Do seahorse neurons exist?

Yesterday, I stared down the microscope at some rat neurons, labelled with fluorescent mouse, chicken, and goat antibodies, and saw a seahorse staring back at me. I called him anti-Noah: an antibody concoction of animals gathered together at the end of their lives, without a Savior.



 

When I think of seahorses (which I admit is not very often) I imagine them to exist only inside the glistening waters of my imagination. Like some kind of ethereal, transient being that only comes into existence when my neurons fire together in such a way as to conjure them into existence.

What must life be like, as the figment of someone's imagination? But seahorses must be real. I saw them for probably the very first time the other day at a public Aquarium where I took this overexposed image through layers of glass and water. I admired the way they drifted aimlessly through the water, clutching at seaweed with their tails to change direction, just for something to do.

Nature has conjured up some funny creatures through the process of evolution. Is Darwin's theory of natural selection any less amazing than my own ability to imagine these beautiful creatures inside my mind? How do I know that we haven't evolved an imagination just so that seahorses have a place to live?

This seahorse neuron was real to me. But seahorses don't live in microscopes, silly.