The last two weeks I spent pondering on whether it’s possible that everything around us is in fact just an illusion. What if we live in a matrix?
Equipped with this ludicrous idea, I stumbled upon an interesting theory.
It deals with the notion that everything we call life, including ourselves, is in fact a piece of software running on the computers of the future.
Oxford philospher Nick Bostrom published a paper in 2003 in which he discusses his theory in much detail - let me try and summarise the key points of his thesis.
The underlying assumption here is that time travel may not be possible for any post human generation, purely because the laws of physics may not permit us to do so. So he introduces the possibility of running parallel computer simulation of our reality that are so identical, that it may be difficult for anyone experiencing it to distinguish.
Now that’s not surprising at all, seeing the advancement in gaming and 3D virtual reality headsets that we’ve developed just in the last five years. This simulation may then be used by future generations to go back in time and relive the memories of their ancestors - moment to moment.
I know this sounds crazy, but he gets to this conclusion in a few simple steps:
He starts by introducing the notion that there isn't anything magical about the wet stuff in our brains - that it merely processes information and therefore it's just a matter of time before they can be virtually simulated on a computer.
Computing power is being doubled year on year for a little less than a decade. So he introduces the idea that at some point in the near future, we will be in a position to simulate the processes of our minds on computers. Not only our minds, but with the right advancement we could even simulate entire planets, and universes. Within that framework, we could all co-exist with a conscious mind, that is able to write poetry, play symphonies and do maths. Not only does it create an identical  experience, but it also creates the illusion that the person experiencing it, is in fact at the drivers seat navigating with sheer free will.
Should this be possible, then any futuristic 14 year old kid can simulate a universe on his computer in his parents’ garage - just like our children simulate SIMS Cities.
That means, that naturally simulated universes will outnumber real universes (after all, there are only a limited number of universes out there!). Therefore statistically speaking, we are much more likely to be living among the simulated universes, than we are among the real universes.
You've given up a perfectly serviceable time to read what I have to say, and you are trying to follow my trail of thoughts on this blog - but you also have a voice inside your head just telling things and competing for your attention.
I'm here writing this article, yet I find an inner voice merely reading out the words that I am typing. Who am I reading it out to?
It's almost like I have an unpredictable person stuck in my head, who has to comment on almost everything that happens moment to moment.
Try and place close attention to your thoughts, and you’ll notice these thoughts arise in your consciousness without any act of freewill on your part. It's like me saying some words out loud and consequently appearing in the privacy of your mind.
If I asked you to pick three countries you'd want to spend your next holiday in, which ones would you choose? Remember you can choose any country that you desire. This is as free of a choice as you'll ever get.
I think most of you agree that you all have come to three countries by complete free will. I have not places any cues into my blog post and I have not influenced you in any way, shape or form.
Done?
For the moment, let’s just recreate the selection process that led you to those three countries. First of all, let's remove all of the countries you couldn't have picked, because you simply didn't know their existence.
Tajikistan is a not so well known country in Central Asia. You couldn't have picked it even if your life depended on it.
Then let's remove all the countries that you knew, but just didn't occur to you when I asked you to select three countries. Â
Lichtenstein, for example. You absolutely know Lichtenstein is a country, but somehow it didn't occur to you at the time. You had a limited pool of options that arose in your consciousness - only from which, you were able to choose from.
Now let me ask you this. Were you free to choose that which didn't occur to you? The next thing I am going to say, is much of a mystery to you as the next thought arising in your mind.Â
I am writing this blog post on free will, but I could suddenly start talking about the necessary ingredients to make a delicious cupcake. Where did that come from?
As far as you are concerned, it came from nowhere.
Perhaps let's focus on the three countries you've chosen. For arguments sake, I’m going to assume you've picked Italy, France and Spain.
What can you say that supports why you have chosen the countries that you have chosen? In other words, are you able to justify why you have chosen Italy, France and/or Spain over other countries?
Here is another scenario. Let’s assume you picked China first, but then decided at the last moment to settle with Italy instead. Are you able to explain why you chose what you chose?
Of course, you could tell me a story about how you had Italian food yesterday, and therefore it seemed somehow right to pick Italy. But why didn’t you conclude, “I had Italian food yesterday, let me try out something new and go for China this time?"
It seems to me that there is very little you can say to support the argument of why you chose what you chose.Â
Everything that we conciously intend are caused by prior causes in our minds. What does it mean to say that someone could have chosen otherwise?
It means that he had the choice. Imagine a murder who has killed a young girl during a burglary. To say he had freewill, is to say he could have done otherwise if he wanted to.
It seems to me however, that we are the sum of all our prior causes. If I was to be that murderer - with the exam social background, education and life experiences, I would be him. Molecule to molecule, and I would have committed the same felony. There’s no doubt in my mind about that.
“We do not know what we intend to do until the intention itself arises. To understand this is to realize that we are not the authors of our thoughts and actions in the way that people generally suppose.”  - Sam Harris
In the last few years, neuroscience experiments were conducted, in which participants were hooked up to fMRI equipments and given a simple option of choosing between two objects. They are given also a button that they are asked to press as soon as they consciously realise that they've made a choice.
What the conclusion showed is that neuroscientists were able to accurately predict the choice using the fMRI images, half a second - sometimes even several second before the subject knew what they chose.
In other words, moments before you make a decision on what seems to you an act of free will, the decision has already been made for you.
Everything that we intend is caused by prior causes that we don’t intend and that we are entirely unaware of. So the question I put to yourself is, where is the free will in seeing that everything that we intend is caused by prior causes, in which you have no choice over and that you can't inspect?
This article is hugely inspired by Sam Harris’ book titled Free will and many of his public speeches. It’s merely a compilation of Sam Harris’ arguments.
It’s a metaphysical question. We all seem to agree more or less on what constitutes a successful life.
Thinking about this question led me to another finding. Everything that we call life, everything that’s on an experiential level to us, is man made. Therefore it follows that the definition of a successful life is arbitrary, no?
I may find living in a jungle in harmony with nature the tip point of a meaningful life. Who is to say that I am wrong?
Given that we CAN all have different views on what constitutes a successful life, isn't it possible that nothing is wrong and no one is right?
It seems to me that a successful life is living a life by the priorities that you’ve set yourself. Not what you’ve been told, but what you really feel life is living for. Existentialism.
Life seems to be full of regrets. You do things you don’t want to and you don’t do things that you would have liked to.
Comparatively our life always seems worse off - you see someone who is doing better and regret knocks at the door.
The human mind is conditioned to put ones life constantly into perspective. It’s a never ending game of placing your life into the framework that you envisioned during different stages of life. If only, I’d have done that… If only, I’d have more open minded parents.. If only, I would have gotten into a better university.
The constant battle to pass the blame onto others - or it you’re like me - onto yourself, continues. As long as our mind continues to feel the notion of discontent, the downward spiral is in motion.
“No one believes their life will turn out just kind of okay. We all think we’re going to be great. We are filled with expectations. Expectations of the trails we will blaze, the people we will help, the difference we will make. Great expectations of who we will be. Where we will go. And then we get there… ” - Meredith Grey in Grey’s Anatomy
Regret occurs when the reality doesn’t scale up with our expectations and you feel you could have done otherwise. Perhaps there’s always room for having done otherwise, but the chain has to be broken somewhere - otherwise you’ll be trapped in this endless loop of what appears to be wrong actions.
I see it all perfectly; there are two possible situations - one can either do this or that. My honest opinion and my friendly advice is this: do it or do not do it - you will regret both. -Â Soren Kierkegaard
The alternative is to be content and free of expectations. But that begs the question, can you live a life free of desires? Can you teach the mind not to seek desirable feelings and experiences without compromising the quality of your life?
It’s clear to me that what each of us want of life is vastly different then what the society, parents or friends expect. We are a self fulfilling prophecy in that regard. We all start our life’s at the same start line and travel different paths pursuing different experiences from there. Consequently our desires and the search for pleasant sights and experiences follow.
It seems to me that living a life of meaning by your own terms is the answer while maintaining an accepting mindset of the continually changing nature of our existence.
At the essence, everything appears to be neither good nor bad. It seems to me that we are the ones that attribute value to them.Â
The ideas of what’s good and bad are constantly changing. Many of our beliefs originate back to our childhood. We live in a society where every day the acceptable norm of behaviour is conciously and often times subconciously reinforced. Our senses delude us into following the crowd without the second thought of questioning whether something is intrinsically good or bad? A thought provoking quote of entrepreneur James Caan comes to me mind: "observe the masses and do the opposite!"
In other words, many of the acceptable forms of behaviours in our current society are constantly evolving. Let’s look at witchcraft, as an example, that took place up until the 1750, in which it was acceptable based on a potent myth to torture and kill over 40,000 people in the name of religion.
You may think that this this was three centuries ago. Let me steer this into a more recent event. The holocaust - in which Jews were accused of murdering Christian infants and drinking their blood, for nothing more than a simple reason that they were born Jews. The Christians can’t take any more credit they were raised Christians, than a Jew taking credit for being raised a Jew. There is an article of neuroscientist and atheist Sam Harris’ book that I want to point your attention to:
“Beyond the abject (and religious) loyalty to Hitler, the Holocaust emerged out of people’s acceptance of some very implausible ideas.”
In my mind, every idea, every concept and every belief we posses in our society is man made. Everything that surrounds us are concepts of our mind.
The rare footage of Steve Jobs’ interview just highlights this amazing thought...
What matters? Life is precious and our time is limited. We move through life having to achieve the goals we’ve set ourselves, and forget what truly matters…
It’s far too easy to get caught up in the corporate world that pushes you into all the wrong directions. Louis CK said it well: “everything is amazing, and nobody is happy.”
The constant search for happiness always seems to remain in the privacy of our minds. You set yourself a goal, achieve it and consequently, the next desire arises. The framework for life is pre-written. At least, it certainly feels like it.
Our life is filled with desires and it’s far too easy to get caught up in this trap like a cat chasing its tail. But what is it that we really want? Education? A well paid job? A Good lifestyle? It seems to me that what we really crave, is the desire for happiness.
Asking God (or the genie lamp if that makes the metaphor any more plausible) to eradicate suffering and give us a life of permanent happiness isn’t going to solve the problem. Why? We just have to look at how we behave in day to day life. Without suffering, I see ourselves as alcoholics, always needing an additional drink to experience the same mental state of bliss. Your mind becomes more and more saturated always needing an additional dose to sustain the same level of happiness. Isn’t it true that the mere existence of suffering is what allows us to put our happiness into perspective? It’s what makes happiness precious, and to some degree I would argue that that is the feeling that we are attracted to, when we say that we want happiness.
“Even at the best of times, one notices at the level of ones attention, you seek happiness moment to moment and only find temporary relief from your search. We seek pleasant sights, senses and sensations. Our pleasures are at best fleeing. Even when things have gone as well as they could go, the search for happiness continues. At the very least, the anticipation of death interrupts.”
Death is an amazing thing. But it seems to me that even living in the face of death should not interrupt happiness. It makes sense to be filled with dread if the thing you’re looking forward to, is itself bad. Maybe for example, it makes sense to dread going to the dentist, if you believe that being at the dentist is a painful, unpleasant experience. But if being at the dentist isn’t itself unpleasant, it doesn’t make sense to dread it in anticipation.
“So death, the most terrifying of ills, is nothing to use, since so long as we exist, death is not with us; but when death comes, then we do not exist. It does not then concern either the living or the dead, since for the former it is not, and the latter are no more (Epicurus, Letter to Menoeceus, quoted in the Oxford Book of Dead, edited by D. J. Enright)
Perhaps being content and ecquinimous with the wide range of life stages is the answer? If you can’t change the world, change yourself. The further you go outwards and experience life through different perspectives, the more you start realising that the journey was always about going inwards.
Every idea, concept and belief we posess in our society appears to be man made. If everything is man made, then the obvious conclusion is this.
At the edge of (in)sanity - My experience at a 10-day Vipassana course
Vipassana means seeing things as they really are. It’s the process of purifying the mind by observing one self and realising the changing nature of body and mind and experiencing the universal truth of impermanence, suffering and egoless ness.
Wanting a piece of that, I applied on the recommendation of a good friend. It wasn’t too long before it became clear that I had no idea what I was doing.Â
The course had strict boundaries of having no communication to the outside world and maintaining complete silence for the duration of the course. Strategically it was also placed in the middle of nowhere making it close to impossible to escape. Upon my arrival, I came to find the following note in my allocated room:
Every student is asked to follow the daily time table as closely as possible:
4:00 am            Wake Up bell
4.30 am to 6.30 am   Meditation in the hall or in our room
6.30 am to 8.00 am   Breakfast and rest
8:00 am to 9:00 am   Group meditation in the hall
9:00 am to 11:00 am  Meditation in the hall or in your room according to teachers instructions
11:00 am to 1:00 pm  Lunch, interview with assistant teacher and rest
1:00 pm to 2:30 pm   Meditation in the hall or in our room
2:30 pm to 3:30 pm   Group meditation in the hall
3:30 pm to 5:00 pm   Meditation in the hall or in your room according to teachers instructions
5:00 pm to 6:00 pm   Tea break and rest
6:00 pm to 7:00 pm   Group meditation in the hall
7:00 pm to 8:15 pm   Discourse of teacher in the hall
8:15 pm to 9:00 pm   Group meditation in the hall
9:30 pm            Lights out
The entire course is taught using videos and audios of S.N.Goenka. There was an (assistant) teacher dedicated to deal with facilitating the program and answering any questions. It turned out to be a great way to learn!
Day 1, 2 and 6 were particularly difficult. Having the attention span of a five year old, I started getting agitated and got close to leaving at some occasions. Being used to a busy schedule, this seemed nothing like liberation - more like torture!Â
Lacking any form of intellectual engagement, I started reading everything I could get my hands on. Everything from my shower gel etiquette to the patient leaflet inside my paracetamol capsules (why does it contain potato starch - how random!). Even the one hour breaks were merely hours I was staring at a white wall waiting for the next thing on the daily schedule that involves doing nothing!
The only level of entertainment were the discourses of S.N.Goenke that were played through projectors in the meditation hall every evening. I’d wake up at 4 am everyday thinking, “only 15 more hours to go, yay!” The 75 minutes videos were knowledgable and humorous.Â
It took lots of perseverance to complete the course. The tight boundaries really pushes one to the limits and I came to find out that the physical pain (sitting cross legged for over ten hours) takes a back seat to the mental pressure that one experiences. The course had a total of approximately 150 students of which about 10% quit half way through (some for family reasons and others simply couldn’t cope).Â
As days went by, my fellow meditators also started looking miserable (perhaps a reflection of myself?). David, the one I was sharing the room with was particularly frightening. On some occasions he would get up at the middle of the night and start sleep talking. On day 2 he said, “it’s all a bit strange” in a deep voice making me nearly jump off my bed. I couldn’t help but to agree with his observation, and we both went back to sleep.Â
The teaching is very insightful, well explained and progressively laid out over the during of the course. Despite its traits of Buddhism (i.e chanting, bowing, reincarnation, etc), there was no attempt of religious conversation. It’s clear that this technique is not only practical, but also promotes sila, the life of morality.Â
The facilities and the volunteers are very willing to help and understanding. I found it to be a very decent organisation with the pure objective of spreading the teaching of Vipassana.Â
Eventually, after about 100 hours of meditation I made it to the end (it’s fair to say that I was asleep for 25 hours, and day dreaming for another 25 hours). When I started speaking to some meditators after the course concluded, I made an interesting observation. It turned out that the personality I perceived many of the meditators to be, were the opposite of what I envisioned. Everyone I spoke to turned out to be a wonderful soul with a likeminded interest. And that I think, sums up the retreat - it’s not what it seems; it has to be experienced to be understood.Â
Despite the difficulties of the program, I truly believe, someone striving towards living a meaningful and moral life should attend this course. It gives one lots of time to think and to develop a technique that speaks for itself. Having come out of the program, I genuinely appreciate many things that I’ve been taking for granted in life, and I feel more strongly about the directions I want to go moving forward. Life is precious.
[High Existence #40] People are often unreasonable and self-centred. If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. If you are honest, people may cheat you. If you find happiness, people may feel jealous. The good you do today, may be forgotten tomorrow. Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough.
Give your best anyways.
[High Existence #35]Â You are the story of mankind. You wrecked yourself, my friend. You killed your ambition to live upon realizing your fear. You cannot blame that on external forces. Erase fear and have awareness...
[High Existence #33] I just don’t trust any of it. Every time I read something about how there’s been another ridiculous climb of the Dow Jones, there’s a part of me that goes, “This can’t be good.” None of this is real money. You know what I mean? It’s not like there’s actually more of anything. It’s just ideas. When people are getting richer and richer but they’re not actually producing anything, it can’t end well.
“Normal is getting dressed in clothes that you buy for work and driving through traffic in a car that you are still paying for – in order to get to the job you need to pay for the clothes and the car, and the house you leave vacant all day so that you can afford to live in it.” - Ellen Goodman
[High Existence #19] Let go of things you've done, let go of the failures and mistakes that you have made. Be humble and secure knowing that there are things in your life that you can't change, but there are places that you will go, and doors that will open for you if you continue to live life being as great a person as you possibly can.
