Day 3411, Cogito, ergo sum.

I understand Descartes’ journey to find the things that he, or maybe better said, we can know. I also strive not to speculate, but to stick to what we can know, such as Descartes’ “I think, therefore I am.” And it is obvious that we think, regardless of what we believe.

I thought about this because of what even he, in a different way, will have noticed. I like YouTube, but I don’t care too much for the model or the company that owns it. However, there are a lot of interesting videos to find. There is, of course, this famous algorithm that serves you what might be interesting for you. This makes it difficult to be critical of what you find on YouTube because we all have a different experience, no feed is the same. But as long as you know that there is an algorithm and how it roughly works, you can make use of it to find interesting stuff and what hangs around the borders of what you find interesting.

I enjoy watching documentaries, interviews, and video essays about philosophy, psychology, society, and related topics. But most of what I watch is from creators who are sceptical, and they tend to steer away from speculation. Last week, I watched some videos about consciousness, and in some of them, they interviewed individuals who seemed to be experts in a specific subject and stuck to that topic throughout the video. If I find someone interesting, I will conduct some research to gain an impression of their stance on other subjects. Sometimes, they stray from the norm and come up with the most fantastic ideas on how all of this, in this case, consciousness, works when you watch them being interviewed or portrayed by creators who have a more specific agenda and are less critical. It is, of course, no crime to speculate, but when I then see them in these pseudo-scientific videos about third dimensions and alternate states, I will reach for the ignore button.

These uncritical thinkers are no Descartes, so that’s why I ignore them. Even though Descartes will also venture into areas where he cannot prove that what he says is true, he still has a great mind. With thinkers from his time, it is also harder to blame them for not being too outspoken because blasphemy could literally cost you your head, and they did not have the luxury of all the knowledge we now have about our physical bodies. Descartes is, of course, known for his dualism, which posits that the physical body somehow interacts with the spiritual world, specifically the soul. Scientists have examined the brain and other parts of the body where this connection is formed, but most serious thinkers recognize that there is no soul and such a connection. One of the clues is damage to parts of the brain, which then affects how we think (think also of alcohol, caffeine, and drugs). If there is a soul separated from our physical body, how can this soul then be affected? Damage to the brain is something that can be measured, and its effects are visible in how someone behaves. In this, you also need to theorize on why this is, but there are at least effects to be measured that can give some proof. Theorizing what happens with the soul and how that connects with the world is much harder to ground in reality, a reality we can all understand, and not just the imaginative mind of a few individuals.

Day 3405, Do you know that they say? 1

Daily picture, Do you know that they say?

Do you know that they say?

They say that we, well… with ‘we’ I mean our brain, are good at spinning our experiences, and especially our past experiences, in such a way that we feel we are the same person now as we were years ago. There is, of course, no independent source that records all our experiences, but if you know how our brain works, you more or less have to conclude that the past we remember is, for the most part, an invention of your brain to keep you from feeling lost in the overabundance of reality.

We get bombarded with millions of inputs every second through all our senses, but some scientists say that we process only 20 inputs per second. Can you imagine that if you heard everything that your ears hear, you would not be able to listen to the sound you want to listen to? Our Brains are evolved to ignore most of the noise around us and “guess” what is interesting. You will also feel a touch on your arm when it is unexpected, but ignore all the times your clothes are touching you in the same places. The we in us, the so-called conscious part, is only aware of a select part of all the millions of inputs.

If you accept this as something that sounds right or at least logical, then you can take it a step further and view all our experiences as just another input for our brains. Our brain not only filters out unwanted noises but also unwanted experiences that disturb our present state of mind. This doesn’t mean that you only feel happy thoughts; it means that if you are a racist at this moment, your brain “rewrites” your past in such a way that you forget that you really liked your teacher, who was a foreigner, when you were young. This is, of course, a possibly flawed example, but the point is that we often lack a clear understanding of what happened in our past because our brain gradually rewrites memories over time to align with who we are now. There is simply no way to remember who you were in a distant past; even stories from friends and family contradicting your version of events will have to go through this filter, so you preserve them as correct, and otherwise you will dispute them.

If you believe that you have a soul that is independent of your body and that your soul is the you, you feel then this idea might not work for you. There is no proof that we have a soul, only that we feel that we have something like a soul, and the soul you feel correlates with the one prevalent in your culture. As far as we know, our brain, along with all the hormones and other factors that influence it, is responsible for shaping our emotions and identity, which in turn create our feelings, including those of the soul. This can be tested, has been tested, and a conclusion can be drawn. Just as most of the cells in your body are not the same as they were 30 years ago, there is no reason to believe that very little of you is the same as the you from 30 years ago, though you would never feel it; you can only understand that it is so if you’re lucky and except it.

“My soul is a hidden orchestra; I know not what instruments, what fiddlestrings and harps, drums and tamboura I sound and clash inside myself. All I hear is the symphony.”
Fernando Pessoa,

I don’t say that your brain does a good job of protecting you from feeling lost; it is possibly the default or primal state it tries to tone down. I suppose a cow that does little thinking requires less protection from somber thoughts in an evolutionary context. I guess our first words and thoughts were questions, wondering why we need shelter every day and why some people stop being there, and the endless chore this is. This was probably the reason why religion was a successful tool in taking away the sharp edges of this empty feeling. We need our illusions, pretty lights, and sounds so we can forget. I just wonder when “we” decided the noise was ugly because is not your symphony, my nightmare?