• Question: Hi again ;) I watched a documentary the other day about how the most zoomed in part we can see in a leaf cell resembles exactly the same structure as the most zoomed out part we can see of space. What are your feelings on the microcosmos being connected with the macrocosmos?

    Asked by iheartprofiteroles to Cat, Daz, Johnson, Pamela on 23 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Darren Braddick

      Darren Braddick answered on 22 Jun 2011:

      Hi iheartprofiteroles..

      Wow, amazing question. Immediately I cannot believe the two are related – it must be some coincidence! But then again, who knows. The best example I can give you is that many patterns in nature – for example colouring of patterns on animals and plants, the number of things together (like number of leaves from a twig of some trees and plants)… They actually have very similar mathematical reasons behind them.

      So, despite the fact that they are all very different things, nature seems to borrow the same maths to make this. The reason why is simply that it was easy, it made sense. Nature nearly always takes the simplest route to a problem… Although of course, that isn’t always true, and your other question about the appendix is an excellent example!!

      I hope this helps! Do you think there could be a connection or link between these things??

      Daz

    • Photo: Cat O'Connor

      Cat O'Connor answered on 23 Jun 2011:

      Wow Num Nums (my new name for you,….what I’d do for a profiterole!!),

      I’d love to see this documentary; can you remember what it was called?

      Like Daz, I believe that there are patterns in everything and that nature is created in the most effective (so best functioning and easiest or parsimonious) way. So it kinda makes sense that we’d see recurring pathways in different things in nature.

      Or you could say that what we say is a microcosm could be a macrocosm to something else and what we see as a macrocosm is actually something else’s microcosm………I try not to think about this too much though because it makes my head hurt!!

      What do you think about all of this?

      Cat

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