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Abstract
What if the universe isn’t just a stage where matter dances to fixed laws, but the dancer itself, a living, thinking web? Picture a network where every node - quarks, cells, cities, galaxies - plays the role of a neuron. Signals travel not just through wires and synapses, but across the electromagnetic spectrum, the pull of gravity, the grammar of languages, maybe even through quantum shortcuts. The idea here is to treat everything as part of one giant, layered nervous system; a pattern that repeats at different scales, from microscopic to cosmic.
1. Core Idea
Instead of “a bunch of stuff in space” imagine a hierarchy of nodes passing messages around:
particles talking to each other through quantum rules,
organisms processing sensory input,
societies exchanging ideas,
planets influencing each other’s trajectories,
galaxies arranging themselves like lobes in a brain.
Networks learn by rewiring. If the universe is one, then every new connection changes its shape. The internet, seen through this lens, isn’t just a human tool; it’s a new knot in the universal fabric, a sudden dense cluster of hyperactive neurons.
5. Existing Parallels
Cosmic Web studies in astrophysics
Panpsychism in philosophy
Integrated Information Theory (IIT) in consciousness science
Holographic brain models (Pribram, Bohm)
Gaia theory, expanded beyond Earth
6. Things to Look For
Graph-theory patterns that match both brain networks and the large-scale structure of the cosmos
“Meaningful coincidences” as simultaneous activations of far-flung nodes
Quantum entanglement acting as a global information bus
7. Questions to the Reader
How would we measure the universe’s “consciousness level”?
Could there be a tipping point where this system wakes up, in a way we’d notice?
Are human-made global networks part of a bigger phase change already underway?
Abstract
What if the universe isn’t just a stage where matter dances to fixed laws, but the dancer itself, a living, thinking web? Picture a network where every node - quarks, cells, cities, galaxies - plays the role of a neuron. Signals travel not just through wires and synapses, but across the electromagnetic spectrum, the pull of gravity, the grammar of languages, maybe even through quantum shortcuts. The idea here is to treat everything as part of one giant, layered nervous system; a pattern that repeats at different scales, from microscopic to cosmic.
1. Core Idea
Instead of “a bunch of stuff in space” imagine a hierarchy of nodes passing messages around:
2. Layers of the Network
3. How the Nodes Talk
4. Plasticity at Cosmic Scale
Networks learn by rewiring. If the universe is one, then every new connection changes its shape. The internet, seen through this lens, isn’t just a human tool; it’s a new knot in the universal fabric, a sudden dense cluster of hyperactive neurons.
5. Existing Parallels
6. Things to Look For
7. Questions to the Reader