Tag: simulation

Fantasy Is Reality

crimson

I’ve written two other posts discussing fantasy and reality. In the first I tried to show how fantasy and reality related to one another; how fantasy tends to include and be influenced by reality. I felt it was important to demonstrate that many fantasies are often mistaken for reality, of fictions being misrepresented as facts. That I think it is important to recognize this, lest I fall into creating my own simulacra, deceiving myself about the world.

In the second post, I explored more precisely what fantasy was, and how I tend to work toward making my fantasy into reality. I tried to show how fantasies are sort of like my wishes and desires, and how I can sometimes manipulate reality in order to turn a fantasy into the real. The main point I focused on was how fantasy and reality are not really opposites from each other, but more like steps of a procedure; my fantasy is my ambition, and turning it into reality is my goal.

Today, I again delve into these two related concepts, but this time I want to discuss how there is something of reality in fantasy. That is, when I spend time in a fantasy, like when I read a book or enter into simulation, how the fantasy is in some way just as real as the reality I am in here and now. How fantasy is reality, in a very real sense.

Before going any further, I first need to set some ground rules. Language here is already becoming incredibly confusing. And so, when I use the term Reality (with the capital letter “R”) I will be referring to this realm that I presently inhabit. That is, I am talking about the life that I exist in, just as I assume you do as well, where I have a flesh and blood body and I am required to breath and eat to sustain myself. Where I live on a planet we call Earth, in a country we call Canada. I have a job and I have a partner that I live with.

It may seem strange for me to delve into such detail, but I assure you it is necessary. This Reality is not to be confused with what goes on on the Internet in chat rooms or the like. In Reality, I have to literally walk from place to place, picking up objects with my flesh and blood hands. In Reality, if I die, I cease to be able to participate in other realities, which is something I will discuss a little later.

When I use the term Fantasy (with the capital letter “F”) I will be referring to a realm of existence where I am real but the world I inhabit is in some way fictitious. For example, when I read a book, within my mind I imagine the world of the story. The images in my mind, of the landscapes and of the people, are entirely fictitious and do not exist in Reality. The world I inhabit, while reading the book, only exists within my mind and my imagination. Often there are similar and related things in Fantasy to what exists in Reality, however if something in Fantasy is changed, the similar thing in Reality will remain unaffected.

There can be many Fantasies. As another example, perhaps I play a video game on my computer. The world of the video game is another Fantasy, distinct from the earlier example while I read the book. In the world of the video game, I still exist in some fashion, though the world of the game is now represented within a computer. It may be presented to me through the use of a monitor or perhaps even goggles over my eyes, but that world still does not exist in Reality.

I hope the clearing up of these terms helps, but I suspect it is still going to be challenging to follow. I will do my best to keep things clear.

I have already been hinting at something significant here during my definitions that is the real focus of my interest in this discussion. In both Reality and Fantasy, there is something in common: me. While the world in Fantasy may be fictitious, I am not. Perhaps I control an avatar within the Fantasy, and that avatar is certainly going to be fictitious, but I am still linked to that avatar in some way. And again, for emphasis, I am still real. I inhabit Reality and Fantasy simultaneously.

But then what am “I” really? Clearly I cannot be talking about my flesh and blood body, as that seems only to exist in Reality. There is no flesh and blood in Fantasy, at least not of the same sort as exists in Reality. If one assumes mind-body dualism, as René Descartes suggested, then “I” clearly cannot be my body. “I” must be somewhat closer to being my mind. And when it comes to simulations like video games, this may very well suite our purposes acceptably. But in the case of reading the book, this does not work as well. In a video game, “I” controls an avatar. In a book, “I” does not control anything.

No, when I talk about “me” in these cases, I need to be talking about something distinct from my mind as well. Perhaps not entirely distinct, but at least different than. “I” can exist apart from my mind, in some sense. So again, what am “I” really?

The best I’ve been able to describe this idea I have, up to the point I wrote this post, is that “I” am a thing that experiences. A “first person” for lack of better language. When my eyes react to the light outside my body, chemical signals are sent to my brain and interpreted. The interpretations are then… What exactly? Analyzed perhaps? Worked with? Experienced is the only word I can come up with. Something experiences whatever the brain has been dealing with. This is “me,” the thing that experiences.

I’ve tried to explain this concept to others, but I think I have failed every time. Perhaps I am failing again this very moment. But I hope not. And I will continue, in the hopes that you understand, at least a little bit.

What is extremely important to clarify here is that if “I” am the thing that experiences, then my mind is not necesarily under my control, in a sense. I am a reflection, or a reaction, to the world around me. It seems to be, as far as I can tell, that Reality is highly (if not completely) deterministic. That is, Reality appears to follow a law of cause and effect. For me to see, light must excite the cells in the back of my eyes. The light is the cause, and the excited cells are the effect. Those excited cells send chemical signals through neurons to my brain. The excited cells are now the cause, and the chemical signals now the effect. I can add more specificity, but the result is the same. Something causes something else to happen, the effect.

My mind is part of this chain that started with my body. The body is my interface to the world, reacting to stimulus, and manipulating matter. I can pick up the glass that was on my table, and place it beneath, and thus have manipulated Reality. However, as I stated earlier, my body does not exist in Fantasy. My mind receives the information from my body, and can send commands to my body, allowing me to pick up that glass. But in Fantasy, there is no body and no glass.

In the case of some Fantasies, my mind may still exist in the same fashion it did in Reality, however, it no longer controls my body in Reality nor even necessarily receives the same stimulus from it. This point is highly contentious, as it can easily be argued that the body in Reality is receiving all the stimulus from the monitor or goggles, which are presenting the Fantasy to me. Perhaps this is why my mind can so easily be reasoned to continue to exist within Fantasy. So let us tackle this from another perspective.

In the case where I read the book, what then is going on? There is no monitor to present Fantasy to my eyes. No speaker to present Fantasy to my ears. Where does the interface lay? It seems to me that my mind itself now becomes the interface. Through my imagination, I generate my Fantasy realm. My mind has, in some sense, replaced my body in this regard. But it still isn’t quite clear what is happening in this case. It is not clear whether my mind is both representing my Fantasy world and simultaneously “me.” Can it do both at the same time?

Untangling becomes a bit more interesting when I consider the fact that the story from the book contains a character: the protagonist. “I,” in some way, inhabit the protagonist. “I” become that entity in a very real way. As the story is read, I can feel what the protagonist feels and see what the protagonist sees. Within my imagination, of course. But that is the very point I am driving towards here. I feel what the protagonist feels. My feelings are real, even when the protagonist is not.

To be happy or sad are not things I can control or fabricate. It is true that I can present myself to be these things to others in Reality, or even in Fantasy, and the others may be convinced. But I would still know on some level. I cannot deceive myself, can I, akin to Jean-Paul Sartre‘s description of Bad Faith, working at convincing myself to ignore the evidence to the contrary. My feelings simply are as they are. I can try to deny them or ignore them, but they still exist despite my best efforts.

The key here is that these feelings are still real to me. I still experience them, regardless of what realm I seem to be inhabiting. In Reality. In Fantasy. It makes no difference to “me.” I feel as I feel. The feelings are.

In writing this all down, it occurs to me that perhaps these feelings are not necessarily a part of my mind anymore, and may instead be a part of “me.” Perhaps “I” am more than merely a thing that experiences. Or perhaps the fact that “I” am a thing that experiences is why I have these feelings at all. Perhaps emotion is a component of “I.”

Returning to my focus, “I” still experience my feelings, regardless of whether I am in Reality or in Fantasy. “I” am the same, in some sense, even when the world around me is completely different. “I” remain. “I” am consistent, or persistent. “I” exist in all realms.

The feelings I feel, the experiences I experience, are all just as real to me regardless of the realm they seem to originate from.

It makes no difference to me if the world around me is fabricated, if I am still brought to anger and wish to lash out. I still lash out. Perhaps the manner in which I am forced to lash out will be changed based on the limitations and restrictions of the realm I presently inhabit, but I still feel as I feel and I still lash out in some manner. Whether I am flailing my arms in Reality, or my avatar is flailing his arms in Fantasy, I still manifest my emotional state in both cases.

In the case of the protagonist, I may not have control of my actions. I may be stiffled. My anger welling up inside me, begging to be set free, while the protagonist restrains himself. Unable to manifest how I need to manifest, as the Fantasy realm in this case is limiting my actions and agency. But I still feel that anger. I still feel.

I know this is all quite a lot to consider. Quite an abstract concept to wrap one’s brain around. But I hope I’ve been successful in my attempt. To demonstrate how there exists something very real within Fantasy. How Reality, in some sense, exists within all Fantasy. Because “I” am real, and “I” exist in all Fantasy. At least, all Fantasy that “I” participate in, whether voluntary or involuntary.

Because “I” exist in all realms, and because “I” am in some sense real at all times, the significance between Fantasy and Reality becomes less important. I experience in both Fantasy and Reality. Fantasy and Reality both generate within me feelings, and those feelings are always real to me. In these ways Fantasy might as well be Reality for most purposes. And if I don’t know the difference, it may ultimately be unimportant to me. Robert Nozick‘s suggestion that I would not want to participate in the experience machine because it was somehow not real seems false. Fantasy may be Reality, as far as I can tell, or even as far as I want to.

The Rarity of Free Will

crimson

What could possess me to make another post so quickly? An epiphany. A revelation. Many years in the making. The adjusted belief that perhaps freedom does exist, but it is simply so very rare.

In the beginning, about when I was in high school, I started to doubt the ideas of free will. More specifically, the idea of an effect without a cause. I would play Dungeons & Dragons with my friends, and I considered the randomness of rolling a die. When one throws the cube, it bounces around before settling down with one of its six faces showing up toward the person. The epitome of random. But is it really?

In high school, I took physics classes, and perhaps it was due to my novel education that I considered the situation carefully. Were I to know the precise velocity that the die was released, the effects of the atmosphere on the cube as it flew through the air, the imperfections in the surface as it struck down, the coefficients of friction, and all of the various minutia of the events, using a bit of math I could probably predict which face would end up showing. Sure, to know all of these details may not be feasible; I am merely human with limited capacities. But if I could have somehow acquired all of this knowledge, I feel quite confident I could do it. I could predict this random event.

But that becomes a contradiction, does it not? Part of what is baked into the definition of random is that it is unpredictable. To be truly random, no amount of knowledge should ever be sufficient to perform such a calculation. Certainly there is a conflict here. Either my idea is incorrect, or there are not as many random events in our universe as I believed. In fact, what if there are no random events at all?

I’ve been working on computers for most of my life. Computers can generate random numbers, can’t they? Well, as it turns out, no they cannot. The algorithms used by computers to provide seemingly random information can be exceedingly creative, running up against the feasibility concern I’ve raised above. But the results are still not truly or purely random. The use of seemingly unpredictable events from the outside environment (the passage of time, the manner in which I move my mouse, the choice and patterns I employ when utilizing my keyboard, etc) are called entropy and are used to seed the random number generators in our favorite electronic devices. It’s random, but really, it’s not.

There is a marked difference between something that is entirely unpredictable because no amount of knowledge could ever be acquired to predict a result, and something that could be predicted given enough time and effort. The question I posed to a philosophy group this past summer was to suggest that were I God, with an omniscient and omnipotent nature, the feasibility issue might be overlooked. God, I said, could predict these unpredictable events. Unfortunately for me, the suggestion of being God simply overshadowed any attempt at a reasonable discussion after that point.

However, this is the point I am making. For something to be truly random, even God would not be able to predict the outcome. If God could predict the outcome, then it isn’t truly random. Does true randomness exist in our universe? Or does everything bow down to the law of causality, with every single effect being caused by some other event? It seems impossible for us to ever determine such a thing.

If I exist in a hard deterministic universe, where all things follow causality, then there seems to be another very serious problem. There are other things I cherish and value that seem impossible. True creativity seems impossible as well; anything I may want to call creative is simply the reorganization and reassembly of other past things. Perhaps I might want to include the idea of accidents promoting creativity, but as with the previous discussion of randomness, accidents are simply expected events that may not feasibly be predicted either.

Freedom is another such thing. I am speaking of the sort of freedom that includes unpredictability as part of its description. The sort of freedom that I assume God would have, and that I hope I too have. The free will that allows me to break out of a purely deterministic universe by injecting something like an uncaused cause into the mix. If true randomness and true creativity cannot be, then neither can true freedom it seems.

I told my own mother my discovery one day, telling her that I could not believe in free will. Fate, I said, must be how things operate (using the term as I wasn’t aware of the term deterministic at the time). Her response was both passionate and quite surprising to me. “Go step in front of a moving bus,” she said, “if what you say is true, then you will not be harmed.” I was shocked. Of course I would be harmed I told her, but the discussion simply became ridiculous. I could not, for the longest time, understand why she had suggested such a thing.

Later, I realized that what she was suggesting wasn’t quite the same thing as I am discussing here. For her, I think I sounded pompous and arrogant. Like perhaps I felt I had divine protection and influence, or some other equally unlikely blessing. I think I understood the reactions Joe Bauers in Idiocracy was receiving from people after having been frozen for 500 years. Like Joe, I was not trying to impress or sound special. I was simply stating things as I understood them. Communications can be quite challenging at times.

As a result of that interaction with my own mother, I decided it would be best to broach the subject differently going forward. I would say that I don’t believe in free will, but I am open to the possibility. If ever someone was able to convince me of the possibility, I would take the argument seriously.

Fast forward now to the years of the pandemic. Marvel releases the television show Loki. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there is a multiverse. That is, there is not one universe but many. There is not one me, but many, each just a little bit different than the others. In each case, the differences are typically caused by my exercising of my free will. When an event occurs whereby I can choose between more than one option, in truth I actually choose ALL options. Each option I choose forks the universe into another parallel universe. In one of these universes I chose the vanilla ice cream, but in another I chose chocolate.

One issue I found with the show was that there seemed not to be as many Nexus events (these free will events that fork the timeline) as I would have expected. After all, I am faced with numerous free will choices every day. Possibly each hour, minute, or even second. The administration of the timeline, trying to address the multitude of Nexus events caused by me alone would be untenable, let along that there are literally billions upon billions of other individuals with free will causing as many other Nexus events across time and space. So, in the show, why are there only a few at a time? The Time Variance Authority (TVA) seems pretty calm, simply sending out their teams occasionally to address these problem events.

The show never addresses my concern, but I have a theory: perhaps the reason Nexus events are so rare is that free will is not so prevalent as I would like to think. What if I am not expressing a free will when selecting between ice cream flavours, as my selection perhaps follows a more predictable structure due to my preferences and past experiences. If this is true, it may even be possible that not all individuals are even capable of expressing a free will. Perhaps free will is an extremely rare occurrence.

The Loki television show may have sparked this thought process, but it has been the immanent release of The Matrix Resurrections that has truly pushed my mind to think about this outside the box. Specifically, not the upcoming film itself, but rethinking about the previous films.

In particular, a person on Reddit posted a question regarding what would happen if two people inside the Matrix were to mate and have offspring. They wondered whether the offspring would be a computer program or somehow connected to a physical human outside the Matrix. Initially I laughed, but then I thought about it, and the question is absolutely brilliant. The answer is both surprising and depressing at the same time.

The Matrix is a simulation. Any individual who connects to the simulation will experience their own personal perspective of the simulation. While the simulation can offer the opportunity for individuals to interact with other individuals within the simulation, ultimately the bulk of any one person’s experience is being provided by the simulation itself. The simulation is what controls the environment and all things that the individual can interact with. If a bird flies by, the simulation will control that bird (unless the bird is an occupant jacked into the simulation, which is likely not occurring very often, especially in the storyline of The Matrix).

The answer to the above question is that any offspring would be a product of the simulation. The offspring would be a program, or part of the simulation’s program. Simply code. Similarly, if a physical baby human is born and immediately connected to the simulation, the simulation itself will have to provide virtual parents and all the other necessary elements to attend to the new life. Even if one thinks for a moment that those running the simulation might decide to take a moment to try and find appropriately similar parents or children to connect to the strange virtual relationship, aside from the most ridiculously complicated procedure that would render the simulation untenable, they would be mistaken. If the point of the Matrix is to sedate the occupants of the simulation in order to facilitate leaching energy off those occupants, a process attempting to maintain the connections between the occupants in this manner would use up all the available energy acquired in the process. It wouldn’t make any sense, because it is unreasonable. It isn’t feasible.

In other words, most of the “players” in the simulation must necessarily be controlled by the simulation and not be occupants. What is often refereed to in games as Non Player Characters or NPCs. There would be far more NPCs in any simulation than individuals connected to it. In fact, it would even make sense for there to be only one individual to be in simulation, with ALL other individuals being NPCs. To be in simulation is to enter into a sort of solipsism.

To further expand on this situation, consider the possibility that I am in simulation presently. It has been suggested that if a civilization develops the capacity to perform ultra realistic simulations, they are likely to run many, many such simulations. And if there are so many simulations in existence, the likelihood is quite high that I am within one of these simulations. To have so many simulations seems quite similar to the description of a multiverse.

If the probability is high that I am in simulation, then it is similarly high that any individual I encounter is an NPC. In fact, yes, it is also possible I am such an NPC as well. In any case, even if I am not an NPC, there are still going to be an incredibly high number of NPCs in this universe I find myself in. I could possibly be the only non NPC as well.

Finally, if I make the assumption that an NPC will NOT have free will, then I can now explain why free will would be so incredibly rare. With so few non NPCs in existence, even across so many simulated universes, the number of Nexus events in the Loki television show would be quite small and very manageable. And in my “real world” that I occupy right this moment, I can provide a reasonable explanation as to why free will itself would be so incredibly rare, to the point that it may not even exist.

In Simulation

crimson

The new Matrix film is nearly upon us, and so my partner and I are watching all the previous films and supplementary material. An important part of this process is discussing the films after viewing, sharing the various revelations we have that we may have missed on previous viewings. It speaks to the quality of the original story that we continue having revelations and epiphanies even 20 years later.

My latest revelation is one that is raising some rather disturbing questions regarding the story and regarding how consciousness operates in our real world. I might even suggest it is a weakness in my previous arguments regarding consciousness thus far. The issue of what it means to be “in simulation.”

Of course, before I can even talk about being “in simulation,” I will have to discuss what a simulation is. As it turns out, trying to elucidate the idea of a simulation caused a rather heated debate between my partner and I. We cannot agree what a simulation is. And so, in this post, I will be primarily focused on my interpretation. I will try to share her interpretation, but the honest truth is that I don’t really understand her interpretation.

I have spoken before about identity and of the world. My identity is what I (and others) consider to be what constitutes me. The “I” when I say I. In some sense, my identity is what separates what is me from the rest of the world, and from others. Which brings us to the idea of the world. The world is that which is not me, and very generally what is not others. You are not the world, but you are a part of the world, just as I am a part of the world as well.

However, the world also includes that which is not a part of you or me. The world, in some sense, can exist without either of us. The world (we generally believe) can and will persist even when I cease to exist. Furthermore, the world contains objects that both you and I can observe and generally agree upon. We can both see the same objects, albeit from slightly different perspectives. And so, very generally, the world is the same for me as it is for you. At least, this is a significant assumption I make about the world. And I believe most people make a very similar assumption, even if they are not aware they are making this assumption.

A simulation is also a world, though not the “real” world. The world we presently inhabit, I believe, most will agree is considered to be the “real” world. This blog, this website, is a part of the “real” world. This blog is not necessarily a part of a simulation. Having said all this, I will acknowledge that as I continue this discussion, questions may be raised regarding the integrity of this.

A simulation is loosely based on the “real” world, and will be a lesser version of it. That is, a simulation will bear some resemblance to the “real” world in some way, and may even share some elements of it. However, a simulation will always be absent some of the elements of the “real” world as well. This is a large reason we will call it a simulation. A simulation, in some sense, is a straw man argument of the “real” world.

Like the “real” world, a simulation is governed by rules and laws. Or, as my partner has pointed out, perhaps not so much governed by as perhaps explained by. For example, in the “real” world there appears to be some sort of attractive force that acts upon all bodies. We often refer to this force as gravity. We even have various mathematical formulas we use to predict how gravity will affect various bodies, and we use science in order to validate these formulas as best we can. Gravity is a sort of governing rule of the “real” world.

A simulation can include gravity, though it does not necessarily have to. The rules of the simulation may be similar to the rules of the “real” world, or they may be vastly different. What both the simulation and the “real” world share is the fact that there are these rules or laws. Navigating a simulation can be done in a similar fashion to navigating in the “real” world; an understanding of these rules is what is required. If I understand how gravity operates (at least on some rudimentary level), then I can navigate through a world governed by gravity.

The point of all this pedantic examination is that a simulation will bear some resemblance to the “real” world. In the case of the Matrix from the films, the Matrix is a simulation that bears a lot of similarities to the “real” world. However, as the character Mouse points out in the first film, it is possible the machines (who created the simulation of the Matrix) could have either accidentally or intentionally made errors:

“How did the machines really know what Tasty Wheat tasted like. huh?. Maybe they got it wrong. Maybe what I think Tasty Wheat tasted like actually tasted like oatmeal or tuna fish. That makes you wonder about a lot of things. You take chicken for example, maybe they couldn’t figure out what to make chicken taste like, which is why chicken tastes like everything.”

While the machines may have correctly or incorrectly represented Tasty Wheat or chicken, the point is that these humans who are now discussing what their “single cell protein combined with synthetic aminos, vitamins, and minerals” actually tastes like are basing their assessment on information they have received from a simulated reality that they acknowledge may have provided them misinformation. In the end, in truth, they have no idea what their meal tastes like, only that it has a taste.

This is one of the critical issues with the idea of simulation and of simulacra. The information we receive from our interactions with any particular world are what we use to recognize and understand the elements of that world. This is the heart of the arguments made by the Empiricists of the 18th century; that all knowledge is based on experience. What they may not have concerned themselves with as much is the reliability of the world that provided them that experience.

Which brings us to the heart of my own discussion here. What does it mean to be “in simulation?” More specifically, what is happening when we are in simulation? In the story, when someone is in the Matrix, does their mind or consciousness or soul leave their body and exist within the Matrix? Or does their mind remain within their body, and the simulation is simply altering the interface one has with their world, hijacking their senses and replacing those experiences with alternate ones?

As I write these words, it seems obvious what the answer ought to be. In the case of the film, as seems to be presented, human minds exist in human bodies, and connecting to the Matrix does not somehow separate the two. A physical cable is connected to the brain stem, and all the sensory input normally fed to the brain by the rest of the body is replaced by alternative sensory information provided by the simulation. Morpheus rightly inquires: “What is real? How do you define real? If you’re talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.” It does not matter the source of those signals, the brain will interpret whatever signals it receives.

The problem raised by the story is that if all of your senses have been hijacked, then you might not be aware that the world you think you are in is in fact a fabrication. You might be in simulation, and not know it. The issue my partner and I debated was whether one could be in simulation and still know they were in simulation.

The manner in which our debate manifested raised an even more insidious issue: where does one’s mind or consciousness reside while in simulation? For me, it seemed obvious: the mind continues to reside where it always seems to reside, in the body in the “real” world. However my partner did not agree. For her, while in simulation, the mind or consciousness left the body and resided in the simulation itself, inside the simulated body. Which case is true can have significant ramifications on events that follow.

As Morpheus suggests, the body cannot live without the mind. Therefore, the mind must necessarily remain within the body at all times, lest the body die. If this is true, then the mind remains in the body in the “real” world. But if this is how it works, then why would unplugging the cable that connects the physical body to the Matrix cause anything bad to happen? How did Apoc and Switch die? If the mind is always in the body, then disconnecting a cable should cause no issues for the individual, as their mind and body remain intact. Only the connection to the simulation is severed, which would seem to merely end the simulation for the individual. They should have simply woken like from a dream.

The alternative is equally problematic. If the mind in fact does leave the body and enter the Matrix, then the body is without a mind and ought to expire. Clearly, within the story, this does not happen. So if minds can successfully be separated from bodies, then Morpheus must be mistaken. Bodies can exist and continue without minds, perhaps on some sort of life support. However, if this is now the case, then how does anything that happens with the mind while it is disconnected from the body affect the body. How can the mind make real such things as injuries?

My partner and I did come up with another alternative that could explain what is going on. What if the mind does not entirely leave the body? What if the mind is sort of tethered to the body, so that a part of the mind remains with the body but a part of the mind enters the Matrix? This would resolve a number of issues, including how the mind makes things real for the body. This tether is what is maintained through the physical cabling that is connected to the brain stem. Severing the tether would be akin to lobotomy, which could then be severe enough to end a person’s life.

In some fashion, the mind is in both places at the same time. Both in the “real” world and at the same time in simulation. If we think of the mind in the “real” world and the mind in simulation as being two parts, then they could be considered connected like in quantum entanglement. I admit, this sort of view of the mind seems incredibly unsatisfying for me. It reminds me of René Descartes’s pineal gland.

In our “real” world, we really have very little understanding of minds or consciousnesses. What we can suggest is that minds and consciousnesses are very unlike bodies or other physical objects. One cannot crack open someone’s head and look at their thoughts. In fact, if you consider how a closed-circuit television (CCTV) system operates, there is nothing that guarantees that the mind exists within a body at all. The mind and consciousness could exist elsewhere entirely. Only the apparent localization created by the position of the various sensory inputs suggests that the mind ought to exist within the physical body.

Without the ability to experience what others experience, I cannot say much about experiences other than my own. What I can say is that when I have dreamed, I have had dreams where I was convinced that the reality of the dream was the “real” world. Only after I awoke from those dreams did I realize my error, and then acknowledged that the dream was in fact a dream and not real. I have also been so immersed in various experiences, such a watching a very engrossing film or a very intense video game, that I momentarily forgot that the world of the immersion was not the same as the “real” world.

In every case (so far) I can say that once I finished or left the simulation, I realized that it was a simulation. Once I had escaped, I felt that I knew with confidence what was “real.” But that only really suggests one thing: that in order to know that something is not real, I have to leave it into something that is more real. In other words, the only reason I have to suggest this is the real world presently is that I have not yet experiences a more real world.