Reality As An Illusion

TheMadFool

We've all been exposed to the idea that reality could be an illusion. That it's a worrying possibility is lost to no one but what exactly do we mean by "reality could be an illusion"?

There are three things to consider:

1. Reality itself. The thing-in-itself is probably what I have in mind.

2. Perceptions of reality. phenomenon seems to fit the bill.

3. Interpretation of perceptions. I don't know whether there's a previously known concept that matches this stage of our interaction with reality. It is essentially the conclusions we draw from our perceptions and involves some amount of logical reasoning.

Where exactly in this chain from 1 to 3 can things go wrong? How exactly can reality be an illusion?

The thing-in-itself, while purportedly inaccessible directly, can't be illusory for it is by definition not.

Some may be of the opinion that on phenomenon/perception lies the answer to how reality could be an illusion a la Descartes' demon or brain-in-a-vat thought experiment. However, there's the final stage/step to factor in, to wit 3, the interpretation of perceptions. It maybe an incontrovertible truth that our senses could be misperceiving but whatever filters im through our senses must go through the final stage, that of interpretation. In a very basic sense, there's the analysis of perception we must take into account. Only when the mind completes the examination of perceptions does the encounter between us and reality end. In essence then accepting a perception/phenomenon as reality - an accurate representation of noumenon - is ultimately not about noumenon, not phenomenon but actually consists of the mind making a judgement on what reality is to it.

Given this is the case, the issue of whether reality is an illusion (or not) has nothing to do with reality itself (noumenon) or pereceptions of them (phenomenon) but is entirely a matter of how the mind interprets/analyzes perceptions/phenomena. In short, when we say, "reality could be an illusion" it doesn't necessarily mean that there's something fishy going on with reality itself or with perception/phenomenon; what we actually want to convey is our lack of confidence in the mind's analysis/interpretation of perception/phenomenon.

The usual way this idea of reality being an illusion is understood is at the level of perception/phenomenon - our senses being triggered in the absence of a real/actual stimuli i.e. noumena are non-existent. The final stage 3. interpretation of perception is never discussed but, as it turns out, as outlined above, the mind creates a map of the world (interpretation) as it were and the process of drawing this map is not immune to errors; thus we could be under an illusion, a different kind of illusion where there's no issues with either noumeona or phenomena.

3017amen

1. Reality itself. The thing-in-itself is probably what I have in mind.

2. Perceptions of reality. phenomenon seems to fit the bill. — TheMadFool

Great OP TMF!

I'm subscribed! (Because item 1 seems to include Metaphysics, and item 2 consists of things --many things-- like the paradox of time and the perceptions of same... .)

Gregory

Well why isn't epistemology the same as philosophy of mind?

Forgottenticket

I think it's a pragmatic position. Anyway I've read recently that "sleep" may be responsible for most of our mental training. It's how we generalize events with dreams being used as quick tests to see its working correctly which may explain why we sleep so much when we are babies.

Neb

That it's a worrying possibility is lost to no one — TheMadFool

It doesn't worry me in the slightest.

I know I exist and I know I experience perceptions, phenomena. Those perceptions aren't random (like white noise), but have patterns. The patterns allow me to interpret them as a 4-dimensional world which is in a lot of ways consistent and to some extent predictable in all those 4 dimensions.

Producing this mental picture of a 4-d world involves interpretation of my perceptions.

Now, what I can't know is the source of those perceptions. Do they come from a world like the one in my mental picture, one which contains other people who are conscious just like me? Or do they arise in some other way, like a computer feeding stimuli into a brain in a vat?

I can't know that, and I don't need to know that. It makes no difference to me either way. It won't change my experiences or the way or feel about those experiences or the value to me of those experiences. And it won't change how I react to those experiences.

One might think that, if I assume other people aren't independently real, I would treat them badly. But I know that, if I do treat them badly, people will treat me in ways that I don't like. It makes no difference whether those people are independently real or not.

I try to get the maximum pleasure out of my existence. I would go about that exactly the same way whether or not other people are independently real - whether or not the world I perceive is independently real.

Pantagruel

Aren't the concepts "real" and "Illusory" inherently exclusive? If something is an illusion, then it is by definition "not real". So saying reality is an illusion essentially just denudes the meaning of both reality and illusion. Like saying, circles are squares.

If reality is an illusion then, to the same extent, illusions must be real.

TheMadFool

It doesn't worry me in the slightest. — Neb

To each his own but that's just a side issue. Thanks.

Aren't the concepts "real" and "Illusory" inherently exclusive? If something is an illusion, then it is by definition "not real". So saying "reality is an illusion" essentially just denudes the meaning of both reality and illusion. Like saying, circles are squares.

If reality is an illusion then, to the same extent, illusions must be real. — Pantagruel

Yes, they are but the idea behind the thought doesn't seem to be that reality = illusion (that would be the square circle you were so kind to mention) but that reality OR illusion.

Harry Hindu

If reality is an illusion then, to the same extent, illusions must be real. — Pantagruel

Illusions are real. They cause us to behave differently. They are a misinterpretation of sensory data. What they are interpreted as isnt real until you interpret it as an illusion.

Pantagruel

Illusions are real. They cause us to behave differently. They are a misinterpretation of sensory data. What they are interpreted as isnt real until you interpret it as an illusion. — Harry Hindu

Indeed. So it would seem that being real for a subject is independent of being real as an object.

180 Proof

I have known many gods. He who denies them is as blind as he who trusts them too deeply. I seek not beyond death. It may be the blackness averred by the Nemedian skeptics, or Crom's realm of ice and cloud, or the snowy plains and vaulted halls of the Nordheimer's Valhalla. I know not, nor do I care. Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content. Let teachers and philosophers brood over questions of reality and illusion. I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content. ~Conan the Cimmerian — Queen of the Black Coast

:death: :flower:

(emphasis is mine)

Given this is the case, the issue of whether reality is an illusion (or not) has nothing to do with reality itself (noumenon) or pereceptions of them (phenomenon) but is entirely a matter of how the mind interprets/analyzes perceptions/phenomena. In short, when we say, "reality could be an illusion" it doesn't necessarily mean that there's something fishy going on with reality itself or with perception/phenomenon; what we actually want to convey is our lack of confidence in the mind's analysis/interpretation of perception/phenomenon. — TheMadFool

:up: vide Epicurus, Sextus Empiricus ... Spinoza ... Peirce, Zapffe, Merleau-Ponty, Clément Rosset ...

What we make of their testimony, that alone introduces lies; for example, the lie of unity, the lie of thinghood, of substance, of permanence. “Reason” is the reason we falsify the testimony of the senses. Insofar as the senses show becoming, passing away, and change, they do not lie. — Twilight of the Idols

(emphasis is mine)

TheMadFool

↪180 Proof

:up: Whatever the noumena or phenomena are, the final stage of the our mind's interaction with reality involves judgements made by the mind i.e. the mind is not a passive victim of the illusion if there's one but, in fact, actively participates in creating the illusion.

Gregory

↪180 Proof

.

Add Nagarjuna to the list

180 Proof

Add Nagarjuna to the list — Gregory

:up:

↪180 Proof :up: Whatever the noumena or phenomena are, the final stage of the our mind's interaction with reality involves judgements made by the mind i.e. the mind is not a passive victim of the illusion if there's one but, in fact, actively participates in creating the illusion. — TheMadFool

Agreed. Also very much like Ernst Cassirer's neo-kantian "symbol theory". Or Zapffe's / Camus' confrontation-divorce-mismatch of our minds with the world aka "the Absurd". Acculturated repertoires of overlapping interpretations, idiosynchronized by lived experiences, mediate-regulate our illusions about reality (not of reality), no? Thus, inescapable fallibilism.

Gnomon

interpretation of perception — TheMadFool

I agree. Many people assume that what you "see" is what's out there. But they forget that "what you perceive" sub-consciously (the Territory) is typically converted into a conscious concept (the Map). Yet we faithfully follow the map, as-if it were the terrain, ignoring the fact that a simplified map omits the fine details of the specific topography. That is basically what Don Hoffman is talking about in his book, An Argument Against Reality.

But, I'm not worried about that "possible illusion", because it's all I've ever known, and everyone else is in the same fog-shrouded boat. Except for a few Enlightened Ones, who may still be unable to "see" the true terrain, but are merely aware that "there's more to the world than meets the eye". :smile:

Harry Hindu

Indeed. So it would seem that being real for a subject is independent of being real as an object. — Pantagruel

It depends on what we're talking about. Are we talking about the experience or what the experience is about. Experiences are real, but what they are about requires logic to be applied to the experience.

Pantagruel

↪Harry Hindu

Yes, they are two different things. Isn't that what I said?

Ciceronianus

I like to hope that we have some reason to doubt, some reason to believe everything is an illusion, before we consider whether it is an illusion. That is to say, something different from the faux doubt indulged in by Descartes and others, or references to The Matrix, or pencils in glasses of water, and other examples of what may be explained without resort to a belief that nothing we interact with daily and predictably ain't really real.

Pantagruel

faux doubt indulged in by Descartes — Ciceronianus the White

Specifically what about Descartes' proposition of radical metaphysical doubt qualifies it as being faux doubt?

Ciceronianus

Specifically what about Descartes' proposition of radical metaphysical doubt qualifies it as being faux doubt? — Pantagruel

I would say we cannot truly doubt everything because by living we don't doubt everything. In fact, we rely on everything, for the most part unreservedly. Thus we eat, drink, walk, build things, interact with each other and the world at large every minute. We wouldn't if we had any real doubt. We doubt, really, when we have reason to in specific circumstances.

Pantagruel

I would say we cannot truly doubt everything because by living we don't doubt everything. In fact, we rely on everything, for the most part unreservedly. Thus we eat, drink, walk, build things, interact with each other and the world at large every minute. We wouldn't if we had any real doubt. We doubt, really, when we have reason to in specific circumstances. — Ciceronianus the White

If Descartes' doubt is faux doubt, then equally anyone's commitment to any belief could be characterized as faux belief...unless it led to a serious commitment in actual circumstances. Unless you are practicing faux philosophy, please don't minimize one of Mssr. Descartes' central tenets. :)

TheMadFool

↪180 Proof

↪Gnomon

Well, how does the mind take part in creating, sustaining or swapping, illusions? Proclivities, biases, prejudices, etc. come to mind. In a nutshell, mind-boggling ignorance but this in no way implies knowledge will save the day for knowledge is precisely that which is impossible to gain and keep in our possession. If there's anything that can be known then it's that nothing can be known. Socrates, of "I know that I know nothing" fame, wasn't knowledgeable but the Delphic Oracle never said he was; the Oracle announced only that the father of western philosophy was the wisest.

Harry Hindu

↪Pantagruel

No. A subject is an object.

Pantagruel

No. A subject is an object. — Harry Hindu

I'm pretty sure I said being real for a subject is not the same thing as being real as an object. I'm quite sure I did not say a subject is an object.

Pinprick

I would say we cannot truly doubt everything because by living we don't doubt everything. — Ciceronianus the White

Also, in order to doubt literally everything, wouldn’t you need to be aware of everything? Also, isn’t “doubt” a thing? If so, then you would have to doubt it too, which would mean that you couldn’t be certain that your doubts are warranted or accurate.

Harry Hindu

I'm pretty sure I said being real for a subject is not the same thing as being real as an object. I'm quite sure I did not say a subject is an object — Pantagruel

Correct. And I disagreed and said that a subject is an object.

Dreams are real states for some objects - like humans.

Pantagruel

↪Harry Hindu

Sorry, I don't understand the construct.
The subject is an object. Yes, things which are subjects (have subjective experiences) are also objects. But having a subjective experience (which is specifically how subjectivity was being characterized, "being real for a subject,") is explicitly different from "being real as an object." Your construction lacks specificity.

Shawn

When reality in terms of language maintains itself without such occurrences as "sudden", "catastrophic", or "scary" or even an "evil occurrence" towards a being existing in a four dimensional plane, primarily whilst in the three dimensions of space, then when reality is able to maintain itself for a prolonged period without such instantaneous terms as above or without decrepitude'(s) in understanding (psychosis, mental disorders), then there's a profound sense of relief if one is to exist in such a state of affairs.

What can be said about such a state of affairs, with and without?

Ciceronianus

If Descartes' doubt is faux doubt, then equally anyone's commitment to any belief could be characterized as faux belief...unless it led to a serious commitment in actual circumstances. Unless you are practicing faux philosophy, please don't minimize one of Mssr. Descartes' central tenets. :) — Pantagruel

There are some things we can't properly be said to "believe." I don't "believe" I'm eating, breathing, pissing. I need make no "serious commitment" in order to understand this to be the case. Nor can we be properly said to "doubt" such things. Imagine wondering whether you're really breathing as you breath. I think it's unlikely Descartes doubted he was really writing his "central tenets" as you call them, while writing them. He was engaging in an extended game of "let's pretend." It isn't clear to me that the result of the game was in any way useful.

Pantagruel

He was engaging in an extended game of "let's pretend." It isn't clear to me that the result of the game was in any way useful. — Ciceronianus the White

As I said, the same could be said of any belief of any person, including yours, unless you can demonstrate that you're committed to it in an existential sense (which is the force I take to be behind your argument). So if you want to discount any beliefs that aren't "existentially impactful" I'll just as casually ignore your comments about Descartes.

Hippyhead

DMT users often report that what they experience while on the drug feels much more real to them than normal consciousness. Not taken the drug myself, have no opinion on the claims other than that they seem quite interesting. The following worth watching, imho.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwZqVqbkyLM&t=221s

In somewhat related news, a recent NPR story reports that LSD is making a significant come back, but with middle aged and older people, not the young folks.

To compare, while LSD distorts our perception of the world we normally perceive, DMT takes the user in to a completely different realm. A very philosophical drug, but not for casual users seeking entertainment.

Ciceronianus

So if you want to discount any beliefs that aren't "existentially impactful" I'll just as casually ignore your comments about Descartes. — Pantagruel

I'm unsure what you mean be "existentially impactful." But if you want to ignore my comments, suit yourself. If your desire is to ignore things, there's no better guide to doing so than Descartes.

Reality As An Illusion

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