The Void of Somethingness

I haven't posted on here for a while, but I wanted to test something.

This is just a little experiment of mine, so please follow along if it intrests you. I will set a hypothetical situation and you just answer the question. That is all. We will then disscuss this question afterwords. I'm not sure if this will get far or not, that will depend if people are intrested.

Also, excuse my spelling. I type fast so i ussually don't pay attention to it much. Besides, isn't like I'm writing a resume.

The situation...

Here you are, in nothing. You cannot see, because you have no eyes. You cannot hear the birds, you have no ears. Your voice is absent, even if it wasnt you wouldn't hear it anyways. You fell nothing, for that you have no body. You've been like this since you were born.

Despite these disabilities you do have one thing, thought. Call it consciousness, existance, whatever you will. But something is there. You just know it.

So I ask with the following. What is real?

Please await my reply to your post because I will have more questions for you.

I'm sure many will be able to answer this question better than I can, but I'll go ahead and toss my immediate idea out to the question you posed....

My immediate thought would be that the only thing real would be what you perceive to be real. As you have no voice, no sight, no hearing, but you have thought, I would believe that you could make rational decisions using your thought. Thus, whatever you believed to be real, would be real....to you.

reply to post by TSearchX


Yes. Then there's more though.

You have emotions still. You don't need your five senses to tell that. What would you feel?

I smoked some of that stuff one time.

It would be the ultimate sensory deprivation experiment. There would be no ability to sense any external stimulus to stimulate the brain....so, I would think that you would be lost in your thoughts, fall into REM sleep based on memories, and eventually go utterly mad.

Originally posted by hbarker
I smoked some of that stuff one time.

Real replies please...

reply to post by Ultraman2011


Sorry I added a sentence to clairfy it a bit more. Reply again but you've been like this since you were born.

"I think therefore I am"

The only thing that you would be certain of is yourself. At least your own self-awareness/consciousness right?

In a way, isn't that what we all are anyway? If not for light waves, our eyes would serve no purpose. If not for sound waves, our ears would also be obselete.

pretty interesting thought... nice post

reply to post by deanGI5


Exactly, but I was wanting to take this a bit further, but yes thats pretty much the point.

Now same question, but remember, you have emotion. You don't need your 5 senses to tell that. What would you feel at this moment?

reply to post by Passafist


Ahh...okay, in that case, what is real is whatever you can think, envision and experience internally with thought, for there is no external reality as you know it. Reality would be purely based on your thoughts. I guess if you approached this individual it would be like asking us to describe the 4th dimension. We cannot describe what we cannot experience.

However, I question how much this person could think in advanced thought patterns. I have read that dogs think in pictures as they cannot speak. So, could this person think advanced, concrete thoughts under these circumstances? I have having trouble envisioning it.

reply to post by Passafist

As you would have always been in a state where you had no external stimuli there would be no longing for that which you have never had. I think, as was stated already, you would create your own reality. Perhaps even a multitude of realities.

This is the ultimate question of creation. From out of the void there came life. We are indeed the creators in this scenario, and to go even a little deeper, perhaps that is our state of being and what we perceive as reality is merely an illusion of our own creation.

reply to post by Ultraman2011


Pleae stay with the question at hand I asked above (Unless you missed my edit making your reply, that understandable). Now, you have emotion, you don't need 5 senses to tell that. As said before you have NONE of the five senses as well. What woudl you FEEL at this moment?

reply to post by kac63


Spot on, now take it further.

Imagine you are this person. No five senses but you have emtoion, you don't need senses to tell that. What would you feel at that moment?

reply to post by Passafist


I believe what I would feel is the need for connection, companionship...even love. To know that I was not alone. This need, this feeling would lead me to formulate a reality where I was not alone, where there was connection to another or others.

I also think I would feel the need to learn, grow, create. This would in a sense require some sort of conflict, for it is from conflict that growth emerges. My mind would set into motion a bit of chaos, giving me and those I envision challenges to overcome.

reply to post by kac63


Yes, in a simple word bored as well.

Now, you've created your reality and started to accually become completely real to you. Mainly since you have no external stimuli your mind would focus on it.

Now, last question.

Lest introduce that external stimuli. All the sudden you can see, hear, taste, smell, and feel some other world external to you. Is the world you imagined during your 'disabled' time real, or fake?

reply to post by Passafist


I've often thought about this exact scenario, before I answer this I'd just like to point out that I have a few metaphysical beliefs and theories.

I think through the early stages of brain development I think we'd experience an extended dream-like state but as our brains developed I think our 'other' senses would start to kick in enabling the possibility of seeing flashes and random images of the outside world through dreams and hypnagogic imagery.

There was actually a woman who was born blind and one day had a near death experience, in-fact I think she actually died for a few minutes but the paramedics were able to resuscitate her, she then told them in detail what they were doing and wearing, I've heard a number of cases like that, so I'm definitely open to that idea.

reply to post by Passafist


The perception of this new stimuli would appear as the illusion. After spending a lifetime living in my own reality and what I understood to be real anything that would challenge that notion would be met with fear, doubt and perhaps would even be blocked out and overcome by the reality of my own creation.

It is similar to being told a fact all your life by those you trust, seeing and believing what you have been told to be real. Then the time comes when you are shown what you have accepted as real all you life was indeed a lie, an illusion, many would fight to keep their own perception of reality in place. This is not so far-fetched and occurs on a daily basis in this world in which we live.

Originally posted by Passafist
reply to post by kac63

 

Yes, in a simple word bored as well.

I don't know that one in this situation would comprehend boredom....as there would be nothing to gauge it upon.

One would simply ....be.

Now, you've created your reality and started to accually become completely real to you. Mainly since you have no external stimuli your mind would focus on it.

Now, last question.

Lest introduce that external stimuli. All the sudden you can see, hear, taste, smell, and feel some other world external to you. Is the world you imagined during your 'disabled' time real, or fake?

I don't know how a human would respond to the sudden "change of state"(so to speak)... but it has been observed that Battery Hens go crazy/mad when freed of their life-long pens.

I don't think that it would be unacceptable to consider that the same may happen in a human devoid of "input" to suddenly be inundated with synaptic stimuli.


To add....

Here I ask...giving the senses back to the subject....Are we freeing them of a prison or are we imprisoning them?

reply to post by YouDeserveToKnow


That is what I've been thinking. I came to this idea a few years ago, I was 8 (I know, young). I just thought, "How come I'm seeing, hear, tasting, etc from this body and not that one?" I didn't think much of it at first, but that idea grew on me. It blew my mind once I hit 15 and really thoguht about it. It's been a few years since.

One thing led to another and here I am.

You would not be able to determine if it was real or not.

Just like we can not now, technically.

The only thing we can be sure of is ourselves - "I think, therefore I am."

think about it this way -

Your whole life has been nothing but a 'dream' per say. This reply that I am currently typing to you now, is really from your subconscious, trying to get you to see that you are only dreaming and need to wake up. You have never woken up. I am only in your head. So is everything and everyone else you have ever encountered.

Your favorite songs have meaning to you because they were written by your subconscious. Your favorite movies mean so much to you for the same reason - they are really from you. from your subconscious. Every conversation you have had with anyone, was really just all in your head. You were conversing with no one other than yourself - your subconscious.

There have been many signs throughout your life that have tried to do the same thing - reveal to you that nothing you know is real. The only thing you can be sure of being real is yourself because you are self-aware.

The reason you go along with this 'dream' is because you believe that your 'reality' is real. It seems real to you because it is all that you have every known. You have known nothing else.


You can not disprove this. You can ask people if they are real, you can touch them, hurt them, get in trouble, suffer consequences, but that does not disprove this. They will tell you they are real because that is what you want to believe. You will get in trouble for doing wrong and suffer consequences because that is what you are programmed to believe in this 'dream' of yours - in this false reality.


So... Then only thing that everyone can be 100% sure of is their own existance, because they can think for themselves. They are self-aware..