Is reality fake?
Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2017 3:06 pmAs I hear mentions of "fake news" over various issues, and the soul-crippling realization that humanity is inherently cruel and barbaric to others, I am starting to wonder if it is a good idea to find comfort in the fact that perhaps reality as we know it is just a product of your imagination. And I don't mean the social reality, I mean objective reality itself.
Think about it deeply: you have spent your whole life only experiencing it from one perspective: yours. Of course you see other people kicking about and going on their day-to-day business. But how do you know that they are not just a figment of your imagination? How do you know that this screen that you are reading this actually exists, and not just a figment of your imagination? How do you know that this is not just an illusion designed to protect us from something that is far more terrifying than we can ever dare to imagine? Or worse still, that this is actually a form of torture?
Sure, you can feel your arms. Your toes. Your eyes. You open your mouth and say some things, and you hear a response. But how do you know that response actually exists, and not just something that your brain imagined up?
Hell, perhaps for irrational numbers, which Vsauce claims "keep reality real," our brains just pretend that these numbers are infinite, and generate a new decimal place after we discover each number so to not question the very nature of objective reality itself.
So, what do you think, NSG? Is there such a thing as objective reality? Or am I, like everything you have read or heard or observed, just a figment of your imagination?
Personally, while I operate under the theory that there is such a thing as objective reality, at the same time, it is comforting to know that there is a chance that this whole reality thing is fake.
Think about it deeply: you have spent your whole life only experiencing it from one perspective: yours. Of course you see other people kicking about and going on their day-to-day business. But how do you know that they are not just a figment of your imagination? How do you know that this screen that you are reading this actually exists, and not just a figment of your imagination? How do you know that this is not just an illusion designed to protect us from something that is far more terrifying than we can ever dare to imagine? Or worse still, that this is actually a form of torture?
Sure, you can feel your arms. Your toes. Your eyes. You open your mouth and say some things, and you hear a response. But how do you know that response actually exists, and not just something that your brain imagined up?
Hell, perhaps for irrational numbers, which Vsauce claims "keep reality real," our brains just pretend that these numbers are infinite, and generate a new decimal place after we discover each number so to not question the very nature of objective reality itself.
So, what do you think, NSG? Is there such a thing as objective reality? Or am I, like everything you have read or heard or observed, just a figment of your imagination?
Personally, while I operate under the theory that there is such a thing as objective reality, at the same time, it is comforting to know that there is a chance that this whole reality thing is fake.
