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Originally posted by Rasputin13
mojo4sale that is incredible because I've actually thought of something like this before! Everything seems to be broken down into smaller and smaller parts, just like we're basically made up of cells (please forgive me because I have ZERO knowledge when it comes to science). I've thought before that we are just living parts of this planet, and that the planet is just a cell in another being. And when we have wars and such, and pollute the planet, we are basically turning it into a cancerous cell. I've often thought that just about everything can be broken down into smaller living parts, and that everything also can be put together to make bigger and bigger living organisms.
It's not something that I "believe" per-say, but its always been one of those "what if's" that I've imagined over the years.
Originally posted by Speakeasy
So, you're saying we're basically antibodies, waste products, and maybe even parasites within a galaxy-spanning lifeform? That is definately a unique theory but that begs the questions as too what this entities purpose is. Is it just around to exist or does it converse and hang out with its buddies? It just seems odd that a thing of such size and importance has no other lot in life than to sit around and let the things living inside of it have free reign.
Ralph_The_Wonder_Llama
The idea that the Earth is actually a living creature and we are its organs and cells was actually a hypothesis among biologists for a long time. When I took Biology 101, however, the professor addressed it, and there are some very specific reasons why it was proven incorrect (although I can't remember a single reason).
However, the idea has its merits. Plants take carbon dioxide CO2 and water H2O and use them to make sugar C6H12O6 and oxygen O2. Humans take sugar C6H12O6 and oxygen O2 and use them to make... carbon dioxide CO2 and water H2O! Great cycle.
Every species has its little place in the world, and it all balances out. It is a really fun concept to toy with.
The way i see it is there would be a society of these beings, galactic size?, larger i dont know. What are they doing, again only speculation but would the thoughts of a creature this size take millennia to form and the following action of its thoughts take equally as long. Who knows what the aims of this society of beings would consist of, certainly they would be on a grander scale wouldnt they? Perhaps they just exist to create/destroy (order/chaos). Are they celestial engineers? Or are they merely base lifeforms with little direction other than to breed and survive.
Originally posted by Speakeasy
I was thinking more towards these beings having the same aimless pursuits and trivial goals that we do. Of course, if there are such beings they probably don't see themselves as massive entities supporting life, but just as normal Joe's who go to work every day and support their families.
But then again, if they do know what they are I'd be willing to bet they're all a bunch of cocky SOB's who hold life and death in the palm's of their sweaty hands. Kind of like the Mafia on a grander scale.
Originally posted by V Kaminski
Cool. 'Sounds like "Gaia" writ big. Makes a great deal of sense to me. We may be everything you suggest and more AND less; perhaps we are the "answer" and the "question". Then again perhaps we are just prototypes in a "Skunk" or "Phantom" like "works" "non-us" R&D project. It'd be fitting if we turned out to be a fancy equation that turns up in some "proof" or a "bet" outcome in which we are only useful as an intellectual exercise or better yet - a null outcome!. Yeah, that'd put us in our rightful and humble "place".
Thanx, your ideas are thought provoking I like that!
Victor K
Originally posted by Astyanax
The idea that we are bugs or brain cells in a universal organism has a lot going for it, though it isn't exactly new. But then, what is?
Our colleague aboard Discovery I mentioned James Lovelock's Gaia hypothesis, which is similar though it applies only to Earth.
The Jesuit scientist and philosopher Teilhard de Chardin wrote extensively about the idea that the universe may be evolving towards self-consciousness or even divinity. I have suggested elsewhere on ATS that perhaps the function of humanity is to be a participant (doubtless a very minor one) in this evolution.
Some might say the whole idea goes back to Neoplatonism and the concept of the all-pervading divinity of the One.
And then, of course, there's this:
"The earth... hath a skin; and this skin hath diseases. One of these disease, for example, is called 'man'". -- Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra
Originally posted by mojo4sale
It doesnt in any way discount either religion or science imo.
Edit to add: wouldnt mind hearing more of your thought's regarding this Astyanax.
Originally posted by Astyanax
I mean to make a post of them, just as soon as I have the time. But as I said earlier, none of these ideas are particularly original. You can find 'em all over the place.
Originally posted by T0by
This theory doesn't sound quite right to me, however, i do believe that systems do repeat themselves on a microscopic scale, and a macroscopic scale throughout the universe.
I believe we may be like a cell, within a large structure, just as we have cells in our bodies, but I think it may be in a way different to that portrayed here.
I'd prefer to think of it similar to how you described, but not as us really being the contained within it, but it being the universe itself. From what I read, you described some kind of external factors, or a lifeform. But I've always thought of this 'god' as being more internal within the universe, and not as externally aware as you describe.
To put it simply there may be no outside of god, as if there is an outside, that means there is something god is not, whereas i believe god cannot be something there is not.