Neuroscientists have discovered that the brain contains multi-dimensional geometric structures, up to 11 dimensions. The scientists are talking about algebraic topology, and how it describes neurons connecting into ‘cliques’, and that the description requires higher-dimensional geometric objects. This is a mathematical concept, and they are not claiming to have measured higher dimensional space-time objects (after all, how would they have done that?).

However, this brings up something very interesting. Although their description is a mathematical topology that can be described in ordinary space-time (3 spatial and 1 time dimensions), it can result more naturally in a higher dimensional space-time. This may seem academic, until you consider that the canonical description of space-time in M-Theory (or string theory) is eleven dimensional (ordinary space-time plus 7 ‘curled’ dimensions). For those unfamiliar, M-Theory is currently the best candidate for a unified field theory to describe the universe.

So turn this around. If M-Theory is correct, and the universe is really eleven dimensional, is it really any surprise that constructs that are best described in eleven dimensions are showing up in the human brain? The implications are staggering and the possibilities endless. To give an idea of what I mean, my novel Beyond the Stars exploited some of these possibilities to consider the constitution of the human soul. And that is just the tip of the iceberg; this is also a place where things like wormholes naturally exist, and where quantum entanglement and the Fermi Paradox might find rational explanations.

We are in an exciting time, where things that were once pure fiction are appearing as serious research in scientific journals. If you think that modern times leave little left to be discovered, you have only to look at research like this to see otherwise. In truth, we are only at the threshold of scientific discovery, with most of the universe still out there waiting to be revealed.