Is the Universe Conscious? Are you affecting it with your thoughts?

What if the Universe is self-aware?
​What if it’s conscious?
Could it be a giant brain or Mind?

Panpsychism from the two Greek words “Pan” (all) and “Psyche” (soul or mind) is the view that consciousness is fundamental and ubiquitous in the Universe.

Pantheism from the two Greek words “Pan” (all) and “Theos” (God), is a doctrine which identifies God with the Universe, or regards the Universe as a manifestation of God.

Exploration of the details of the early Greek attempts to decide if the Universe is conscious or not, has filled endless volumes and so obviously we won’t elaborate here too much.However it is worthy to note that after over 2,500 years scientists seem to be circling back to a view of a Universe that is conscious..afterall and that our thoughts affect it ie. the observer influences what is being observed. ​

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“The Universe is alive and full of spirits...”   Thales (c. 624–545 BCE).

Theoretical physicist, Freeman Dyson (Professor Emeritus, Princeton University) embraced panpsychism, and said that the Universe not only operates through our consciousness but has  consciousness of its own. So could this be true? 
First we have to establish what consciousness is. Neuroscientist and psychiatrist, Giulio Tononi, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has proposed a way to measure how conscious a thing is.​
He proposes that consciousness has to do with how much control a being has over itself or
other things around it. This theory separates intelligence from consciousness, which are two different things. Supercomputers for example, which are highly intelligent, can routinely out-think humans and beat them at chess, but they don’t have a will of their own. The programmer controls it. So intelligence and consciousness are two different things.
 
A being doesn’t need  to be highly intelligent to be conscious. We can say that a tree is more conscious than a rock. A worm is more conscious than a tree. A cat is more conscious than a worm. A human is more conscious than a cat. And the ultimate consciousness could be the Universe itself.
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If this is the way consciousness works, then the complexity of an organism’s brain has
something to do with its level of consciousness. And scientists, in fact have good evidence that
the seat consciousness resides in brains.
 
Consciousness seems to be a property of highly interconnected, communicating
systems, like the brain which is an interconnected network of neurons that can fire chemical
and electronic signals. Neurons are triggered by certain stimuli, and can send signals to each
other. And large complex networks of these neurons seem to emerge into consciousness.
The more complex the network, the more conscious something appears to be.
 
Is there any evidence of such a “brain” or network of connections in the universe?
Well, there is a humongous network of galaxies in the universe, many hundreds of billions
of galaxies. This is not dissimilar to the network of billions of interconnected neurons in our brain.
 
The difference appears to be that each of our brain cells can communicate or at least
fire signals to other brain cells. Do the galaxies have such a communication mechanism
between them?
 
It doesn't appear so. But remember that at the center of almost all galaxies, there is a black hole. It's like the nucleus of a brain cell. What's happening inside a black hole?
We have no idea because our equations break down at the singularity, at the center
of a black hole – this is the point where time and space cease to exist and Einstein’s
equations don’t work.
Is it possible that something is happening here that we just don’t know about?
 

The black hole could only be similar to a brain cell if somehow they were connected
to each other, and could send signals to each other. If that was the case, a vast network of communicating trillions of black holes would act like a gigantic information processor, and indeed be intelligent and possibly conscious. This would truly be a kind of super consciousness that could theoretically control not only our universe, but perhaps time and space itself.

Did a Consciousness direct the ‘Big Bang’ to occur? This cannot be ruled out. The faithful, will argue that God had a hand in it. The panpsychist will argue that a conscious
Universe set up laws from the moment of creation in order to maximize its value. A materialist will argue that there is no fine tuning, no decision-maker, that given enough universes in a multiverse, and enough time, a Universe such as ours, where conscious intelligent beings can evolve, is inevitable.
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You decide for yourself. 
One thing is for sure: Observing a situation or phenomenon changes it. In physics, the ‘Observer Effect’ is the disturbance of an observed system by the mere act of observation.
 
The phenomena which operates at an atomic level affects the very nature of how we interact with the world around us and how we can impact our surroundings.Simply put, it’s fundamental to the reality we create and experience. 
The ‘Double Slit’ experiment (see image below) is a classic quantum physics experiment, which produces ‘the observer effect’. Understanding this phenomenon and how to apply this effect in our life and business interactions can propel you and your projects forward in fulfilling their potential.

When observing, atoms fired through a thin slit onto a screen produce an expected pattern, as you can see in the diagram below. With one slit you see one line of images, with two slits two lines.
However, when the experiment is left unobserved the pattern changes to become more like a wave. The event of observation, seemingly affected the atoms behaviour. When left unobserved they are amorphous, without shape or form, unaffected it would appear by any force of attraction. The attention paid to the atoms changed their behaviour and form to create the reality of atoms as we know them.

Could it really be true that the focus we place on events in our reality will create the outcome and create physical form where none originally existed? This in essence means that what you are focussing on, how you view yourself, your roles in life is the is being physically created in your reality. It’s a powerful reminder to have cohesive and positive messages in your inner conversations and thoughts. 
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It requires a stretch in current mainstream thinking to translate this proven phenomenon into your way of thinking, however, intelligent people like yourself think ahead of the curve, are already applying this key understanding of the nature of everything towards creating the outcomes they desire in life.
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Refer to my webpage on Deep Relaxation to learn about the exercises that can help you to train your brain/consciousness, in the direction you desire, which will ultimately lead to a new reality/outcome that you desire.