Is Anything Real? (Vsauce Reaction)

Is anything real? As explained by Vsauce. Talking fast, spitballing about solipsism and considering reality.
Original Video: • Is Anything Real?
Literary Recommendation:
As a Man Thinketh
As a Man Thinketh by James Allen (FREE audiobook): • As A Man Thinketh (190...
Try Audible for Audiobooks: amzn.to/3QMwv2G
Crash Course Psychology: • Intro to Psychology: C...
Solipsism Articles:
- www.scientificamerican.com/ar...
- www.cambridge.org/core/journa...
- digitalcommons.iwu.edu/cgi/vi...
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[@seantheswimmer]

what i love about vsauce, is that not only do they answer every question u have, they refuse to keep everything answered and leave u with more questions then u came into the video with, and the whether theres an answer to the title question is still up for debate

[@ub-4630]

I answer my own questions, never 100% sure it's true. Like how you go beyond the edge of the universe and you get to the other end of the universe. Like walking around the world.

[@psalamndr9033]

Mark Twain wrote an amazing solipsistic story, "The Mysterious Stranger" that everyone should read

[@symbiosisai]

Mark Twain the guy who wrote a story about a big black guy called Nig**r Jim?

[@ravenward626]

While I've never read the story, the stop motion animated version is pretty dope.

[@Softapplecore]

YES MORE PHILOSOPHY

[@donaldclark8909]

What a breath of fresh air. A KZbin reactor that actually provides us with interesting and provocative content. Keep it up, I'm so excited to see someone as young as you be so well versed on so many interesting topics. I look forward to what's next.

[@Zanroff]

Something that hits me is when social bubbles merge. I'm almost 34 and I still am confused how one friend group meets another, or my family meets a friend of mine. It feels unreal. I think something along the lines of "how is this possible? They exist in the same universe?" It's pretty freaking weird to say, but that's what goes through my head.

[@osmaniesquijarosa4308]

Nah, that’s just a natural thing humans do called suspension of reality, we like it when we can clearly understand things, in order to do so, we compartmentalize things, in this case friendships, into neat little boxes with categories. The moment something breaks the boundaries of the reality created within the box we are surprised, for we have fooled ourselves into believing the crafted reality within the box, which was done for our sake of easier understanding.

[@Cyan37]

@@osmaniesquijarosa4308 Nicely put!

[@noefillon1749]

@@osmaniesquijarosa4308 The same happens when you take the train/plane and go far away. Far enough that: 1. You are not able to get into your mind all the space continuity between the two places at once (except on a map, but you don't really percieve a map as real) 2. You can't go back and forth between A and B on demand, and don't do it frequently 3. Your habits, the people you meet... are not the same in both places The these two places seem like parallel universes, and it's difficult to realise things continue to happen in place A when you are in place B. It can become even strange to meet people you know from place A in place B because in your mind, they don't belong there. They are in this other segment of your life. This time, the segment happens to be geographical.

[@TheGabrielPT]

I always thought of the adjective "solipsist" as the same as "egocentrist", and I was not wrong. But I never knew what solipsism really meant, as a concept. Interesting stuff.

[@Tuning_Spork]

I don't recall ever wondering if my classmates existed outside of school. And I think I know why. Since you DID wonder about that, my question to you is: "How did you get to and from school?" Perhaps the reason that that thought never occurred to me is that, even as a 1st-grader, I walked to school. I lived so close to the school that, when walking there, the first intersection I came to had crossing guards. And I walked with many of my classmates, and other strangers, at least part of their way home. Several of my classmates lived in my immediate neighborhood -- meaning, less than half a block away. It's interesting that not growing up in such a neighborhood might lead a child to entertain the crazy idea that their classmates existing only at school. All of this is just more evidence in support of my thesis: Kids are crazy. 😅

[@maozedong8370]

You didn't get the video at all.

[@antonm1834]

@Mao Zedong I mean solipsism is a moronic ideology for the intellectually disinterested "philosphers".

[@maozedong8370]

@@antonm1834 I mean, I understand the logic behind the belief. You can't disprove solipsism which is why it exists like religions do. It would be much more logical to view the universe as a 24 hour game server. When you log on to an online game, you are interacting with other players and that world programmed in the game. If you get a game over though or stop playing, even though you are no longer in the game, it is still going on with other players still playing. THAT is how the universe works. Our mind is our construct of reality and the universe is our server. Once our mind stops being able to "process" the server, our consciousness is gone and we can no longer exist on the server unless we can somehow restart the game, get a second attempt or join a new server. Did that make sense or did it sound like nonsense?

[@Cyan37]

@maozedong8370 No idea how you arrived at the conclusion that OP didn't understand the video. It makes sense, in America many children are being driven to school by car. This is not the case for many other countries. So a child might develop solipsistic ideas due to being connected and disconnected from school before and after with the car ride. There is no continuous experience of going to and away from school with your class mates and maybe even visiting them after school, which would create a full connection throughout the day. A reasonable thought from OP in my opinion.

[@utubekullanicisi]

@@Cyan37 Seconded

[@Pestsoutwest]

I once had a total amnesia moment at the age of 16: Smoking pot out of a gravity bong, not knowing it was laced... with what i have no clue. After a huge hit, I looked around the room with no memory at all... the most mind-blowing part of the event was when the door to the room opened, and I realized there was more than just this room. With no memory, what you can see is all you think there is.

[@axilslayer]

that sounds WILD did you freak out?

[@Pestsoutwest]

@@axilslayer YES!

[@SirHargreeves]

I’ve had a couple of extremely vivid dreams where I’m an entity looking down on the earth and having zero memory of being a human. It felt realer than real and I’ve had it twice in my life. I just felt intense excitement and love towards the earth. I’d wake up and have to take a moment to compose myself.

[@Oxley016]

@@SirHargreeves did you take DMT before having this dream by any chance? lol

[@Nickel138]

@@SirHargreeves​Interesting. While take an EXTREMELY high dose of psilocybin, I had a very similar experience. It was 16 grams, and I wanted to look at the stars. But I could go out in space. So I went so far out in space until there was nothing. Then I made something. It was a planet, and things started to live on it. …and it was so real and so beautiful. I loved it so much. I loved all the things on it so much. It was way more important than my life. It’s like I was always there, and being alive was like… someone asking me what I had for lunch a month ago after winning the lottery. Who knows? Who cares? That’s just a far, far, far away thought. The least important thing. This, where I existed, was reality and life was a dream. Then I had to choose to go back. It felt like being pulled back. By the way, I would not recommend dosing that much. I thought I went to sleep, but I was up for about 8 hours, just gone from my body. Not fun for the other people there. Apparently, I was moving around and just repeating whatever they said… I don’t remember any of it. Again, please don’t do this without a support team.

[@garetjax2768]

I really appreciated when you said, "everything you experience is real to you, which makes it real". I believe one of the most important things we can do in our life is to learn and grow from our experiences. Even if this was a simulation, the experience feels real enough to me that I believe we can learn and grow from it. Also, I'm digging your vsauce reactions.

[@Jabberwocky415]

That line fits perfectly with my philosophy as well. This may seem like a random reference but the tv show Agents of Shield dealt with this extensively in their fourth season, regarding the difference between perception and reality, and whether such a difference exists at all.

[@conexant51]

On the note of classmates only existing in school... I was born in 1976, so around 1981 when I was about 5 years old, I thought colours didn't appear until 20 years before my birth because of monochrome movies. It wasn't something I thought deeply over, it was just something I sort of figured "Well, that's how things are!". Anyway, I asked my mom when colours were invented and didn't quite understand it when she told me they'd always existed. "But mom, the movies were black and white in the old days?!". She laughed and told me it was because technology for colour film was very expensive back then so movies were mostly shot in monochrome, which was a cheaper option. She then gave me examples of early colour films like The Wizard of Oz, Gone With the Wind and Bambi. It was kind of a revelation for me at the time, because it just made so much more sense that colours were just an intrinsic part of how humans perceive the world. (And no, my 5 year old brain didn't use those words, lol)

[@vibaj16]

reminds me of a Calvin and Hobbes comic that goes something like this: Calvin: Why are old movies black and white? Calvin's dad: Because the world used to be black and white. Calvin: Then why are old paintings colorful? Calvin's dad: The paint became colored along with the world. ...and there's more that I forget

[@KeldonA]

" ... and then the documentary takes a deep dark turn ..." 🤣 that escalated quickly

[@TheGabrielPT]

I remember being like 6 years old when I asked myself basically a simpler, child version of the question "why is there something rather than nothing?". First moment of my life I really became self aware, it paralised me for like 1 hour straight. It was also after a nap, which sucked, I remember like it was yesterday

[@abnr1983]

The thing that made me "self-aware" was when I thought about death. I was about 7 or 8 years old at the time. That paralized me as well for the whole night. I was that afraid. That really scared the heck out of me. I was thinking what would happen to my mind, my memories, my very being. Even nowadays I still think about it from time to time. I've gone down a rabbit hole of trying to get as much information about it as I can. So I guess I have thanatophobia (fear of death), but not in the sense of dying physically, more on the fact that I don't know what will "really" happen to my mind when I pass away. I was raised Catholic, but I'm not really religious in my adult years. It's just one big cluster f*ck in my mind whenever I think about it.

[@SirHargreeves]

Poor atheists, getting wound up.

[@c_n_b]

​@@SirHargreeves God must wonder where he came from 🤔

[@DavidStruveDesigns]

Funny thing is, the Universe itself had asked this question and decided it'd rather be made of nothing than something. So everything inside it is constantly decaying at various rates towards a state of such low energy that it essentially _will_ become nothing at some point in the future. This is called entropy and results in the Heat Death of the Universe. It's one theory of how the Universe will one day "end" - end being a now constant state of energy so spread out it's undetectable and nothing in the Universe will even exist _to_ detect it, not even sub-atomic particles or light or radiation.

[@norsehorse84]

@@DavidStruveDesigns Technically, it will never be "nothing". Everything being low energy doesn't mean there is no energy (and by extension, no matter).

[@IllyaLeonovMorganFreepony]

I spent a great deal of time thinking about this 50 years ago when I was 20. It bothered me a great deal for awhile. I talked it over with my physician who was a friend of mine and whom I had known all of my life. He convinced me that though it was an interesting thought experiment, it was ultimately a useless exercise because the only path open to us is to live as though what we experience is true. All other paths lead to certain falseness.

[@SirHargreeves]

Exactly, there always a pragmatic foundation that says ‘Who cares about language games like this? I have a concept of my hands, I use them and I continue to survive’

[@decomposedcorpse5186]

Brother, I refuse to believe you are a brony at 70.

[@IllyaLeonovMorganFreepony]

@@decomposedcorpse5186 You may choose to believe that which you will. Nevertheless it is true. I quite understand your frustration however. I know of no other my age who delves into the Ponies.

[@mikeconoan]

No one has mentioned Descartes. "I think therefore I am" is the basis for knowledge of reality.

[@benjaminroe311ify]

Ah man! You beat me to it. I did mention it but 45 minutes after you!

[@mikeconoan]

@@benjaminroe311ify Glad I wasn't the only one!

[@gingerninja8785]

I happened upon your channel and enjoy reaction channels just so I have someone to share in the experience with and come to find you enjoy a lot of the same topics that I'm interested in. I fully support it and thanks for hanging out! 🤘

[@scottmoquin]

As far we know, you only exist in that chair, in front of that framed picture and only from the torso up, and an occasional knee.

[@heavydown2582]

I love watching this channel! The reviewer's responses are every bit as informative as are the content being discussed. Wish I could have this caliber of quality interactions with the people I meet daily.

[@wisdomplaysbtd6144]

When you were 6, you were unknowingly running around with a head full of memories that you will never have again

[@dialog_box]

2:38 another cool example i learned in a Semantics class is the statement "I am here now." A statement which, when interpreted lexically (i.e. using only the literal definitions/grammar involved, without taking any context into account), can only ever be true at the moment of utterance.

[@DavidStruveDesigns]

My all-time favourite lesson in Physics at school was when our teacher explained that we've never _actually_ touched anything. And never will. The sense we call "touch" is actually our body measuring how strongly the atoms of the object we are trying to touch are repelling the atoms that make up our fingers. Like trying to push the two same poles of magnets together (south-to-south or north-to-north). That same resistance you feel doing that _IS_ what our body reports as "touch". You need something like a Sun to _actually_ force atoms close enough to touch, and that results in atomic fusion where a _lot_ of energy gets released in the form of radiation, heat and ends in a brand new heavier atom being created. So not something you want to happen when you pick up a drink can or your keys or hold someone's hand. It made me realise that almost every sense we have is lying to us, and that what we think is real actually isn't.

[@osmaniesquijarosa4308]

Or that the reality of touch is really as simple as that, and that what you envisioned for what that reality ought to have been has caused either disappointment or a bafflement at your minds inability/unwillingness to grasp the concept as is.

[@DalleGamer]

I actually had the same thing with solipsism as a kid. Fun to think about, i thought everybody was a robot that turned off when they went home. i guess when you view the world a lot more simple you somehow can think "above" it and start questioning it. Cause ur right u totally grow out of it after learning more about the world and the people surrounding you. Idk thinking about it my mind keeps telling me "the truman show" idk if it affected me with that. But watching that and seeing everything being setup, and then diving into Trumans pov. idk it for sure could have had an impact. on 90's kids

[@CarlosRenfroe]

He makes me think more than I am comfortable thinking 😅

[@hijack1453]

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a great great movie, I've watched it a couple of times. But yay, more Vsauce! I don't understand how you're able to not binge all of them, they're the best youtube videos there is. Even though my life is a chronic existential crisis, I've never cared about solipsism too much. It doesn't matter and there will never be an answer. Kinda same with anthropic principle. Or the question whether there will be anything after death.

[@Adi_Jewel]

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is one of my favorite movies, and since watching it made me think if I would erase memories that makes me feel bad or embarrassed. I think it is better to keep those memories, that way you can learn your lesson, grow from it and not repeat the same behavior.

[@joekavalauskas8767]

Been subscribed for a while, another great vid! But what chair is that? Looks comfy!

[@Onnarashi]

I find myself prone to questioning reality. I "live in my own head" and find the experience generally comfortable. I recall bus trips where I'd look outside and see all the houses, imagining myself as an alien visiting Earth and noticing how bizarre we humans truly are. Existence is truly strange. Our universe is strange and mysterious, beyond our puny human understanding. I've imagined the universe like brain, with each star and planet being a neuron connecting to another. I've wondered if we could all be living in one big cosmic dream, inside someone's head, and the universe is our understanding of that mind, like self-aware dreams peering up at their creator.

[@SonOfMuta]

4:04 You down with LTP (Yeah you know me), you down with LTP (Yeah you know me)

[@dpall38]

A priori example, “bitches be crazy”.

[@mediaproductionpro]

I always heard “all rectangles are squares” as an example of a priori

[@jeff0125]

Since you mentioned both, I came across an edition of As a Man Thinketh narrated by Earl Nightingale on Audible.

[@ub-4630]

"Reality is an illusion, the universe is a hologram"

[@DomR1997]

0:04 He'll never be ready for the answer to that question.

[@Gauzzly]

More OG vsauce reactions please

[@IsaacG8]

You know, some of my earliest thoughts were questions on whether or not anyone else exists. I didn't think I was the only one, I believed what my senses told me were likely the truth, but as early as three years old, I remember wondering if everyone else could be "fake" ( the best word my three year old brain had at the time). Also, I used to wonder if the whole purpose to everyone else was for me. Now, hearing that you had similar thoughts, I wonder if it's common.

[@vibaj16]

same

[@kurtsmith9564]

So like the upside down tongue experiment. If you cross two fingers and then put another finger in between them. There is a sensation of a space that does not correlate to what you're seeing because you were not touching the inside of both fingers when you run the other finger across them, you're touching the outside of both those fingers

[@Kieslowski1]

your kindergarten story reminded me of the concept of object permanence.. "Object permanence involves understanding that items and people still exist even when you can’t see or hear them. This concept was discovered by child psychologist Jean Piaget and is an important milestone in a baby's brain development.", says webmd.

[@thewhat6219]

Ever heard of the pistol shrimp? They can see colors we cannot even fathom. I've often wondered what it would be like to see that color, and what would change in the world as a result. I don't know if this counts, but I used to have weird bouts of self awareness, where it just became really weird and surreal to be looking thru my own eyes at that very moment. And then it would pass with no issue. I still have them today, but it's not as alien anymore, I suppose.

[@ub-4630]

I think you meant mantis shrimp. -Funny- Funnily enough, they are not good at distinguishing between colors.

[@paquinraino8180]

This happen to me to, where you have a moment and you're like " I'm me, in my body" and it feels strange because you see that from the outside in your mind, it doesn't happen during a long time, but sometimes it's disturbing. I like this sensation nowadays because I have more knowledge about philosophy and especially solipsism (which I heard about for the first time in physics documentary yes not philosophy but physician who were asking about the origin of the universe and one theory is about that it's our mind who creates everything) And also I like the relativism like in Gulliver's Travels where he make you see the world differently

[@thewhat6219]

@@ub-4630That's the animal I meant, I think pistol shrimp is a nickname because of that snap thing it does. And it not being able to properly distinguish colors is funny, maybe all those extra shades blur the lines a bit? I'm sure being in the ocean doesn't help either.

[@subspace666]

what you describe kinda sounds and feels like tunnel vision but like your sitting in a giants head like in man in black.

[@benjaminroe311ify]

"I think therefore I am"- Des Cartes

[@Nairozet]

Thanks to your story, i suddenly remembered that i had those same thoughts when i was in kindergarten. It also stuck for quite a while. Unfortunately i was too introverted to even think about talking to someone about it. For me it felt like the world around me only existed as far as i could see it. I couldn't prove it nor disprove it, but it made sense to me. Infinity probably had some part to play in it. And this still keeps my mind busy at times. It has to end somewhere. Yet, if space stops somewhere, what's behind it?

[@IanDarley]

It's a shame that James Mason (English architect, turned actor) is no longer with us; I would listen to any audio book narrated by him, though I would probably be asleep in five minutes. He had one of the smoothest speaking voices ever.

[@seanneal552]

I got a lot out of this vid. Great take. I'm very happy listening to your thoughts.

[@tnightwolf]

What a great channel you have!💥

[@DrMustacho]

For people that can't flip their tongue try crossing your fingers and rub the tip of your nose, it'll feel like you have two noses

[@Softapplecore]

Those are your nostrils bro

[@jaryncovell2538]

@@Softapplecore 😭💀

[@josephturner7569]

"Things just happen, what the hell". Didactylos of Ephebe.

[@SalamiSelimbo]

I hadn't seen this one from vsauce yet and watching it with your reaction was really nice👍

[@oddpoppetesq.3467]

These kind of videos boggle my brain... I love them.

[@exiledskunk5046]

In terms of a priori statements, the austrian school of economics is basically deduction from a priori statements about human action. If you're ever curious about different branches of economic thought, austrian economics is an interesting one

[@kev4366]

“I'm not crazy about reality, but it's still the only place to get a decent meal.” ― Groucho Marx

[@aletheiahenosis5962]

Do I exist? Answer: I think, therefore I am. You can only know relative truth, never precise truth. Answer: If that was true it would be an example of precise truth, so the statement defeats itself hence it's not true.

[@dyoung3536]

Where are your fingers? On hand. You crack me up.

[@DLN000]

I literally just watched a reaction to The Truman Show and joked "Wait to you realize you are in an Alien Tv Reality Show"... and now with this? lol I'm starting to question my own reality..

[@johnmassey2980]

I always arrive late - maybe because I live the other side of the world, or maybe because I just have other stuff to do, I dunno. I was entertained by the print on the screen instructing to ignore the tilt on the picture behind you - I wonder how many people noticed it. My favourite KZbinr is a young Chinese woman who actually lives not too far from me (as in a hundred kilometres or so, I suppose) and who films herself making complicated and difficult things from waste materials, and why I was reminded of her is that sometimes she does something that is not safe, like climbing around a roof nailing on the ridge capping or whatever without wearing any safety harness, and the words "Please do not do this at home" will appear on the screen (in Chinese and English). One time she was nailing something down and she accidentally hit her fingers with the hammer, with a howl of anguish - and she left it in the video, which was simultaneously funny, sympathy-inducing and a good visual safety warning to her viewers. Now I must go and straighten that painting in the bedroom.

[@mikerobytes]

Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind is one of my favorite movies

[@charlesf2804]

The upside-down tongue thing: wouldn't that depend upon how the nerves are connected?

[@terpcj]

Back in the way-back when I was in some philosophy class, there was this bit of helpful unhelpfulness: How do we know we exist? Well...start with the proposition that we don't exist and see where it gets you.

[@NoProtocol]

I like this

[@Bryan-T]

more vsauce please!

[@KeldonA]

Well, the tongue touch illusion is kinda right, because it correctly tells you WHERE the touch occurred.

[@austinwyss]

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was a great movie. Now I want to watch it again.

[@tonydorsett33]

While there is no answer for hard solipsism, we can know one thing, that we exist. I think, therfore I am.

[@EdmontonRealEstate01]

A few books you might want to take a look at are: Six Blind Elephants vol l and ll; TRANCE-formations; Transforming Yourself; Using Your Brain For A Change; and Frogs Into Princes. If you don’t mind taking a deep dive into something even though it might be a bit advanced, and are willing to come back to it later when you’ve learned some more, consider reading “Six Blind Elephants vol One And Two” first. If you would like to read something more foundational consider reading “Using Your Brain For A Change” and “Frogs into Princes” first. Either way, I think you’ll enjoy these books.

[@gogyoo]

13:35 you reacting to Tim Minchin's Storm could explore that feeling further.

[@sunshynff]

Thank you for introducing me to Vsauce, judging by the comments I've been missing out! For anyone curious like I was, a petabyte, in digital storage terms, is the next general size up from a terabyte, so it's 1000 terabytes. Scientists say it's similarly equal to 20 million tall failing cabinets full of documents, or 500 billion pages of text on standard printing paper. Meaning our brains could hold appx. 1.25 trillion pages of text worth of memory, hmmmmm. I think that factoid just fried some of my neurons.

[@earthwormandruw]

If you are reading this I just want to say it is a pleasure to be one of your creations (:

[@knightowl1985]

When I was a child I thought if I could not see then no one else could. My mom saw me covering my eyes trying to take an item off a table and I thought she could not see me.

[@suqmadiq68]

Last Thursdayism is the idea that the universe was created last Thursday, but with the physical appearance of being billions of years old. Under Last Thursdayism, books, fossils, light already on the way from distant stars, and literally everything (including your memories of the time before last Thursday) were all formed at the time of creation (last Thursday) in a state such that they appear much older.

[@GolDFish-if1ov]

I thought the same thing. I believe when I was a kid that teachers live inside the schools and when I left the school they will still be there.

[@shoujahatsumetsu]

Both Anton Petrov and PBS Spacetime have released videos about the nature of reality lately.

[@ArtistJoshuaWeigand]

I watched a video earlier today with the strangest argument for the existence of God I've heard. That defining God within the parameter's of a person with a personality, the same arguments made to prove God doesn't exist can be made to say you don't exist. It was a very unexpected line of thinking, but it's an intriguing way to think about it. It kinda made the argument that thinking solipsistically in the abstract is equivalent to disbelief in God.

[@earthwormandruw]

Oo0

[@markaxworthy2508]

If we worried about this stuff, we would go mad. I go on the working assumption that my fingers are at the end of my hands and it hasn't failed me yet.

[@G_Demolished]

Anyone trying to convince you that solipsism is true is basically talking to himself.

[@user-vm1xm1ch7p]

“If the universe is meaningless so it’s the statement that it is so”

[@PathtoYahawah]

A good portion of those probably lay in the realm of touch, specifically the first 5 on the left.

[@dependent-wafer-177]

Example of a priori: There is no number greater and less than 1 at the same time.

[@bugsby4663]

This is like Dawn from Buffy who was magically created a few months before but as far as she was concerned, she had always been Buffy's sister and despite the odd doubt, Buffy and her friends thought so too. Even her mum remembered giving birth to her.

[@chrislit702]

Love it! Thanks for making me think today.

[@sunshynff]

Ok, I should probably wait until I watch the entire video before commenting..lol. Ok I've only heard of solipsism briefly, this was my first step into learning more about it. While finding it fascinating, and planning to dive deeper, I do have an initial thought at disproving it, only a quick hypothesis off the top of my head....... Not to get too depressing, but after retiring a little early due to job related ptsd, right before the pandemic, and the following lock downs and poor mental health state I found myself in, I developed a bit of agoraphobia. Making matters worse I was drifting apart from most of my friends which were from my former job, and my youngest finished college making me a divorced empty nester. I'm doing much better, and have a handle on my mental health and while I still don't enjoy large crowds, my agoraphobia is almost completely gone. Thing is I went through about a year or so of pretty dark times, and felt immensely alone, and would have given anything to interact with friends, or even have a long phone conversations with someone, to the point I found myself probably annoying the heck out of the cashier at the grocery store or bank as I prattled on about something odd that happened during my weekly day of errands. So, if solipsism was a reality, wouldn't I be able to will that need for human interaction into my reality, solving the egocentric predicament?? Or am I blending two different scientific philosophies?

[@joltheosas9565]

Solipsism terrifies me for some reason idk 2 years ago I had a Psychotic episode after a really bad panic attack thinking everyone is fake lmao but it was a really scary experience but it doesn't sound convincing enough to me anymore

[@savory_bacon]

11:15 I don't think its necessarily solipsistic thinking that causes a child to think everyone only exists at school/daycare/at home. It's probably just that they haven't yet developed a theory of mind yet. It's not that they think they're the only ones that truly exist, it's just that they haven't really had the physical ability to perceive another being's perspective yet because their mind is still growing.

[@invisigoat]

Absolutely fascinating!

[@andymiller3366]

Not sure if this is solipsism or not but as a young boy lower end of grade school I believed if you looked away from something it would "unload" and anytime you flicked on the light in the darkest room it would load in right in front of your eyes. Basically if I or others couldn't see it hear it or perceive it it did not exist at all.

[@chanahasnomana]

Ah yes! 2.5 petabytes... clearly i failed all those history tests because my brain ssd was corrupted 😂

[@peoples4712]

The Why Files is some great narration. I love every video. So interesting

[@Sizzlik]

If you cant twist your tongue, cross your fingers and touch your nosetip. Feels like two nosetips. We made that experiment in school with a marble. Blind it feels like 2 marbles

[@John-ir4id]

With regard to solipsism, I've come to the conclusion that I am the realist thing in existence to myself. Although I can empathize and sympathize with others, I can only really know them in relation to myself and anything more is a leap of faith. But, as true as it is for me, it is just as true for everyone else. Addendum: An interesting question - that no one will see after so long - is if our Phaneron is responsible for our sense of morality. At best, it seems to work in conjunction with our sense of community to construct it - family, home, city, state, nation, planet, species, etc. ...in any case, the argument could be made that it is subjective and incomplete and, perhaps, even moot beyond ourselves and the consequences we inflict on one another.

[@osmaniesquijarosa4308]

Yes, it’s rather simple concept in truth, that we, as thinking beings have differing perceptions, but when you have to think about it, and put it in relation to everything, it seems most complicated.

[@John-ir4id]

@@osmaniesquijarosa4308 I think that has to do with the fact that we have to balance the solipsistic limitations of our individual consciousness with the acknowledgment of the multitude of consciousnesses that exist beyond our own.

[@Scoobay]

I have a feeling that 2.5 petabytes is lowballing you.

[@dgames8900]

Only way to "know" objective reality would be to live in a higher dimension, not bound by time and space. We live in a room without the ability to see the house...ever.

[@KainMalice]

My memory only records 1.5 petabytes

[@MarkusAxunIllianus]

The Creepy-Video from V-Sauce is a definite recommendation.

[@thomascarr6037]

It's so fun to think about these things!! There is actually some amazing theories coming out of the science of consciousness nowadays that lend some weight to solipsism. I'm not going to try to explain it right now, but check out the book 'Being You' by Anil Seth. It's mind-melting haha

[@Sandman60077]

I can flip my tongue around. I tried what he was saying, and maybe for a split second it tricked my brain, but my brains too awesome to be tricked that easily.

[@r3cy]

I work in psychiatric nursing, and spend many hours engaging with people who are experiencing reality entirely differently to me. It's really important that I can accept that a thing experienced has the quality of being 'real' whether or not I share the experience, otherwise it is impossible to meaningfully engage with patients and help them. I strongly feel that it's a mistake that philosophy isn't incorporated more into mental health nursing education.

[@shreksmith]

More Vsauce please 🥺

[@NoProtocol]

I will do!

[@2dashville]

Reminds me of a joke from the comedian Gallagher. He took his little daughter with him to the store to buy milk and they got into a traffic jam. His little girl looked around and exclaimed, “can this many people be going for milk?”

[@kristinaF54]

The best a priori example I can think of (and one that also blows it apart) is: 'Every question presupposes an answer.'

[@benjaminroe311ify]

Yes this is reason why MANY questions can be answered by a deep analysis of the meaning of the words uttered in the question. Fascinating.

[@earthwormandruw]

what about every answer must have a question preceding it? or is that just rewording what you just said?

[@user-qy3jq9kr1d]

My reasoning for not being solipsistic is unpredictability and the ability to learn new things. If everything exists within my own mind, then nothing that's within my vicinity that's about to happen should surprise me when it does. And if the reason things surprise me is because they are being manifested from a part of my mind that I am not consciously aware of which operates independently of me, is that part of my mind really me or another being entirely? I suggest whoever is reading this should watch Anthony Padilla's interview with people who have dissociative identity disorder. Their multiple personalities are just as distinctive and independent from one another as you are from me, each with their own memories.

[@stevechapasko5244]

In the movie The Perfect Getaway, the villin of the movie most definitely believes in an interesting take solipsism, tho it most definitely stems various mental disorders and copious amounts of drug consumption. But hey, if life you lemons, find somone who has tequila and make it s party lol, if you watch the movie, you'll get how dark that joke is.

[@ravenward626]

I heard a line while watching "The Expanse", a cop is awkwardly trying to console their partner about a recent trauma and says: "You know, every time you remember something, your mind changes it just a little. Until your best and your worst memories are your biggest illusions." IIRC the hippocampus is involved in stimulating the disparate parts of the brain to recall or hold a thought in your short term memory. I'm no doctor, but it seems to me that recalling or "reliving" a moment when you are in a different time, setting, or state of mind, could create new associations with a memory through that LTP mechanism.

[@subspace666]

its possible and likely we have some kind of memory protection / checksum or other mechanism like we have for computers we do not know about. if we need that for computers maybe so does nature. seems if we didn't have that and many memory's would change others would notice, since we would all make different errors. that mechanism is probably linked at least partly to why we forget things. the errors might have to happen multiple times in the row to have a noticeable effect like even if an error occurs once it might not fire that new neuron next time you recall the memory because of that potential thing he talked about and the stimulus that make the error wasn't present this time. i am not sure but think when we recall memory your not actually saving it on top after its just a new memory and you will probably forget it shortly because its not important in the same way we forget most of the things we learn that we do not reinforce or use. but you might be into something in the sense some mental disorders or so could do what you talked about , we all know people who remember things you and others witnessed wrong.

[@ravenward626]

@@subspace666 I have my doubts about using computers as a metaphor. It seems like that could be misleading, then again I keep comparing what I learn about AI training to some of the similarities and differences with how I perceive my own thoughts. Regardless of how our opinions develops and compare I'm glad to see others contemplating the topic.

[@therealestninja]

I like Vsauce. I haven't seen any videos since the one where he took ayahuasca.

[@NoProtocol]

Lol you must tell me the name of that video

[@shinejnn2]

This is like breaking the 4th world of a game, a game that we live in :o

[@itoibo4208]

No solipsism, growing up. It was a very strange idea when I first heard of it, and I thought it was a fun idea. Something different from reality as I knew it.