An argument for the subjectivity of reality through simple mathematics

I remember being a bit disappointed when I found out what The Matrix was. He popped out of his illusion, only to find himself still himself, but in a dystopian nightmare run by robot overlords. That’s usually how these types of conversations work out. The logic leads to some version of only being able to perceive what we can perceive but never gets to how that perceiving came to be in the first place.

The Matrix trilogy explored the “what is real” conversation. I don’t see this “article” headed toward much, other than a binary answer of subjective vs objective

Shame on you, didn’t you come here to have an adult discussion? Don’t poop on it with gratuitous childish sarcasm. Stick to your rational arguments.

W4U is taking a lot of time to give you nice, thoughtful explanations. He rescued this thread and help direct it into a constructive direction. Why don’t you stick around for the ride. You came here with the challenge, don’t get all distracting simply because you aren’t finding the support you were hoping for.

On the bright side, you have a real chance of learning something if you following through in the spirit of honest curiosity and learning by seriously engaging him, rather than tossing out emotional distractions.

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My apologies to the old timers, but it’s still worth bringing up, . . .

Lausten I feel like you pitched that straight to me, although I appreciate that is only a figment of my imagination, but that doesn’t mean I won’t swing at it.

First and foremost we must define and appreciate the Human Mindscape ~ Physical Reality divide. This conversation like so many others avoid that simple fundamental reality and then we wonder why were all over the place, mushy as heck and in the end nothing seems to be achieved, learned.

“Objective” and “Subject” are both concepts that are born from the human mind, the result of eons worth of nature/evolution training us.

We are processing machines, doing the best we can with what we perceive.
Everything we do is subjective from our own little mind.
The world out there is solid and does what it does no matter what any particular participant observes.

Side note: Hallucination is a hideous word and reveals Seth’s limitations rather then his genius.

Nature and Evolution are our only solid touch stones to reality -The atom is NOT mostly empty space (that is only one specific mathematical rendering, not an actual reflect of what atoms are in ‘reality’. And a philosophical troupe to entertain and confuse the masses) - and time relentlessly moves forward piling on changes that we call evolution.

Well gotta run, I’m already late, I need to remember not to open this 'puter when I have things to do.
But I do have some thoughts to share with weareinthematrix since perhaps he’s looking for something from a refreshingly different perspective …

Missing Key to Stephen Gould’s “Nonoverlapping Magisteria”

… Science was so successful that today most people believe we are the masters of our world and most have fallen into the hubristic trap of believing our ever fertile mindscape is “reality.” Which brings me back to Gould’s magisterium and his missing key.

The missing key is appreciating the fundamental “ Magisteria of Physical Reality ,” and recognizing both science and religion are products of the “ Magisteria of Our Mindscape .

Science seeks to objectively learn about our physical world, but we should still recognize all our understanding is embedded within and constrained by our mindscape.

Religion is all about the human mindscape itself, with its wonderful struggles, fears, spiritual undercurrents, needs and stories we create to give our live’s meaning and make it worth living, or at least bearable.

What’s the point?

Religions, Science, political beliefs, heaven, hell, even God they are all products of the human mindscape, generations of imaginings built upon previous generations of imaginings, all the way down. …

Granted, but the universe exists independent of the human mindscape. It was here long before the human mindscape and will be here long after the human mindscape.

Do not forget that ultimately humans and the human mindscape are products of the evolution of the “universe”, not the other way around.

In the end there is nothing mysterious about it. The physical evidence leaves no room for scientific speculation, in spite of the limited knowledge contained in the human mindscape.

My point precisely, and from listening to all sorts of philosopher kings of thought, I find it’s regularly given lip service, then promptly forgotten. They go right back to telling the same ego-centric stories that totally leave out the reality of stuff and evolution and Earth.

All the B S around needing metaphysical thinking to comprehend consciousness - for instance Seth with that solar system atom schtick, it’s an example of losing sight of that divide.

It’s easy to give it lip service, not so easy to really appreciate the lesson.
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Tell me W4U how about thinking of the Hubble space telescope, or the computers that weave together the incoming data from Mars, into an amazing images - would you say those machines hallucinating that image for us?

Um… no because 1 x 1 = 1 Still doesn’t work with animals, be they human or other critter.

[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:45, topic:8480”]
All the B S around needing metaphysical thinking to comprehend consciousness - for instance Seth with that solar system atom schtick, it’s an example of losing sight of that divide.

Where did you read that? This is news to me. AFAIK, Anil Seth is very down to earth

It’s easy to give it lip service, not so easy to really appreciate the lesson.

I would never give lipservice to anything to do with outside-the-brain processes. To me a brain is a biological data processor that produces an individual “experience” of its environment.

Tell me W4U how about thinking of the Hubble space telescope, or the computers that weave together the incoming data from Mars, into an amazing images - would you say those machines hallucinating that image for us?
[/quote]

Nooooo…
I am sorry for not being clear enough to leave that impression . Any mechanical observer records natural phenomena exactly as designed and calibrated.
Unfortunately , the brain doesn’t. It does not observe anything, it only processes data.

It is the brain that must make a best guess of the data stream that is collected by the senses. The brain is completely isolated from the exterior, except for the sensory data it receives via the body’s neural network.

I think this is important to remember. The brain itself is blind, deaf and dumb. It doesn’t see, or hear, or speak, or feel. It is a biological data processor, evolved to offer the “owner” (you) maximum chances of survival in a world full of dangers and opportunities.

All it can do is trying to recreate the images from the electrochemical data it receives from the sensory receptors, which it must compare to prior experienced data of similar properties, stored in memory, make a best “comparison” (guess) and act on what it believes is reality. It is the brain that creates the imaginary mindscape.

The brain does not always create the correct mindscape. Colorblind people are a stark reminder of how fragile the sensory network and processing system is and how easily it can present a false “interpretation” of exterior reality. That is the definition of a “hallucination”, a best guess of what’s out-there.

Anil Seth uses this definition, but modifies it with an internal verification process, that results in a “controlled hallucination” by the mind which most often yields a good approximation of exterior reality.

This is confirmed by the fact that no two brains are identical and yield identical mental images . When two brains create a similar internal image of sensory perceptions, we call that “empathy”.

Empathy

Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another’s position. Definitions of empathy encompass a broad range of emotional states. Wikipedia

Why would this be an extraordinary ability if all brains generated the exact same reality? The point is that they don’t. Each individual brain experiences a slightly different reality and that is not just a result of relativity.

Only when our brains agree on what they “imagine reality to be”, do we call it reality.

I agree, but that is a false argument, because you are applying the equation incorrectly.
The way you proposed it the equation should read 1 + 1 + x = 3

Roger Antonsen explains it this way: (X + X = 2 x X) or (5 + 5 = 2 x 5)

see 5:55 below

I disagree. It’s not 1+1+x because there is one mama and one daddy and they get together and become 3. It’s cell division, not math as we know it.

Then again, what I do I know. it took me forever (3 tries) to pass College Algebra with a good solid D. I worked very hard for that D, with a tutor, my gifted (older) son helping me, head banging, insanity, and more, but I passed it and finally got credit for it. I’m proud of that D, because I worked harder for it than any A I ever received. I’m not a math person, but I get cell division, science (without mind-bending math), and oddly enough, I can do basic chemistry and fractions. I also have dyscalculia, which the university discovered and the earlier grades didn’t, due to lack of knowledge of the time concerning various dyslexias prior to the years of my college attendance. My younger son, thanks to his father having dyslexia and me with dyscalculia, he has Classic dyslexia. With a lot of help, and I do mean a lot of help, I finally passed it and got credit for it. I still was able to major in Psychology, but not research psychology or any science that requires math.

Yeah, it’s hidden to those who know 1 + 1 = 3 with humans and more with some other species and no longer have to bust their brains and sanity to get a good solid D that’s better than any A.

During his introduction, in that video lecture of his you keep asking us to watch.

That “produces” an individual experience???
What about the other side of that equation?
You know the environment the person exists within and is always interacting with?

So. right there you’re pissing on the reality ~ mindscape divide

Solms and other scientists describe conscious as basically the inside of your body and brain processing what’s happening to it.
Makes much more sense than saying we “produce” reality = which immediately implies there is a reality that needs producing.

You imply that because the body brain machine needs to process data according its particular instrument/body’s ability. I mean if the Hubble images something and the IRAS images something, they are different images - so which is hallucinating the IRAS or the Hubble?

Our brains have to process data and compose the final product as meaningfully as possible. Simply because we have different brains that process information differently, and yes, we also inject emotions into our thinking algorithms - why does that fundamentally make it any less of an information processing system than the Hubble? Makes no difference if one is color blind or deaf while other senses are enhances, or what ever variance exist, all that is simply the programming.

Right there a place where, I’d say, you have stepped off the edge of the Earth!

To even conceive the notion that the brain is dead, is utterly insane from my perspective. No one’s brain has ever been dead, because once that happens they are no longer humans but have transitioned into carrion.

The brain is not independent of the body anymore than the body is independent of the brain - to discuss the situation in that light, can only lead to dead-end - as the grabble unreal philosophical musing over consciousness continue chasing the same Abrahamic demons western thought has been stuck within.

Perhaps we’re just too ego-centric to be able to take a fresh truly ‘objective’ look at the creature of evolution that we humans are

Here’s another example of you totally missing the Physical Reality ~ Human Mindscape.

This has nothing to do with the fact that each of us perceives the reality around us slightly differently.
That’s totally different from the down to Earth that we navigate a solid physical reality that unfolds according to it’s own natural laws, regarding of how any of us perceive it.

I agree with most various things you’ve said about the physical brain - it’s the flippant attitude toward the physical reality we are negotiating that are fight’n words for me.

That’s just a flashy sexy thing to titillate the intellectually boarded with. It’s a hideous blinkered description of what our brain does.

A hallucination is a perception in the absence of external stimulus that has qualities of real perceptions.

Hallucinations are vivid, substantial, and are perceived to be located in external objective space.

They are distinguishable from several related phenomena, such as dreaming, which does not involve wakefulness; pseudohallucination, which does not mimic real perception, and is accurately perceived as unreal; illusion, which involves distorted or misinterpreted real perception; and imagery (imagination), which does not mimic real perception, and is under voluntary control.

[1] Hallucinations also differ from “delusional perceptions”, in which a correctly sensed and interpreted stimulus (i.e., a real perception) is given some additional significance.

Again no time to carefully unpack your comment, please accept this quick overview.

We agree then on the incorrect application of the equation… :hugs:

p.s. Is cell division not multiplication by means of division?
1,2,4,8,16,32, … :upside_down_face:

Thought of something during my morning walk with Maddy,

It is an intellectual dead end to isolate the brain - after all the brain is directly and indirectly wired to our entire body.

Consciousness is not something emanating only from the brain, it’s an emanation that’s the sum total of your physical being. Your stomach and intestines have about as much to do with our emotions as our brains - these things have been explicate through many scientific studies.

[quote=“citizenschallengev4, post:52, topic:8480, full:true”]
Thought of something during my morning walk with Maddy,

It is an intellectual dead end to isolate the brain - after all the brain is directly and indirectly wired to our entire body.

I agree, the brain controls the body. But it is more complicated than that. Homeostasis is an unconscious control mechanism, similar to a home thermostat. It remains active when the thinking (conscious) part of the brain is anaesthetized.

IOW, your body is a vehicle for the brain. It reacts electrochemically to external stimulus, regardless if you are awake or asleep. Think of a Mars Rover that remains active autonomously, even without direct control from the operators.

Consciousness is not something emanating only from the brain, it’s an emanation that’s the sum total of your physical being. Your stomach and intestines have about as much to do with our emotions as our brains - these things have been explicate through many scientific studies.
[/quote]

I agree, but homeostasis is a sub-conscious control function only. It’s what keeps you alive when you have an operation and are rendered unconscious. The sub-conscious controls remain active.
The anesthesia is only to render the conscious part of the brain “gone” in order to block the pain signals the body sends to the brain.

Homeostasis is not concerned with “where” your organs are located, it is only concerned with "keeping their functions in electrochemical balance ".

Lastly, regardless how smart a person is, he/she would die very quickly without the help of your symbiotic bacteria. And your brain has no control over the way they function. They live in their own world, which is our microbiome.

Only 10 % of you is Human and controlled by your brain! Incredible, but true!

Exactly and that is all the brain can do. The brain itself does not perceive anything located in external objective space. It receives streams of electrochemical data from the senses, from which it must try to make sense, by comparing it with memory.
If the data the brain receives is corrupted in some way it will still make a best guess, but then it will be a “false experience”, i.e. an “uncontrolled hallucination” rather than a “controlled hallucination” which is based on accurate electrochemical data and will result in a true “perceptual” experience.

What Causes Hallucinations? The Brain May Be OverInterpreting a Lack of Info

Now, in experiments on mice, researchers have discovered that hallucinations reduce activity in the brain’s vision center . The finding suggests hallucinations happen when the brain overcompensates for a lack of information coming from the outside world. Mar 26, 2019

Anil Seth: How Does Your Brain Construct Your Conscious Reality?

SETH: Answering this question is so important because consciousness, for each of us, is all there is. Without it, there’s no world, there’s no self, there’s nothing at all. And when we suffer, we suffer consciously, whether it’s through mental illness or pain. And if we can experience joy and suffering, what about other animals? Might they be conscious, too? Do they also have a sense of self? And as computers get faster and smarter, maybe there will come a point, maybe not too far away, when my iPhone develops a sense of its own existence. Now I actually think the prospects for a conscious AI are pretty remote.

In the story I’m going to tell you, our conscious experiences of the world around us, and of ourselves within it, are kinds of controlled hallucinations that happen with, through and because of our living bodies.
Anil Seth: How Does Your Brain Construct Your Conscious Reality? : NPR

Seth doesn’t say that the brain is dead when under anaesthesia. He says that the person (you) becomes an object (like a vegetable) and then is restored to being a person when the anesthesia wears off.

(note: Tegmark uses the same analogy with “a conscious person is food rearranged”)

What guarantees that the person always perceives its environment correctly?
image
The squares marked A and B are the same shade of gray.

This is not a trick optical illusion. Your brain actually hallucinates a different shade of grey than is actually there . Try to wrap your mind around that . It is impossible for your brain to interpret these colors as the same shade of gray. This is a “survival mechanism”, but your brain interprets a false reality nevertheless.

Perhaps you have an aversion to the word, but hallucination often does not mean “delusion”. It more often has to do with, " interpretation of sensory perception" .

How do blind people see using sound?

Blind people who use echoes to map their surroundings, akin to how bats or dolphins navigate, have an adapted brain region that allows them to ‘see’ with sound, a new study suggests. … In some cases, especially when vision is deprived, this flexible system might also use the same organising principles to interpret sound.Oct 12, 2019
https://www.sciencealert.com › blind-people-who-echoloc…

Find another word for delusion.

In this page you can discover 53 synonyms, antonyms, idiomatic expressions, and related words for delusion, like: misapprehension , self-deception, misconception, phantasm, apparition, fact, illusion, will-o’-the-wisp, conceit, fancy and error.
https://thesaurus.yourdictionary.com › delusion

I don’t like this word “delusion”. It has always a negative connotation.

I would like to, but I clicked on your link and saw this:

Sorry, this post has been removed by the moderators of r/explainlikeimfive.

Moderators remove posts from feeds for a variety of reasons, including keeping communities safe, civil, and true to their purpose.

As a moderator myself, it’s always nice to have one’s work validated. We don’t get as many problem posts, so I like to take the time to try to get to know people who seem interested only in those who agree with them. You can call me “closed-minded” or whatever, I don’t care. It doesn’t add to your logic.

You are welcome here, but be sure to keep within the rules, and it wouldn’t hurt to think about your methods of inquiry. We kind of pride ourselves on that. It’s in the name.

That’s the sort to silliness that upsets me. Grand conjectures based on an unwillingness to admit you’re processing insufficient information. Just like your over simplification of homeostasis, or that sharp line you draw between conscious and unconscious that you insist upon.

Revised Estimates for the Number of Human and Bacteria Cells in the Body

August 2016
Ron Sender,1 Shai Fuchs,2,¤* and Ron Milo1,*

Abstract

Reported values in the literature on the number of cells in the body differ by orders of magnitude and are very seldom supported by any measurements or calculations. Here, we integrate the most up-to-date information on the number of human and bacterial cells in the body. We estimate the total number of bacteria in the 70 kg “reference man” to be 3.8·1013.
For human cells, we identify the dominant role of the hematopoietic lineage to the total count (≈90%) and revise past estimates to 3.0·1013 human cells.
Our analysis also updates the widely-cited 10:1 ratio, showing that the number of bacteria in the body is actually of the same order as the number of human cells, and their total mass is about 0.2 kg. …

I remember hearing about that 90% when it was first announced and was totally gobsmacked, trying to conceive of all those non-human micros reside within or between the cells of my body and weird thoughts that led to.

Then when I finally got around to reading about, it’s was quite the ah ha moment, then the whole thing finally started to make a lot more sense than a sensation troupes such as: “Only 10 % of you is Human and controlled by your brain!”

That’s the stuff of our playful mindscape, not physical reality, or even serious science for that matter,
really. Don’t believe me:

Assessing and Interpreting the Within-Body Biogeography of Human Microbiome Diversity

August 2018

Zhanshan Ma1,2*, Lianwei Li1,2 and Wendy Li1,2

… A human body hosts a relatively independent microbiome including five major regional biomes (i.e., airway, oral, gut, skin, and urogenital). …

And for gosh sake what is it you are trying to prove with going on about optical illusions.

Trying to understand human perception and conscious by studying optical illusions is self-delusion to the core. Those studies can definitely help in better understanding the brain’s wiring and plumbing - but for understanding consciousness you need to dig deeper inside, and deep into our evolutionary pasts.

All else is looking through the wrong end of the microscope - even if it pays pretty well, in these days where provocative is more important that structurally solid - another example of what I mean about getting lost within our lovely mindscapes.

sorry would have liked being cheerier but not in the mood. All this stuff isn’t just interesting trivia this has a direct bearing on how we pay attention to existential matters and how utterly incapable humanity seems to have become at constructively addressing the problems we ourselves created - instead just like trump, we just double down on the self delusion and dare not question our self-certain arrogance.

That’s not what I find when I look up the word in the dictionary or the literature

A perception of having seen, heard, touched, tasted, or smelled something that wasn’t actually there.
Oxford

Have you ever encountered a patient who reported isolated visual hallucinations but did not have any other symptoms of delirium or psychosis?
2009 study - Visual Hallucinations: Differential Diagnosis and Treatment

What Are Hallucinations?

If you’re like most folks, you probably think hallucinations have to do with seeing things that aren’t really there. But there’s a lot more to it than that. It could mean you touch or even smell something that doesn’t exist.
WebMD - By Paige Fowler
Medically Reviewed by Smitha Bhandari, MD on July 26, 2021

Definition of hallucination

1a : a sensory perception (such as a visual image or a sound) that occurs in the absence of an actual external stimulus and usually arises from neurological disturbance (such as that associated with delirium tremens, schizophrenia, Parkinson’s disease, or narcolepsy) or in response to drugs (such as LSD or phencyclidine)visual/auditory/olfactory/gustatory/tactile hallucinationsa drug-induced hallucinationAn important aspect of the study of hallucinations is the judgement of reality. How does a patient confer the character of reality on stimuli which, beyond any reasonable doubt, originate in his own mind?— Cesare Davalli et al.
b : the object of a hallucinatory perceptionwasn’t sure if the creature was real or a hallucination
2 : an unfounded or mistaken impression or notion : DELUSION
Merriam Webster

and on and on and on.

I don’t see what there is to pick on delusion for, seems pretty straightforward.

Delusion = an idiosyncratic belief or impression that is firmly maintained despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality or rational argument, typically a symptom of mental disorder.

“the delusion of being watched”

Apparently you do not quite understand what’s going on in the brain when you are seeing the shadowed square on that chessboard.

Your brain is hallucinating square B as lighter than square A and there is nothing you can do about it.

Yes indeed, this optical hallucination is a hardwired evolutionary conscious product of a naturally selected beneficial survival strategy. That is why you unable to see the true shades. Your brain won’t let you. It is just one example of the emergent independence of conscious perception of reality.

Why do you continue to resist the simple fact, that took billions of years to become a part of the brain’s survival algorithms.

OK, you keep criticizing the explanations offered by experts in their field, but you are not providing an alternate conclusion other than declaring that everything is a result of evolutionary processes. I know that and I bet all scientist who believe in abiogenesis know that. What we don’t know is how evolutionary processes have enabled our brain to acquire its extraordinary abilities.

However I have proposed a very strong argument in favor of the beneficial mutational fusion of two ancestral chromosomes, because it is the single irrefutable evidence that humans have 23 pr chromosomes, whereas all other great apes have 24 pr chromosomes.
That fact irrefutably sets the homo sapiens from all other hominids.

Don’t fall victim to overconfidence in your own mental abilities to understand the evolutionary journey of mankind. You do know the dangers as is evident by your pointing them our in others.

If you believe that conclusively settles the issue, then it might behoove you to find supporting evidence from other sources.

Here is another source that puts this in perspective:

Methods and Results

# NIH Human Microbiome Project defines normal bacterial makeup of the body

Genome sequencing creates first reference data for microbes living with healthy adults.

The human body contains trillions of microorganisms — outnumbering human cells by 10 to 1. Because of their small size, however, microorganisms make up only about 1 to 3 percent of the body’s mass (in a 200-pound adult, that’s 2 to 6 pounds of bacteria), but play a vital role in human health.
NIH Human Microbiome Project defines normal bacterial makeup of the body | National Institutes of Health (NIH)

Cell division doesn’t quite work like the numbers you displayed. Basically, Nature doesn’t know how to count, multiply, divide, etc as the mathematicians say. It makes it’s own rules and does it own thing, including being radical, muutated, etc