An Introduction To Fractal Panpsychism

I started writing a philosophy book several months ago. I expect it to be finished and ready to shop by around September, but here’s a draft of the first chapter to get you as excited about it as I am… Enjoy!

Chapter 1: Wooly Mammoths

Here’s the wooly mammoth in the middle of the living room, gnarled tusks and all: I’m not a trained philosopher or neuroscientist. Nor a cosmologist or particle physicist. A psychiatrist or a mathematician. I’m an artist. A novelist. A C-List rock star. A sales guy. Dude picking commissary orders for county inmates in an indescript warehouse. Managing dental offices, music, and book stores. Cooking at Bed and Breakfasts. Listen, man, the more I learn about the song of the Universe, the more I realize I’ve not been listening myself. What business have I to write a fucking philosophy book? 

Philosophy + Science = Forever

If philosophy is an applied attempt at understanding a modicum of the universe and her various aspects, such as consciousness, orgasms, and the cosmic cradles of stars, philosophy requires science. It is only in partnership with science that philosophy can hope to contribute a fraction of an understanding. However, there’s an argument to be made that philosophy is dead, murdered by advancing science, now meandering forward as a mere Philosophical Zombie, smelling like a swamp cryptid, some wet bigfoot at 15 yards (life imitates philosophy; see David Chalmers). At this point in our human history, our science, the argument goes, has become so advanced, it has become incompatible with philosophy. Science can detect neurons. Where they fire in the brain during an orgasm. How the fractal geometry of neural pathways during the orgasm in the brain is reflected in galactic nebulae. Our collective, advanced state of science requires technology far beyond that of traditional philosophy: your mind, your choice writing setup, and maybe some weed or something. 

No, man! Science requires space-based telescopes, electron microscopes, and remote-controlled robots to do its work. 

So how might we benefit from a philosophy book from anyone at all in 2026, let alone this dude? 

Philosophy, like religion, politics, culture, language, art, and music is a software our brain runs through which we interpret our individual realities. Sure, think of it like an app. We’ll call ours “Fractal Panpsychism.” Open the App Store in your brain. Look it up. No, there’s a”P” in it, dude. Yeah, there it is. Click it. Bright colors. Bold animations. Hyperbolic advertising. Here we go.

Downloading… 53%… Hold on… Shit. Sorry. There we go.

We will always need philosophy to look at science and tell us what it might mean to us, for us, and because of us. Generalists are important for recognizing the patterns between disciplines that specialists are too siloed to see, the repeating verses and choruses of the Universe's song that can be heard whether you’re listening in a physics lab, chemistry lab, biology lab, or computer science lab. 

Math and Music

Music models math. Math models the Universe.

Therefore, math is the music of the Universe. It is the operating system of her reality, describing everything from one head arcing toward another for a kiss to the expansion of spacetime itself. 

Dude. 

We’ve mathematically modeled gravity, the weak nuclear force, and thermodynamics, fundamental properties of the universe, with damn near samurai precision. I propose that consciousness may be no different. It is not a magical ghost in the machine or an emergent property of complex brains but a fundamental property of the cosmos, waiting for her Hedy Lamarr, her Alan Turing, her Benoit Mandelbrot - to write her equations. 

The Gauntlet We’re Throwing

This book holds a challenge for science. We need science to use math to look at philosophy and ask what it is that is asking the meaning of science (after discovering the science) in the first place. How can we say physics is complete without an explanation of the observer when physics itself is an observation? 

Fractal Panpsychism is an accessible, actionable philosophy built on a falsifiable scientific hypothesis. It posits that consciousness is not just real in the Universe but a fundamental ingredient, and it proposes fractal geometry as the mechanism for how it operates across all scales of reality. It agrees with the philosophy of materialism that most modern scientists adhere to by saying that everything is physical, but by including consciousness as a fundamental field, the Me Field, it offers a fourth path beyond the old, broken models of materialism, dualism, and idealism. We will do this with logic, and we’ll do it with many flavors: philosophical, scientific, mathematical, narrative, poetic, and yes, even mythic. 

What does it mean that we look for meaning in an observation? It must mean something because if: 

A) Consciousness exists. “Cogito, ergo sum,” saith Descartes.

And, B) Consciousness is ubiquitous on Earth, existing in all mammals. Birds and cephalopods possess complex awareness. You’ll get little argument from folks regarding reptiles and amphibians. There’s fascinating science about bees and spiders making decisions and all kinds of party animals and insects getting drunk and taking drugs. These alien water breathers and tiny bottom feeding creepsters without anything resembling brains like ours are conscious. Not conscious like you or I, but aware of the world via their sensory organs. They make decisions, seek stimulus, and avoid pain. 

And, C) Fractal geometry reveals self repeating patterns in all of these systems, revealing myriad physical expressions in our Universe which have inspired a profound sense of awe in me, a resonance, like that last chord ending the Beatles’ song, “A Day In The Life.” 

Then, D) You can infer that if consciousness exists in these self-repeating systems at a vast scale across living organisms and systems on Earth, a microcosm for the Universe, consciousness may continue to scale along with those self repeating patterns throughout the Universe; quantum to cosmic, Plank Length to the Universe Herself. 

This is not proof. It is a pattern. And patterns are where hypotheses begin.

What Is Consciousness 

Perhaps consciousness is best described as awareness, and what we experience is that fundamental awareness in symphony with the complex information processing systems we call our brains. From this perspective, we see that there’s nothing combining to create consciousness at different levels, there is only natural fractal geometric repetition. 

The brain is a biological interface with reality, evolved for survival and propagation. It comes with, at no additional cost if you act now, a receiver, a radio, tuning into the Universal song of awareness we’re dubbing “consciousness.” The complexity of our conscious experience is proportional to the complexity of our radio. The fractal geometric nature of our brains is the antenna receiving that song, and there are other fractal geometric systems that look suspiciously like our radios, like the cells and nebulae we’ve been pointing to. This creates an imperative to investigate systems we've dismissed as unaware. They may be conscious in ways we've been too deaf to perceive.

Yeah, Whatever

Okay, if consciousness is fundamental, so what. Fractal geometry makes my partner come when I go down on them, and the neural pathways firing in their brain while they’re coming mirror the places where stars are born? Yeah, whatever, dude. What does that mean for you and me, right here, right now, making dinner, annoyed with that aforementioned hungry partner? 

It means we need a hunter to bring in the big game for our table, dude. Protein for energy. Maybe some meaning for our lives.

My background working across creative and professional mediums, paired with my neurodivergence, posits a sharp spear in my hands with which to hunt wooly mammoths confined to the middle of a living room. I approach philosophy from a unique perspective. All humans are hardwired to see patterns, but I’m finely attuned by my vocation and neurology to see and correlate them in unique ways. 

In this book, we will embark on a journey to understand the universe through the lens of fractal panpsychism. I’m not your professor or guru, I’m your dude, so together, we’re going to embark on an adventure. First, we’re going to look at the down and dirty reality of daily life. We’re going to work our way through the mythic and the cosmic while keeping our feet planted on Earth. We’re going to discuss hard science, get our minds blown by math, and I’m going to relate it all to my lived experience, the journey of my own consciousness. We’re going to explore practical ways in which we can apply Fractal Panpsychism to our lives. By the end of this book, you will have a new appreciation for the interconnectedness of all things and the profound beauty of the Universe's song. 

The Music Swells

I’m thinking of the Hindu idea of treating every visiting guest as a visiting deity. You, as the reader, are visiting my home; my book, my mind, my ideas, my stories. You’re stepping inside and touring my candlelit apartment, room by room, checking out the art on the walls. Your attention and presence is essential to this book’s existence, you create it In your own mind by reading it.

This book is a case for why understanding consciousness as the universe‘s own song is the very thing that gives our lives meaning. 

Within you, a new universe expands. Are you beginning to hear her song? Feel the beat?