How can we possibly know what’s real? Have you ever waken up in a cold sweat from a vivid dream that, in the moment, you could’ve sworn was real life? Piggybacking off of yesterday’s allegory of the cave; we’re going to be turning inward for truth. After our main course, we’ll have a side of paradox by looking at the Brain in a Vat problem popularized by Hilary Putnam. Wash your hands because thought breakfast is being served.

René Descartes set out in the 17th century to find something that could not be doubted. Descartes believed that to arrive at certainty, you must first doubt everything. For instance, those dreams that you can’t distinguish from reality provide a solid reason to doubt your existence entirely. If you can’t distinguish reality from a dreaming state, how are you supposed to trust any of your human experience?

“There are never any sure signs by means of which being awake can be distinguished from being asleep.” - Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy

Our senses deceive us all the time as well. When you put a pencil in a half glass of water, it appears bent, even though we know its not. We may think we hear our name, then look around and find no one calling us.

Descartes realized that even if you can’t tell the difference of what is real or what’s not, you’re still experiencing something. There must at least be a “me” that had this experience, remembers it, and forms opinions and emotions based on “my” feelings about it.

This is where René Descartes coins his most famous line: “Cogito, ergo sum.” (“I think, therefore I am.”)

Even if you are deceived by everything, the fact that you are thinking proves that you exist, even if just as a thing that thinks.

This is a good segue from last edition with Plato’s Allegory of the Cave because instead of the world around being deceiving, it is your own mind. Plato’ ascent is metaphysical, and Descartes makes it psychological - the pursuit of certainty through doubt.

This thought kind of feels like prophecy to today’s world. With technology advancing at record speeds, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, scams, deepfakes, and the simulation hypothesis (that we live in a simulation), we are with no doubt deceived by the world around us on nearly an hourly basis. Yet, although Descartes grew up in a world where none of the above mentioned technology existed, his prose still remains the exact same: if perception can be perfectly simulated, what anchors us to reality? For Descartes, that anchor is our consciousness, our thoughts that deliberate our experiences, whether real or fake.

Don’t get full too quickly, we have a side dish waiting below.

Imagine your brain, floating in a vat of sustaining nutrients, connected to electrical simulations of all your sensory experiences - sight, touch, taste, smell, hearing, and even emotion.

Everything would feel real, but none of what you’re experiencing would actually be real.

This paradox coincides perfectly with Descartes’ Dream Argument, and provides a more tangible prose to consider the nature of existence.

I was going to go with a different book for today’s reflection, but there exists another section of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Going Home - Jesus and Buddha as Brothers that I believe invokes a symmetrical (or asymmetrical) line of thought to what we’ve munched on previously. In Part 1 - The Birth of Understanding lies a section called Getting Caught in the Non-Self.

For those unfamiliar with the Buddhist concept of non-self (anatta), it is essentially a teaching in which there is no permanent, independent self or soul; but rather, what we call “self” is a constantly changing collection of physical and mental processes.

Thây says:

“There are always some people who are ready to embrace a doctrine, a notion, a dogma, and they miss the real teaching. A monk sitting under a tree was asked by a lady passing by, ‘Venerable, did you see a lady pass here?’ He said, ‘No, I did not see a lady go by. I only saw a combination of bones and flesh, and the five elements.’… This is ridiculous…”

Some people prefer to take the words from great teachers as literally as possible, but the Buddhas intention is not so for this. The point of the non-self teaching is to show that everything is connected to everything else. The waves in the ocean are all made of each other, made one by the water.

So, Descartes’ principle that if nothing else, we are individual beings through our thoughts and experiences, may be true. Alongside the premise that our thoughts and experiences are largely dependent upon our interactions with other beings who have had thoughts and experiences, we can blend these Eastern and Western notions of being.

So, go through today remembering that you’re real, you exist, but you wouldn’t be real and you wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for factors outside of your “self” aligning perfectly to bring about your experiences.

You ought to thank your friend/colleague/parent/forwarder because they’ve blessed your inbox with something special. Every day we will upload more thought-provoking content that will ignite your day with a sense of mindfulness and thoughtfulness.

Remember to stay mindful, smell the flowers, and take it easy.

Chef Ricky - Thought Breakfast

P.S.

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