do you believe life is an illusion?

Spoken like a true citizen. (Because after all---the last thing we want is for people to think for themselves). Work hard, play hard, and use debt to buy what you can't afford. In short, my friend, consume, consume, consume--that is what reality is all about--and it is the key to finding happiness!

Kierkegaard would say that you are afraid of approaching the true questions of life, afraid of exercising your true existential freedom (though he rarely used the word existential, this is what such freedom came to mean). This would mean that you are not, what Kierkegaard labeled, an authentic individual----just another face among the mindless masses.

 

I think all of the above are real. What is not real does not exist.

I don't understand the distinctions being made between life and reality.

We are really alive. We all have personal experiences that are synonymous with living and that is so for all life.

Are we saying reality is broader than life? That there are things not alive? What things can life not have a relationship with? How is life divorced from reality? Only perceptually it seems? Perception is not knowledge but can lead to it. Sensation is not a guide, it is a hint, a taste, a visionary reverie, a representative of something but not the thing itself. You are the thing itself in every instance and what we call objectivity is a kind of projection. It seems to me to more prudent to be objective of our own contributions to the world we see, that world being the kingdom of our own nervous system and not question needlessly calling into confusion, those real effects.

If you decide once and for all that you are real then you will be free to look around at what is there and not be worried of a things verity because by definition what is not real does not exist.

 

This is back to the Philosopher Berkeley's famous statement--esse est percipi---existence is perception. Therefore do you really know if perception is a simulation, or if perception is the only reality?

It is certainly the only reality each of us know, and the problem is it is very subjective. We each know only our own reality.

Then there is the question of the holographic universe---if our mind creates the three dimensions, then perception is more than just a simulation--it is also a construct---taking a flat universe and giving it 3 dimensions. Berkeley's point, however, is that there is no physical reality other than perception, meaning that perception is the construct of reality itself, not its simulation.

 

Not so famous that I would know it. If the problem arises in this dude saying it, then maybe he should shut up. I wake up in a body after having been asleep with no way to account for some periods of time save I woke up in the body I went to sleep in. I certainly existed during those unaccounted for hours but no one saw me. It appears to me maddening crap this worship of perception as fundamental to existence. That is what I get though for not being an academic. I get to be heretical or simple minded without injury.

The I am I call myself is the same I am you call yourself. What you are referring to is projection simply. The problem is in the perceived degree of separation caused by the evidence of the body. We share our thoughts and emotions. That we experience them discretely does not mean we do not share them but that we are locally interested.

.
Kind of a false distinction. It doesn't matter if perception is a simulation of , a picture paints a thousand words. Whether you are making what appears or simulating it, you act or react based upon it.

 

Surprised you apparently didn't understand the difference I attempted to illustrate, because it sounds as though you are more or less expressing the same ideas but are using different vocabulary/reference points.

The thread question is "do you believe life is an illusion"
I tried to illustrate that what is being referred to as life in that question isn't accurate to what the OP intended.
Reality as in our perceptions/experiences is what I believe was the OP's intention of meaning when he utilized the word "life".

What I consider life is a force or onward movement of everything and it keeps on trucking regardless of our personal experiences, whether they be illusion or not.

 

Surprising has been one of my attributes from time to time. I'm surprised that the distinction is being made was my point.
So if I say the same of reality i get what you mean by life?

I think he meant as you took it to mean using different or perhaps less than succinct vocabulary.

The salient question is it illusion.

If by illusion one means not real then what is not real does not exist.
If by illusion you mean not representative then not representative of what?
What is perception representative of? Your own mind body environment feedback loop. You are real but knowledge as distinct from perception isn't wholly self referential as being is shared.

 

The problem didn't arise with him saying it---he was just a part of the train of thought that took place as religion-philosophy-science (which at the time was more or less a single thing) as crashed head on into the crisis known as the Enlightenment. It took Kant to pick up the pieces and mend it all back together. But the problems raised were never solved.

Once again you state that so matter-of-factly. What proof do you have of this? As I have said before---I agree to an extent. We are all filled with spirit, and ultimately the spirit is one---but my thumb is distinct from my forefinger, and each experiences life differently, and for good reason. My hand would be near useless if I only had forefingers on it. The I am that I call myself is filled with unique existential experience that is very different than the I am that you call yourself. I have seen a vision, which I see as a suggestion of reality (and do not hold it as the truth---but it was a vision and it does make sense to me): that consciousness is an inter-dimensional entity, and each being has its own individual consciousness. of course such consciousness is built of energy that at higher levels are singular---as in the Hindu Atman, or Aristotle's nous (mind). I can see individual memories and experiences as a shared experience within our collective unconscious and there is evidence of such things (e.g. Rupert Sheldrake’s work), but I still see each individual’s individual consciousness as a node of unique being.
.

But it makes for an interesting mind game.

 

interpretive due to our psychological dispositions or interpretive due to the limitations of our organism? or both?

I understand the concept of qualia and how we each may experience the same apparent sensations uniquely (which MVW just addressed) or that our biological organism has evolved in a particular way which is not the complete capacity to assess stimuli. I understand that if we normally saw in ultraviolet or heard in sonar, we would obviously perceive and interpret the world differently; however given that our evolution has shaped us with the particular abilities to function in our environment, I'm not sure how you could say with certainty what is there outside your human experience.

I like that first paragraph and I agree with the second paragraph. However I'll throw this out for shits and giggles, if we are to suggest that reality is a simulation, then other possibilities perhaps open up as well, something like metapsychology. At that point, we cannot be certain perception is the only reality each of us know and maybe there are layers buried beneath the unconscious which the simulation expresses.

 

Well leave it to kant to do what kant be done. The only crisis is self doubt.

I'm not ashamed.
Should get used to the fact that we are our only measure. Identification is of two kinds, same or different. My problem with the idea of uniqueness is it is not taxonomical. To identify species we look for similarities. To distinguish one thing from another we look for differences. We are all real. What is your evidence that you are a unique expression? You are a suitable expression. You probably look nice in a suit. Is one real expression different from another real expression?

Grist for books as I said before and that is fine if you want to write books they make good night stands, and we are created to create the good.

 

Interpretive due to the body between us, the body is a communication device. The mind is naturally abstract.
Knowledge is being shared. We are both nature and nurture and nurture our nature. There are no structural limitations or divisions between you and nature or reality on any level. Perception is simply not knowledge but can lead to it and can also lead away from it of you think it is knowledgeable. Helpful is how I think of perception as you must take many samples to make statistical analysis. We are in a constant state of probable becoming.

Why would you want to save to win an argument? Better to have a handle on what your experience is. You are the salt of the world.

 

I want society to see my fear and I want society to know that I'm being programmed correctly, the way they want me to be. So, they don't see the differences in me, not that I have any, I'm like the majority, and they don't see me as a threat. Because of that, they don't bother me.

Life is what they make it and I'm comfortable with that.

 

Fear makes you unpredictable. Never know what will set you off into some offensive maneuver to protect yourself because fear is not of the known but unknown consequences. Fear promises to protect whispering in your ear I will keep you safe but it is a liar. Fear's real intent is to keep you from going where you will and wound your heart. Fear can make you seem unfriendly and it may make it hard to find someone to trust or have someone trust you. The fearful are violators of trust. Fear increases the possibility of distorted or inadequate information because it is based on imagination. It confuses light and dark. The respectful are respected and the circumspect can see where they are going. A life adjusted to fear is one of quiet desperation. The desperate may keep quiet for some time but our tolerance for despair is not indefinite. However I hope whoever will find their comfort indefinitely.
Awareness dispels fear, ignorance increases it.

 

My life is very much an interpretation of my mind. My illusion is just a version of reality..so yeah I think so

Sx

 

Lurking undercover within the establishment...

or selling out...

But alas, I don't knock it---it is your life.

I personally could never blend in to the faceless masses of society. But then I was always singled out by TSA for searches whenever I flew. Even close to 15 years in Japan, where the nail that stands up gets the hammer, could not break me-------though as a foreigner, I was always an outsider and the center of attention.

But even from the time I was a small kid, I wanted to be different. Perhaps this was a baby boomer thing, and the reason we rebelled so much against the mediocre status quo of the 1950's: Suburb after suburb of houses that all looked the same despite the differences each person tried to place--each yard groomed the same, each driveway leading to the same streets, and every sunday, the family would dress up, like every other family, and go to church. Every Saturday, the dad, or the teenage son would mow the lawn, and go out and do the same leisure activities as everyone else---maybe bowling or a movie (pinochle or bridge was often reserved for a weeknight get together). During the week, everyone would get up at the same time, the fathers off to work in their hat, suit, and tie. The children off to the same schools, and the wives dutifully did their housekeeping, with breaks to catch up on the latest gossip---spitefully envying anyone who dared venture off the beaten track of good American values ("Did you know Jane is having an affair... Sally is always getting drunk in the middle of the day--no wonder her daughter carries on like a floozy...), but they always had their husbands dinner on the table as he got home----and of course, everyone got home at the same time too----life was like clockwork----and it was naive and innocent, because roughly a decade before---we had saved the world, and Superman was simply a personification for the greatness that America was---and it was all good, right, and proper. And everyone knew their place---the 'negroes' had their own drinking fountains and swimming pools, sat at the back of the bus, and had to leave town by sundown in some white rural towns. And no one had any idea that the French were promising to give back the land they stole from the Vietnamese peasants, but that America was setting up a puppet dictatorship that would keep the stolen land in the hands of the wealthy. (It would be only a matter of years before many of their sons would be sent to experience a horrific existential nightmare, that only modern weaponry in a thick jungle setting could create, the horrors of which their mothers, and fathers, and sisters and brothers could never grasp---and which for many of them would end in a body bag---as a bloated corpse swelling in the hot tropical sun.) And in the end life was----very empty and very meaningless.

 

The desire to be different or special lends to the sensation of being outcast. The desire to excel or be different yourself, not different from others, makes you attractive of excellence in relations.

 

Not an illusion. Real is not the same thing as illusion, an illusion is a deceptive appearance or impression. A case of mistaken identity. The reason it is deceptive is that it is an extension of the power of your conceptions to present the world to you.

 

I can see that as being one response to fear, but there are other types of responses to fear because the response to fear depends on the person and the technique in which the fear has been established.

In saying that, I think the fear that has been installed in me is the type of fear where it's more self-incriminating, self-loathing, self-imploding, and basically things that affect the self rather than exteriors. It's the kind of fear where you don't press the button just because they told you so, but you don't question pressing the button neither. You just stand there until either they kill you or you die a silent death from sheer exhaustion due to battling with morality. Either way, you don't impact anything, as if you never existed.

 

The stuff our brains are made of does not have consciousness by itself. There is a structure .. atoms are made of smaller subatomic particles. These subatomic particles themselves are basically energy, but they have specific properties that define their behavior. Atoms can form molecules, which can interact with other molecules and atoms. Molecules can form larger structures which can form bigger structures such as brain cells. Even brain cells couldn't be conscious on their own though, so it must be the entire structure and interactions within the structure that cause the consciousness, not the type of material itself that's responsible.

A computer program could provide the environment, all of these things could be represented in a computers memory. It would contain all of the information and properties of every single particle in the "universe", the properties each one has and it's current state (charge, spin, energy level, etc).

The structure would be the same, regardless of exactly how it's implemented .. and if the computer contains all the information about a certain thing .. then it is that thing, at least to other 'things' within the program. They would have access to information about other things in the program if the right conditions were met to allow this. we could never know anything about this computer but we can learn about how the program behaves.

Maybe the program has a lot of bugs, and that's why reality is so strange .. how would you know if the things that happen in "reality" were intended to be that way, or if they're just unexpected conditions that were never really anticipated in the design, a regular software bug?

You can emulate one computer system inside another, and the software running in the emulator can't tell because the emulator program provides all of the aspects of the system it expects (processor instruction set, registers, memory addressing, etc) .. if something is wrong, the program either won't run, or it crashes, the memory used is freed and the information about it is gone, so it doesn't exist .. and for all intensive purposes never did since there is no longer any information about it available.

 

I would have loved to live in such a time. I live in a time where most people want to be different or believe themselves to be different. It's hard being the same in such an environment that has so many antis. It makes me wonder if I'm different for wanting to be the same or if they're the same for wanting to be different. Kind of a "Fuck me" moment if that were to be true. Ha. Not that it matters whether or not anyone is the same or different for obvious reasons.

 

It's programmed with statements or in some cases including beatings, like you have been bad you heard in your younger life and there must be consequences for your mistakes or fearful consequences can be expected if you upset someone. That is not meant to be comfortable but we will always seek our own comfort so we adjust. We have instinctive startle reflexes that protect the body from existential harm to the extent that is possible. Coping is not the same as flourishing and there is no good reason you should be forced to cope with fear or be paralyzed of good sense or faced with moral dilemmas when someone tells you to push the button. Don't misunderstand me I'm not trying to make you discontent with your place in life. Just pointing out as you are saying that fear is self incriminating. I don't imagine you find fear that comfortable but you get used to discomfort. The thought might be a little discomfort is better than a lot. None is highly preferred though.