The authors (Reimann et al.) of the study conjecture that when the brain processes a stimulus, the activity associated with it groups neurons connected by synapses into what they call “functional cliques” (groups of tightly connected neurons) and “cavities” (‘empty’ spaces between them) that then progress “in a stereotypical sequence toward peak complexity.”
Lead researcher Henry Markram is quoted as saying: “There are tens of millions of these objects even in a small speck of the brain, up through seven dimensions. In some networks, we even found structures with up to 11 dimensions.”
These are not space-time dimensions, but a mathematical dimensional concept. It can be thought of as geometric objects, where each neuron connects to all others in the clique, forming a geometric object. The more neurons in the clique, the higher the dimensions of the object.
If this brain model is reasonably accurate, this simulation of even a tiny brain portion indicates a bewildering level of functional complexity regarding how the brain processes information. Even more baffling would be to explain how this complexity could be engineered into our genome by natural selection sorting random mutations, i.e., by an evolutionary process." CMI
