Best Explanation of the Literal Illusion of Reality

Forum for discussion of Tibetan Buddhism. Questions specific to one school are best posted in the appropriate sub-forum.
Post Reply
User avatar
shanehanner
Posts: 105
Joined: Thu Dec 04, 2014 2:37 am

Best Explanation of the Literal Illusion of Reality

Post by shanehanner »

Im not sure if Im not supposed to be posting anything from a non-Buddhist source, but Buddhism is inherently scientific. So I think this cognitive scientists explanation is worth hearing for people with difficulty in understanding what is meant by the "illusion" or "dream-like" nature of reality.

I would watch the TED talk first, then the Closer to Truth video.

In the talks, Dr. Hoffman describes our reality as akin to a User Interface on a computer. The icons on the computer are not to be taken as literal, ie. the folder is not literally blue and in the corner of your screen. This is used to hide the actual nuts and bolts or code of the computer because if we had to deal with that all the time we would never get anything done. Similarly, what we see is a projection of our mind and not a real representation of reality. It is literally and scientifically proven to be a real time reconstruction in our brains. This reconstruction, however, is NOT what actual reality is, but a User Interface designed to navigate.

I wont go on trying to explain it because the Professor does it so much more eloquently. That being said I would love to start a discussion on how this theory relates the Buddhist concept of illusory nature.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYp5XuGYqqY
http://www.closertotruth.com/series/why ... video-2412

Im sorry if this should be under a different topic
daelm
Posts: 486
Joined: Mon Jun 27, 2011 8:49 pm

Re: Best Explanation of the Literal Illusion of Reality

Post by daelm »

shanehanner wrote:Im not sure if Im not supposed to be posting anything from a non-Buddhist source, but Buddhism is inherently scientific. So I think this cognitive scientists explanation is worth hearing for people with difficulty in understanding what is meant by the "illusion" or "dream-like" nature of reality.
In the talks, Dr. Hoffman describes our reality as akin to a User Interface on a computer. The icons on the computer are not to be taken as literal, ie. the folder is not literally blue and in the corner of your screen. This is used to hide the actual nuts and bolts or code of the computer because if we had to deal with that all the time we would never get anything done. Similarly, what we see is a projection of our mind and not a real representation of reality. It is literally and scientifically proven to be a real time reconstruction in our brains. This reconstruction, however, is NOT what actual reality is, but a User Interface designed to navigate.
there was work done a few years back - last time i was seriously curious - that countered the idea of real-time. the initial work was on the zombie theory stuff, and then there was some research into processing power and bit processing. essentially, the consensus then was that we buffered bits, replayed them fro internal awareness, and were therefore non-real-time. if i can find the stuff i'll drop it here.

regards
Post Reply

Return to “Tibetan Buddhism”