A online "test" shows that i have the personality of René Descartes, which reminds me of a interesting concept i've learnt during my philosophy module in university.


The theory goes that: What if we are not actually who we are? What if there's a higher power that took out our brain, and place it in a vat, while stimulating our senses through a series of electrical impulses using advance technology?

The "Demon" as Descartes claimed, had isolated out brain alone in a vat, and through various stimulations, is able to let us experience our five senses; Sight,Smell,Touch,Hear,Taste. He would then create a world in which our consciousness would interact in, never knowing that we are indeed just a brain in a vat.

A very good adaptation of this theory can be seen in the movie The Matrix, where humans are enslaved by machines and made to live in a virtual world. Everything they see in that world does not exist, even people that they interact with may not exist. The brain in a vat theory is similar but only limits to one person, and that's you(the reader).

What if all that you see, hear touch, smell and taste are all unreal. How can you be sure that right now that you are indeed not in a vat? There are no ways for you to independently confirm this. How can you be sure that all the people, your family truly exists, and not a part of a program to simulate thus? If the program is so fine tuned as to stimulate all your senses through your brain, everything can be faked.

How can you be sure that what you perceived is as such? Your perception of the colour Blue for example may differ from my perception. How can you know for sure the blue that you are seeing is exactly the blue that i see? Perhaps what i see is actually your perception of the colour Red, just that by linking the colour that we both see to the common name "Blue" we can often relate to that colour when needed to describe things. Meaning that the "Blue" i see might be actually the "Red" you see, but since I've been taught that its called "Blue" i used that word whenever i want to refer to that colour(Red).

Descartes argued that although we are unable to prove that pratically anything exists for sure, we can be certain that ME exists. He proves it though the theory that "I think, therefore I am." In order for "I" to think, "I" have to exist. So if you are capable of thinking, congrats you exists, but that's all you can do. You (the reader) cannot even prove that I (the blogger) exists, or maybe I'm just a program created to interact with you, like in the Matrix (Agent Smith, Locksmith, the lady in red..etc).

You might argue that all these definitely exists for sure since no program can be that flawless. Yes you are right, for the second part. There are many things in the "world" that doesn't falls into place sometimes. Miracles, some would call them. A term given to things that we cannot explain or doesn't satisfy the laws of physics or nature. Most people would see this as a phenomenon, a miracle rather than a "program glitch".

If really thus so, then we couldn't have an grounds for believing in the things we believe, for we are not certain of those. Of course, whenever i say this to people, they'll scream at me for gibberish since afterall, too much is at stake. And so I shall leave this topic as such, to leave room for thought and for rebuttal.


"You only live once, so for once live as you like."