How can I prove myself that my brain isn't just creating images so I can experience life?

Submitted ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨Grogon@lemmy.world⁩ to ⁨nostupidquestions@lemmy.world⁩

How can I prove that everything I see really exists and isn’t just an illusion/ image created by my brain? How can I really know that once I look away from something that it is still there and doesn’t turn black? I thought about the mirror, but maybe the image in the mirror is also just created. The people I hear talking behind me could also be gone but I only hear the audio and once I turn around they appear visually. I thought about using a camera but the content that is saved on the camera could also be fake.

Can someone tell me how to prove that others really exist?

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mononomi@feddit.nl ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
The philosophical question you’re raising is known as solipsism, which is the idea that one can only be sure of the existence of their own mind and not of anything external to it. While it’s an interesting concept to explore, proving the absolute reality of the external world can be challenging.

Philosophers have debated these questions for centuries, and there isn’t a definitive answer. However, there are some common responses and arguments:

Pragmatism: While you might not be able to prove the absolute reality of the external world, it is generally more practical and beneficial to assume its existence. The way we navigate and interact with the world is based on the assumption that it is real.

Consensus Reality: The fact that multiple people can agree on the existence of certain things suggests a shared reality. If others can perceive and interact with the same objects or events as you do, it adds weight to the argument that there is an external reality.

Scientific Method: Science provides a systematic way of understanding the world through observation, experimentation, and verification. While it may not provide absolute certainty, the scientific method has proven to be a reliable way to gain knowledge about the external world.

Testability: While you may question the authenticity of your perceptions, you can still make predictions and test them against your experiences. For example, if you drop an object, you can predict that it will fall, and when it does, it provides some validation of the external reality.

Regarding your doubt about whether people are real or if the responses are from AI, the same principles can apply. If there is consistency in responses, coherence in conversations, and a shared understanding among users, it adds credibility to the reality of the interaction.

It’s important to note that these responses don’t necessarily provide absolute certainty but offer practical and reasonable ways to engage with the external world. The nature of reality is a complex and debated topic in philosophy, and there may never be a conclusive answer.

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- mononomi@feddit.nl ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Nah sorry just kidding around, I think you stumbled upon a classic philosophical problem. You cannot 100% truly know that your sense are correct. I agree with ChatGPT on pragmatism here: you can try proving it all you want, you will never get there. Better to just look at all those pretty flowers nature created in this weird universe!
  
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  - SorteKanin@feddit.dk ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I was about to down vote as I read your comment, realizing it was AI generated, but the joke is appreciated haha
    
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  - eatham@aussie.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I completely fell for that
    
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SorteKanin@feddit.dk ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Consider this: What does it matter if everything is an illusion?

Does it change anything? Would the answer give any insight or provide any value?

I’m generally of the opinion that, no, the answer to the question doesn’t matter. Even if everything is an illusion, then that just is reality. Whether you think things exist outside your mind or whether you believe everything is a figment of your imagination, both are reality. Knowing which of the two is true makes no difference.

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- ech@lemm.ee ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I love the movie Inception, but the “fans” of it drive me crazy because (for a very long time, at least) nobody seemed to get that this here was the point of Cobb’s arc. Everyone was debating what was “real” and what wasn’t, but completely missed what the character himself figured out and came to peace with.
  
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  - SorteKanin@feddit.dk ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I think I need to watch it again, I didn’t really understand it the first time. Thanks for the reminder! :)
    
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- cloudless@feddit.uk ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  I chose the red pill.
  
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e0qdk@kbin.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You can't really, as others have pointed out, but I like Philip K Dick's definition of reality: "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away."

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Randomgal@lemmy.ca ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
This is a great philosophical question, people have been asking themselves this for a very long time. Some have answers: You may have heard “Cogito ergo sum.”, by Rene Descartes. The context of this quote is that it is a logical conclusion, after the border began purposefully trying to show what really REALLY exists, as he chose to doubt about the existence of everything.

After a lot of thinking and writing he came to the conclusion that there is no way for you to know that your life isn’t just a hallucination, projected unto your brain by a daemon, however, there is one thing you CAN be sure of: If you are asking yourself these questions, you are thinking, that is undeniable you 100% experience your thoughts first hand, and therefore it is safe to say that because you can think, you can be sure you exist. Cogito, ergo sum. (I think, therefore I am)

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- TheButtonJustSpins@infosec.pub ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Descartes didn’t use that as a conclusion; he used it as the basis from which he built up to “prove” the existence of God.
  
  That said, that’s still the only conclusion I can reach with certainty, making me a weak solipsist.
  
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  - Randomgal@lemmy.ca ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I mean… A statement can be both a conclusion and an argument… But sure.
    
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- xePBMg9@lemmynsfw.com ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  If we don’t have the baseline of trusting our senses, which should include perception of our own thoughts; how can we make that statement? Why should one trust perception of thought over other senses?
  
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  - Randomgal@lemmy.ca ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    Correct, but you exist for sure, because you are hearing that voice, whatever it actually is. Even if it is a hallucination, it is you perceiving it. So at least of your own existence, you can be sure.
    
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  - c0mbatbag3l@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    It doesn’t include “perception of our own thoughts” because they’re not a thing to witness like a smell or visuals. You manufacture them immediately yourself, you don’t observe them. That’s Descartes entire point.
    
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aaa999@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
“Let teachers and priests 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.”

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NegativeInf@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You can’t. But it wouldn’t make a difference if it were a solipsistic reality or not. Just don’t be a dick. For all appearances, you and I both exist.

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AmidFuror@kbin.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
What's the point of me trying to prove something to a figment of my imagination? Nice try, brain image. You almost had me.

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NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Read some complex scientific stuff, e.g. physics. Try to really really understand the formulas AND the meaning behind it. Ask others for help and explanation if you can’t understand it yourself, but don’t give up until you got it thoroughly.

Then ask yourself if you (your brain) would have been able to produce this.

No? Then there must be someone with a bigger brain than yours.

Do the same with some truly creative art.

Or watch some really amusing comedy live show.

Or a circus.

Or…

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- Bitrot@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Just the complexity of all the things that happen in the world and individual lives when I’m not looking is enough to do that for me. Like, if I smashed in the door of any random house I would find new and different furniture and random strangers doing whatever it is they’re doing at that time of day because everybody is living individual lives. Sure, I could be hallucinating that too, but really I do not think I am creative enough. I’ve also worked in multiple positions that had more opportunity than most to peer behind the curtains into people’s private lives to the point where I easily accept that life is happening all over the place.
  
  The shared simulation is much more plausible to me than me existing in an individual universe. I don’t really think it’s true either but that’s more of a bias.
  
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Etterra@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You can’t. Best you can do is learn not to think about it.

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Gremour@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You can’t, because in fact your brain really creates images.

Healthy person most commonly sees images based on the light their eyes receive, but based on the quality of information you may interpret it wrongly. Especially light captured by side sight – here brain draws a big part of picture itself.

People with schozophrenia can see and hear non-existing people like we see real people. It can take them a lot of reasoning to verify if person they are seeing in fact real.

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OccamsTeapot@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Dr. Samuel Johnson (writer of the original English dictionary) was posed this theory. In response (probably a little drunk) he ran up and kicked a giant stone, saying “I refute it thus!” He broke his foot.

Probably don’t do that but I guess you see his point.

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bjoern_tantau@swg-empire.de ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You’re actually a Boltzmann brain that just randomly popped into existence thinking all your past interactions were real.

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NaibofTabr@infosec.pub ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Define ‘prove’.

Before you can determine how to prove something, you must determine what evidence would constitute proof and under what conditions you might be able to collect that evidence.

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Neil@lemmy.ml ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
The only thing you can know for sure is that you exist.

Absolutely nothing else can be proven to exist with 100% certainty.

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- ornery_chemist@mander.xyz ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  The only thing you can know for sure is that you exist.
  
  Or maybe not, depending on your definitions of “you” and “exist” :)
  
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- gndagreborn@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Is that Descartes?
  
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Fedizen@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
More important question: If we didn’t exist who are you talking to?

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- TopRamenBinLaden@sh.itjust.works ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  What if we are all just entities created by OPs mind?
  
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Kolanaki@yiffit.net ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
I mean… Your brain is just making shit up.

Color? It’s the brain interpreting the visible wavelengths of light. Maybe what you see for red isn’t the same as anyone else. Maybe the difference between high and low pitched sounds, sound different to each individual because the experience of hearing a sound is, again, just the brain’s interpretation of data.

The data can be the same for everyone, and the experience can be totally different because the brain interprets that data differently for each person. It certainly would explain why some people like subjective things and others do not; such as colors, music, flavors, etc.

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- Fedizen@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Nobody even knows why (evolutionarily) we have to sleep, just that bad things will happen if we dont
  
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  - AmidFuror@kbin.social ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    It seems to be connected with forming long term memories.
    
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  - Kolanaki@yiffit.net ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    We don’t eveb know what the deal is with hiccups. Like, we know the mechanism that makes them happen, but not why it exists.
    
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- TheButtonJustSpins@infosec.pub ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  There are as many universes as there are beings to perceive them.
  
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recapitated@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Your mind is hallucinating all of your experiences based on verbatim inputs from your senses. We’re real together, we’re operating separate flesh machines which are operating separate Internet machines to talk.

It’s pretty cool actually

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The_Mike_Drop@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Oh this is easy to prove. See life is disapointing. If it were all made up by my brain I’d have all the sex and never be rejected and the bank account would have a lot more zeros in it printed in black.

Also I have no impuse control, theres not a reality where my brain would invent pizza and not let me eat it 24/7.

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FelipeFelop@discuss.online ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
scientificamerican.com/…/how-do-i-know-im-not-the…

It’s impossible to prove that anyone else or anything else exists. It’s also impossible to know whether my brain is deceiving me.

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racsol@lemmy.ml ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You’re looking for counter-arguments for Solipsism. Wikipedia’s definition:

Solipsism is the philosophical idea that only one’s mind is sure to exist.

Further reading: [iep.utm.edu/solipsis/](Solipsism and the Problem of Other Minds)

Thread with some counter-arguments: https://philosophy.stackexchange.com/questions/89321/what-are-the-best-arguments-against-solipsism

The one I personally chose for myself is the pragmatic one: Believing reality is a fantasy doesn’t actually changes your experience of it.

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Firipu@startrek.website ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Considering how lazy I am, there is no way my brain would bother with all the little details I see everywhere when I go out. When I’m at a busy station or crossing and I literally see thousands of different people walk by, not a single repeat face? Proof enough for me this is real tbh.

(and if you go the simulation way, who cares? If a simulation can give billions of ppl their own lives, feelings, dreams and hopes, it does not matter in the slightest to the ppl living in it that it’s real or a simulation)

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RegalPotoo@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Suppose it is - suppose that you can know for sure that your entire perception of reality is just noise being generated somewhere and being fed into your consciousness, and that no action you take has any impact on this meta-reality.

How would that affect your choices?

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nutsack@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
The whole point of philosophy is to talk about things that you can’t prove

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Hereforpron2@lemmynsfw.com ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Read G.E. Moore’s take on it uen.pressbooks.pub/…/g-e-moores-hands/

It’s a common and ultimately pointless/self-indulgent philosophical “question,” lots of good essays on it.

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Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
For me, I compare “reality” to my dreams, which are without a doubt, immersive worlds that my mind had created for it’s own amusement.

Dreams just hit different. There are times where I think, this is a dream, I can’t just fly away if I want. And I do!

Haven’t been able to make it work here yet.

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- rikudou@lemmings.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  Just an anecdote, but once I had a dream so realistic, that when I woke up I was really scared, because I thought I was awake the whole time.
  
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paddirn@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
You can’t really disprove it, since any evidence you get can be attributed to your brain just faking it. Even if you were to just wear a blindfold and stumble around experiencing the world without seeing any visual illusions, how would you know your brain wasn’t creating the illusion of sounds and solid objects too? Any scientific tests similarly could be tainted by your brain creating the results.

You have to ask yourself, “Why?” To what end would your brain be creating all this just for you? How is it that you, out of every other person or animal on Earth, is the only one with real thoughts and emotions? Why create this world, out of all possible worlds, why this one specifically? Why would You create a world filled with so much pain, sorrow, injustice, and inequality? Why would You do that? Just to pass the time?

If the bad stuff isn’t even real, then it shouldn’t matter anyways, but if nothing matters why wouldn’t your brain just create a happy, pleasant world in the first place? Why not just create a world of infinite pleasure, since I’m sure it would take the brain just as much effort to create heaven as hell? Why would your brain trick you into seeing a world with as many flaws as we have? Are you the God who made this shitty world?

To me, I think I’m another ‘living person’, that’s extremely unlikely. The more likely scenario is that I am one living thing amongst many and that we’re all struggling to make our way through this life as best we can. It’s a struggle for resources which can lead to pain and sorrow intentionally and unintentionally. What matters is helping others where you can and finding whatever pleasure and meaning you’re able to during our short time here.

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Mango@lemmy.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Well if MY brain was doing that, my brain is an asshole and should just die along with me.

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sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Reality can be subjective. What’s it matter if it’s all in your head? You are still experiencing it no? There is no way to prove that anything actually truly exist other than your own consciousness maybe. What matters is that it is real to you.

In all honesty it sounds like you’re struggling with disassociation which is treatable through therapy. I don’t know a lot about it but there is plenty of information online I’m sure

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Bongles@lemm.ee ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
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- rikudou@lemmings.world ⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  
  It can’t do that.
  
  That’s not an argument. If you’re inside a virtual reality, what you perceive as true doesn’t have to be true at all. OPs brain can be capable of everything you said and more if you and I were just fragments of their imagination. What we know about the brain’s capabilities wouldn’t matter if this was a simulation.
  
  The only real answer is that it doesn’t matter: if the whole world around you is made up by your brain, what does it matter if you can’t change it?
  
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