Is this the most beautiful thing you have seen?

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It's a 3d-Mandlebrot fractal.

I love complexity, I feel a very strong sense of beauty in complex patterns.

I voted 'quite nice', but I think it is between that and being beautiful.

I think it looks both fascinatingly exquisite and utterly repulsive and revolting all at the same time.

I think it looks like an alien, and probably an "evil" one, or a microscopic view of something like shadwell said, like a sort of mould, or virus, like a lichen which will take over everything.

Remorseless, robotic but plant/bacteria like. I much prefer the broccoli, which makes me wonder what it is about the broccoli structure which isn't the same as the fractal? ( perhaps it's simply the "distortion in the 3D mandelbulb which makes it look so poisonous? )

Like life but not life. Does make me feel a bit sick, ( like millie said ), I think it's because of the mixture.

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That's the feeling I got from it too. It looks like deeply submerged tentacles of some sea creature that we've never seen because those who see it don't survive. It could be the Leviathan of sailors' mythology. I don't like it.

The swirls make it impossible to focus on the entire picture. I feel little about it, because it prevents me from judging it. It isn't a whole. It inspires no emotion at all, because you can't look at it properly.

Nature's geometry topic

I once saw a documentary on Mandelbrot and his interest/research in fractal geometry, and I have learned to appreciate the structure of the edge of a leaf, the swirl of a snail, the surface of a vegetable.

Fractal geometry is very complicated, even more so for a person like me who is only average in spatial ability. But I love patterns and interesting visuals, and I find myself studying the broccoli with interest. Beats navel gazing, though the lowly b-button might have its own fractal facets.

Beauty is a subjective quality, but I do find it fascinating.

Thanks everybody for participating. I wanted to know whether this kind of 3D fractals is perceived by Aspies in a different way. Aspies are said to have more short range connections in their brains at the expense of long range connectivity. The fractal shows intricate structures on all levels of detail. I personally like such pictures, especially if they show complicated structures with the help of lighting information only: no colorful complicated textures, just one color and shadows. I had the idea that maybe pictures with these characteristics are easier to process for AS brains due to the brains' local overconnectivity.

Most voters liked the picture, but if 3D fractals really were the perfect fit for the locally overconnected brain, and if all or almost all Aspies have such brain characteristics, then the votes would have been even more onesided. The results are difficult to interpret because the poll was based on one picture only and many people's votes were influenced by characteristics of the picture that have nothing to do with 3D fractals, like distortion or the similarity to a deep sea creature. Furthermore, a few comments sound like some people thought that I created the picture (I did not); a portion of the positive votes might have been positive only because the voters did not want to make me sad.

I cannot draw any definite conclusions from the poll results, but I found your comments really interesting, they gave me stuff for thought. I hope you had some fun with the poll as well.

I think it is beautiful, it's like an alien forest where all the trees grow into each other and the ground. I would live there if I could.

I love it. I liked to look at things like that often when I was younger -- not as much now, though. I find texture interesting and it reminds me of a piece of coral I really liked as a kid. Which means I think of it to be something pretty rough to /touch/, but lovely to look at all the same.

Doesn't really do much for me but it looks fairly nice.

Hypothesis: You would get widely varying responses depending on the colour of the image; the response people have to the picture is not down to the geometry only.

I think that's true, at least for me. I think I would have responded to it more positively even of it were in black and white. The color, especially the blue/green added unnecessary content and got in the way of the image itself.

I think it pwns.

Wow that's beautiful.

I kind of started to go overfocused and stared at it for ages

looks like broccoli! i want to run my nose along it and feel it and smell it.
it creates a very intriguing sort of aura....i want to handle it and experience it!

Pretty trippy. That's what I like about fractals and optical illusions lol