When I was in grade 4, I remember sitting on the classroom stairs with a couple of friends
during the lunch break.
They were talking about something silly, like, what if they were ninjas who could climb buildings
and jump over walls.
As I listened to their conversation, I remember feeling that what they were saying was just
a dream.
It was a strange feeling.
For that moment, I felt that I was just listening to an automated script and that I had no idea
what was real and what was not.
That feeling stayed with me for a long time and it wasn’t until a couple of years ago
that I was able to put a name to it, Solipsism.
Solipsism is the idea that the only thing that is sure to exist is my own mind.
That is, there is no way I know for a fact that another person is real.
It could all be a figment of my imagination.
Consequently, there is no way that another person can prove to me that they are real
as what they are saying or doing could equally be a figment of my imagination, too.
Am I in Control?
During my life so far, I have mostly felt that everything around me is real.
That is, other people are just like me, living their lives and having their own experiences.
But just occasionally, something happens that makes me feel that others are not real, or
more specifically, I can’t prove that they are real and nor can they prove to me that
they are real.
Or, I get the feeling that everything around me is being controlled in some way, and not
playing out in a natural way.
For example, the other week I wanted to go out and buy a small notebook (the pen and
paper variety).
I remember seeing hundreds of notebooks for sale in many different places, however on
that particular day, there was not one single notebook for sale in all the shops I visited.
I literally spent four hours wandering around my city looking for a very simple thing.
In the end, I gave up looking for one and decided that the universe did not want me
to get a notebook that day.
Rationally, I could think of a couple of explanations.
1.
It was back-to-school time, so because of the large number of students going back to
school for the year, all the notebooks had been sold out.
2.
Maybe there are only one or two notebook producers/suppliers in Australia and possibly they were having
production difficulties around that time.
Of course, the notebook example is fairly trivial.
The problem is that these sort of situations happen to me a lot.
Something that should be very easy to achieve or attain, turns out to be a real pain in
the butt.
I sometimes think that there is something more to all of this.
Something that is controlling the events in my life, sometimes for the better, sometimes
for the worse.
In the rest of this video, I would like to talk about a number of possible hypotheses
that I’ve come up with over the years.
1.
God Hypothesis
This is the most grandiose of my hypotheses.
The hypothesis is that I am a god, or some all-encompassing, all-powerful, eternal being.
Everything around me has been created by me for some unknown reason.
Possibly to relieve my boredom.
If I have an eternity of existence, maybe it makes sense that I have created this world
around me to keep things interesting.
Some might ask, wouldn’t I know if I was a god?
Wouldn’t I have some recollection of being the almighty creator?
I answer this by saying that if I was truly trying to make my earthly existence seem real,
I would had to have put myself into some state of induced amnesia.
If I knew everything around me was fake, it would hardly meet the criteria of an interesting
existence.
2.
Virtual Reality Hypothesis
In the same vein as the 1999 movie The Matrix, I am (or we are) in some sort of simulation.
It could be that I have been forced here by some tyrannous entity, or maybe I have volunteered
to be here.
For example, what if the real world is actually a horrible place and I have chosen instead
to place myself inside this simulation in order to relieve my misery.
Although, if this were true, why would I place myself inside a world where lots of terrible
things happen as well?
Another possibility, this life is actually a form of recreation.
Maybe the real year is many years in the future where technology is highly advanced, and I
am simply paying for a simulation service, much like a computer game.
This service gives me the feeling of living a full life with all its ups and downs, but
in actuality, I’m perfectly safe and cannot die in the physical sense.
Part of the service promises that I will have no recollection of my real existence allowing
me to be fully immersed in this simulation.
As an extension of this, maybe we are all eternal beings.
We have created this fake universe to immerse ourselves in to get the feeling of having
a finite life.
Maybe we think it’s great entertainment to pretend we can die.
Maybe death does not actually exist.
3.
Fake World Hypothesis
This hypothesis assumes the world is real, but I am being set up in some way.
That is, everyone around me is either an actor, or some kind of automated entity that is simply
following a script.
In similar style to the 1998 film The Truman Show, I might be the star of some kind of
elaborate reality TV show where everyone around me is trying to influence my actions, all
in the name of entertainment.
Occasionally, I feel like I “catch out” people acting in a strange way, behaving out
of character.
Or I see the same person in one shop, and then 3 hours later in a different shop on
the other side of town, I see the same person.
Yes, it could be just coincidence, but sometimes it feels like more.
Out of all my theories, I think the Fake World hypothesis is the least likely.
If the people around me are real, I think they are just as confused about life as I
am.
Psychological Aspects
A psychologist might say that I suffer from Grandiose Delusions.
That is a condition that basically says that an individual has an inflated sense of self-worth,
knowledge, or power.
But I could rebut this by saying that this condition exists simply to try to convince
me that what I am hypothesising is not true.
If I was in some sort of simulation, then of course the designers of the simulation
would have written a program to convince me that any thoughts of a greater power are not
normal, or verging on insanity.
It’s a way to keep the delusion going.
Death
For a long time, I’ve thought that death is simply the end of the “game”, “simulation”,
or “dream”.
I have no idea if this is true and no way to prove it (apart from dying, or course,
which is something I don’t want to do any time soon).
I have trouble believing the atheist point of view that once we die, that’s it – the
end of our existence.
It just doesn’t seem likely to me.
I remember as a boy having some sort of sense that death wasn’t what everyone said it
was.
But then slowly I was taught by society that death is a scary thing and something we know
nothing about.
Equally, I don’t believe the religious belief that death results in us going to a heaven
or some sort of paradise.
It just seems like something somebody has made up.
Ultimately, I think I have to go with my gut feeling.
That is, I am part of something bigger, whatever that is.
I may or may not be the only being in existence, and this life may or may not be just a projection
or a part of my imagination.
Either way, there is no way of proving any of it, at least not with our current technology.
Anybody who says they know the truth, is probably lying.
Religious leaders who definitively say that heaven exists, are either conmen, or have
been conned themselves, or are simply a figment of my imagination.
Maybe this video is actually part of your imagination.
Maybe you are the only one in existence and I am just a projection of your mind.