.net/cosmic-web-and-brain-network-datasets
Does the human brain look like the universe? | EurekAlert! Scientific news
As above as below Art exhibition
How your brain is like the cosmic web (nautil.us)
[2008.05942] Explore the connections between the cosmos and the mind through six interactive art installations in “As Above As Below” (arxiv.org)Ask Ethan: Is the universe alive? (forbes.com)
How big is the universe? – Universe Today
[astro-ph/9512141] How filaments are woven in the cosmic web (arxiv.org)Aquarius Dark Matter Simulation Video – ESO
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