diesm

[phillip1882]

so here's the premise. start off at the cellular level of a human brain, note the complex and interconnectedness of it. now zoom out a great great deal, to almost the entire universe. it looks like a neural network.  does that mean that the universe itself is self aware, or bears some kind of intelligence?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8Aurpr68uE

[Tank]

No.

The processes that bring about neural complexity are completely different from those that bring about the complexity we see in the universe, they are totally unrelated.

The neural system is an evolved (Note: Not the same use of the word as stella evolution) system created by the processes of biological natural selection. The universe is created via the interaction of the fundamental forces and interactions between matter at the quantum and macro levels.

Intelligence is an emergent property of a biological structure (the brain) that evolved to interact with the physical environment the organism inhabited.

[xSilverPhinx]

You can't really compare evolved natural complexity with that of the universe, especially since natural selection selects characteristics that are best suited to their environments, giving the illusion that complex biological things such as neural networks were intelligently designed. For one, excellent solutions to problems have been arrived at through natural selection, but they're not of the type that we'd imagine a perfect intelligence (such as those who claim that god is the designer is) to have arrived at with foresight. Biology just doesn't look like that.

Why should you think that the universe bears some sort of intelligence just because it's interconnected, just like a neural network? It just doesn't follow.

[DeterminedJuliet]

What tank said.

Furthermore complexity =/= life.

Here's a picture of London at night from space. Is the city of London possibly sentient?

[Stevil]

How does complexity relate to intelligence?

[Will]

How does complexity relate to intelligence?

This is why I voted no. I'm unaware of any correlation to be drawn between these two things.

[BullyforBronto]

so here's the premise. start off at the cellular level of a human brain, note the complex and interconnectedness of it. now zoom out a great great deal, to almost the entire universe. it looks like a neural network.  does that mean that the universe itself is self aware, or bears some kind of intelligence?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8Aurpr68uE

This reminds me a bit of Lewis Thomas' collection of essays Lives of a Cell or the necessarily teleological Gaia hypothesis. Are we just walking colonies of mitochondria? Is the earth comparable to a single cell,  with all of its parts serving some sort of function for the over all goal of the survival of the whole? Decidedly not. But, language promotes these kinds of readings.

Thomas' collection, for me, makes explicit the problems with speaking about biology. Evolution via natural selection is not goal oriented; any sort of teleology is absent. However, the limitations of language make it impossible for us to avoid words like "function" and "purpose" when speaking about systems. In ecology, one can't help but use the term "niche." The concept of the niche at once implies a function within a larger system, and, therefore, invites misinterpretations of teleology at work.

[Recusant]

so here's the premise. start off at the cellular level of a human brain, note the complex and interconnectedness of it. now zoom out a great great deal, to almost the entire universe. it looks like a neural network.  does that mean that the universe itself is self aware, or bears some kind of intelligence?

You've received some fine answers already, but I'm going to go ahead and stick my oar in.

Simple answer: Maybe, but we haven't seen any signs of such an intelligence. Yes, certain parts of the universe bear a superficial resemblance to certain parts of the brain. That really isn't saying much, and in my opinion, it's insufficient evidence to form a hypothesis which says that the universe is intelligent in the same way as a brain is.

Longer answer: We can observe neurons in action, and the brain responding to stimulus. There is evidence that the process or function that we describe as "intelligence" is taking place in the brain, when we observe the brain as a whole.. There has been no equivalent process or function observed taking place in the universe as a whole. That is a problem for those who would posit that the universe is intelligent.

The universe is made up of billions of stars and planets, but mostly it's interstellar (and intergalactic) vacuum. Also, how complex is the universe in its gross physical form? The arrangement of galaxies and galaxy groups and superclusters seem to be a function of gravity; there is no sign that there is any order beyond that imposed by gravity.

It's my opinion that the universe "looks" more like sand dunes or whirlpools in water than an intelligent entity. Sand dunes are made up of billions of grains of sand, and we can observe that there are ripples on their surfaces, and that different sand dunes have different heights and varied shapes. However, the grains of sand seem to be acted upon by forces, rather than acting in any way that we would understand as evidence of intelligence. Equally, whirlpools are composed of billions of molecules of water, and are born and die. Yet their behavior can be explained as resulting from certain forces acting upon the molecules which compose them. Yes, sand dunes and whirlpools aren't as complex as galaxies and groups of galaxies, but we've been observing the universe for a while, and as far as I know, its "behavior" seems to be that of matter acted upon by forces, akin to the behavior of sand dunes and whirlpools.

The complexity of the brain is more in the way that it behaves than in its physical make up. We don't see that sort of complexity in the universe, and in fact I wouldn't agree that it actually does look like a neural network, despite the image at the end of the video.