Thursday, June 7, 2012

I think, therefore I have a headache

A very simple way of finding out if an OS is indeed usable, try changing the colour of the taskbar. If you cannot find a way to do it, stop using it immediately. This way you know whether the OS is user-friendly (easy-to-use, flexible, customizable to suit every user’s needs) or restricting, such as Ubuntu.

 

What is reality?

Is it the same as what we perceive as reality?

If so, do we create it in our minds?

In that case, what do we miss out on, what do we not perceive? What does our brain refuse to perceive?

The simple answer: what we do not understand. Hitchhiker’s Guide named it SEP – somebody else’s problem – something that can only be noticed from the corner of one’s eye, because looking straight at it would crash your brains as it is not able to comprehend or accept what it sees. Hence it gets filtered out. Doctor Who gives a similar explanation – people ignore the big blue police box popping up everywhere not because it is a simple blue box, but because it does not belong there, it cannot be there from people’s perspective.

What we think is completely impossible, we cannot see. Completely means completely – there can be no doubt in our minds because we cannot comprehend it. It is deeper than our mere thoughts of ‘completely impossible’.

If you do not believe me, just keep this in mind: whenever we see something we cannot precisely outline (we cannot tell what it is), we automatically give it a probable shape. We look for familiar patterns in places there might not be familiar patterns. We look at white noise and see shapes. Our mind is programmed to define and simplify what we see, what happens when it is unable to do so? I would say it should ignore it.

Our mind sets the rules for the world. In the words of J.M.Straczynski: “Our thoughts form the Universe, they are always important.”. Everything happens at the same time, every reality exists, the question is ‘which one do we choose?’.

And there comes an another question, who are ‘we’? Who actually is the observer that sees, perceives and interprets the world around us? If every single one of us creates a reality, then how can it be the very same reality that is created?

And in the end, how do our thoughts change our reality, how do they change us?

 

The facts in the movie are mostly true, the interpretations are mostly exaggerated or simplified, dumbed down. If you think hard enough and know a bit about the subject you will notice that… electrons do not grow charges when they are bounced around, for example. But touching on the atomic level is still pretty hard to achieve on a basketball field, that is why ‘touching’ is defined as it is, not as it is not. However, it does raise quite many important points about reality, philosophy, religion, quantum physics, et cetera. It want you to think about these things, and quite frankly, so do I. Thinking and discussion are what keep our society evolving.

3 comments:

  1. Kuna mu pea valutab, siis ma ei jõua su postitust praegu lugeda, aga pealkiri läheb väga ideaalselt minu praeguse enesetundega kokku.

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  2. I just love it that you used Hitchiker and the Doctor as refrences. Made me believe your point much more. :)

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    Replies
    1. The best support for science is fiction, the best source of innovative ideas.
      The best support for fiction is science, the source of practical solutions for creative problems.

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