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Once upon a time, there were people on a planet far away who believed that our galaxy was a brain. Each star would be a neuron. In the absence of wormholes and other ways to get around the speed of light, a scholar estimated that this brain would be tens of millions times slower than the human brain. Is this correct or is there a more meaningful way to map the galaxy to a brain?

Tusky Emonay
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    Correct? Meaningful? To whom? Under what form of analysis? Your people can come up with whatever stories about a thinking galaxy they want. Galaxies aren't thinking so evaluating the correctness or meaningfulness of such an analogy without any context is entirely subjective. We do not answer questions that hinge entirely on the opinions of the answerer. – sphennings Sep 08 '22 at 08:06
  • @sphennings I read the question as "if a brain was scaled up to the size of our galaxy, with neurons placed exactly at the position of stars, and neural communication at the speed of light, would it be accurate to conclude that it is millions of times slower than a human-scaled brain?". Would you still consider it subjective? I can't really answer it because I don't know much about all the possibly relevant factors for "brain speed", but it seems answerable to me by someone with the appropriate knowledge, and I'm somewhat curious of the answer – Barbaud Julien Sep 08 '22 at 08:41
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    @BarbaudJulien, neurons do not orbit according to gravity in our brain, and what do religious concepts have to do with scale comparison? We have to evaluate the questions as written, not as we feel they might mean – L.Dutch Sep 08 '22 at 08:47
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    @BarbaudJulien The bold part of the post, is asking about whether the mapping is "meaningful". If OP wanted to ask about the scale factor they should word their question differently. If a question inspires you, you can always ask a question of your own. – sphennings Sep 08 '22 at 08:58
  • @L.Dutch well, the religious belief of the galaxy being a brain just appears like the context that motivates the question. I get the point about moving neurons, I don't know if that aspect could be discussed in a significant way. @ sphennings oh, ok, agreed. I suppose it also technically goes against the one-question policy ("is it correct?" and "what are the ways to map a brain to galaxy" are 2 different questions) – Barbaud Julien Sep 08 '22 at 10:21
  • There could be a good Q here, but let's ask some questions. (a) Religious belief can be simplified in a couple of ways. One is, "it's a way to embrace the unknown in society." We don't know what's on the other side of death. Oblivion? Valhalla? Torment? Reincarnation? And so religion frames the issue in a way that some can use to overcome fear of the unknown. Another simplification is to embrace the idea of something that can be appeased to provide good fortune. Which path are we taking here, or is there another? How are you using religion is an important aspect of every Q about it. – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:17
  • (b) My personal belief (not shared by all) is that religion and science are two sides of the same coin. One focuses on truth (what things mean) and the other on facts (what things are). Neither is perfect without being a god. Why do I say this? Because you've created a novel idea, but it's hard to balance it in the idea of religion. If your people know enough about their brains to understand neurons, how can they understand astronomy so poorly that they'd jump to the conclusion that the galaxy is an enormous brain? I call this a "technology dichotomy." – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:20
  • You can't be that advanced in one field and not similarly advanced in others. If your people aren't actually advanced enough to understand their own brains to that level, then the Q as asked doesn't make sense. (On the other hand, creating a religion that perceives the value of the local sun in basic agricultural ways and extending that to all dots of light and concluding they're all working in concert, therefore being individually components of a great theological whole, leading to the idea that all the lights represent the love of God... I could see that.) – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:22
  • (c) Finally, please let me warn you of an all-too-human thing: try to avoid making god in your own image. Artistically, looking through the eyes of your people and trying to understand their world as they would see it is the purest essence of worldbuilding - and it's whomping hard to do. At an ancient time in their history, what were their fears? Hopes? How would they perceive the unknown operations of nature and the universe and how would they map that to religion? Then, how would those ideas change through time to the point in history you're actually writing about? – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:24
  • Finally, you might want to check out our List of Worldbuilding Resources. There's a pretty good list of resources there concerning philosophy and religion. They might help you frame your question better. – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:25
  • ONE MORE THING: You're using both the [tag:science-based] and [tag:science-fiction] tags. If you read the mouse rollovers for those two tags you'll discover that they are mutually exclusive. Please pick just one. – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:57

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As a religious concept, that may be useful, but it does not seem to model the galaxy very well:

  • There are about 100 billion neurons in a human brain, and somewhere between 100 and 400 billion stars in the Milky Way. That looks good, but . . .

  • There is no obvious means by which radiation emitted from one star and arriving at another star can cause it to react. The energy they receive from each other is tiny compared to their own output.

  • The speed differential is worse than "tens of millions of times slower." Signalling across the synaptic cleft takes around a millisecond; the distance between nearby stars varies widely, but if we assume stars "talk" mainly to nearby stars and call the average signalling distance 10 light-years, that's roughly 300 million seconds, making the signalling 300 billion times slower than a nerve junction. Space is really, really big.

  • If the galaxy is in some way thinking, its subjective time since the formation of the galaxy has been rather short, perhaps equivalent to two weeks of a human's life. I doubt it has matured yet.

John Dallman
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  • "If the galaxy is in some way thinking, its subjective time since the formation of the galaxy has been rather short, perhaps equivalent to two weeks of a human's life. I doubt it has matured yet" Oh I like that if we assume normal human development patterns at two weeks old baby galaxia can't even focus it's eyes if it had them can barely be considered sentient and less barely be considered sapient, rather than worshipping a god they'll be worshiping a god in potentia that (metaphorically speaking) still needs to be bottle fed and have it's diaper changed, this will be an odd religion – Pelinore Sep 08 '22 at 12:56
  • Model the galaxy? We're talking about a religion. You're interpreting science far too strictly for any value to a religion. "Science doesn't work that way and therefore you can't do what you're trying to do" is a conclusion we draw far too often on a site that's dedicated to helping people build imaginary worlds. The OP's religion believes the galaxy is thinking. Are there really no analogies (who cares about science...) that can be used to bolster that belief? (And since the Q is closed, you have the only show in town. A real opportunity....) – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:30
  • @JBH: Note the science-based tag. – John Dallman Sep 08 '22 at 15:33
  • Actually, I see both the [tag:science-based] tag and the [tag:science-fiction] tags, which are mutually exclusive (*sigh* will people never learn to read the wikis?). Further, [tag:science-based] doesn't always mean, "science as we understand it today." The OP doesn't explain the tech level of his people. Please remember, Real Life cannot be an overriding limitation on any question unless specifically requested. The [tag:science-based] tag does not automatically make that assumption. – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 15:56
  • Frankly, John, if you really want some insight, the help center explains that you should "answer well-asked questions." This is not a well-asked question but you preferred to jump in with an answer that is at best a Frame Challenge against the existence of the religion. You have the only chance w/o reopening the question to either answer the Q or explain why such a religion wouldn't develop. You've not done neither. – JBH Sep 08 '22 at 16:01