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Chapter 1: What unsettling argument does Donald Hoffman make about our perception of reality?
Based on the research and the science that you've done, what we are experiencing right now as human beings is not the full truth. You could call it a simulation. You could call it a game. There is something that is running our body and our thoughts in this world. Is that what I'm hearing you say? That's right.
If you look at the mathematics of evolutionary theory very, very carefully, it basically says the probability that any organism has ever been shaped to see any aspect of reality as it is is zero.
Cognitive scientist, professor and author of The Case Against Reality. By the end of this conversation, you'll be forced to question everything you thought you knew about the world around you. Please welcome Donald Hoffman.
As you get more and more energy into a smaller and smaller region of space, Einstein tells us that that energy is also the same thing as mass. And when you get that mass to a high enough point, space time collapses into a black hole and you actually destroy the very thing you're trying to observe.
So would you say that there is no reality, there's just perspective of what we're experiencing? I would say that... From your research and your studies, Is what we see real when our eyes are open or what we see when our eyes are closed and our mind more of reality than what is real?
Most of us just assume that you look around and you see a table and books and chairs and people and so forth, and you're seeing reality as it is. Most of the time, not all the time, someone can show you a visual illusion and trick you.
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Chapter 2: How does evolutionary theory influence our understanding of perception?
But most of the time, our feeling is, yeah, you know, for all practical purposes, I'm seeing the truth. And, you know, when I see the moon, the moon is there. That's because there really is a moon and it's there and you can look. And if I'm not looking and you see the moon, we can see the moon is there, even though I'm not looking. So it's always there.
And that's the way we normally think about things. And there are evolutionary arguments that are given to support that point of view. And in some sense, evolution says we've evolved to be fit, to survive long enough to reproduce. And surely seeing the truth will make us more fit.
So a lot of my colleagues, for example, and the man in the street would say, yeah, we've evolved to see reality as it is. So I see tables and chairs. That's because there are tables and chairs and it's just that simple. So the physical world is the reality that really exists. And that's the standard view.
It can get a little bit more sophisticated, you know, where you go, well, okay, in this special kind of way, with this kind of light, you can be tricked. We can put these visual effects on you and you can have illusions. But most of the time, people would say, you see the truth. And so I question that.
But is this the truth? Is what we see really the truth?
Well, now I have some good reasons to question that. Really? Why? So on several grounds, but one of them is evolutionary grounds. So evolution has shaped us to be fit. Darwin's theory is about organisms competing for resources and mates and so forth, and the fitter have the greater chance of surviving long enough to reproduce. And so
The genes that gave them the ability to out-compete will then be passed on. So we get the better genes and we're more fit. So that argument has led people to say we do see the truth because seeing the truth would make you more fit. And I argue with my colleagues, Chetan Prakash and Manish Singh and others that I'm working with.
That, no, if you look at the mathematics of evolutionary theory very, very carefully, it says quite the opposite. It basically says the probability that any organism has ever been shaped to see any aspect of reality as it is, is zero. In other words, the probability that we see the truth is zero. Really, absolutely zero. And so that's a stunning mathematical result.
And of course, I've had lots of pushback from not just average people, but from my colleagues in the sciences. So there's lots of interesting discussion about it and from philosophers. Some of the pushback is of the following kind. I'd say the biggest pushback is you're shooting yourself in the foot when you make this, right?
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Chapter 3: What is the significance of the VR headset analogy in understanding consciousness?
And then you're using Darwin's theory to claim that the probability that we see reality as it is is zero. That means the probability that physical objects and space and time are are real is zero. So you've used Darwin's theory, which assumes objects are real, to prove that they're not. So surely you've got yourself shot in the foot with a logical contradiction.
So that's the kind of argument I get, not just casually, but publications in philosophical journals and from my more scientific peers as well. And this really misses a key point about science and how science works. So, and this is sort of a central thing about science. Every scientific theory starts with assumptions. It seems trivial and obvious, but it's full of complications and implications.
So since every theory must start with assumptions, it doesn't explain everything because it doesn't explain its assumptions. So no scientific theory is a theory of everything. And you can say, well, of course, you can give me a different theory that's deeper, that explains those assumptions of some theory that you already have. And that's true.
You can always get a deeper theory that explains the assumptions of the prior theories, but your new theory will have its own assumptions. And so science will always... be in search of a new theory and we will never have a theory of everything. Wow. So I would say what science, my own take is that science at this point and forever will know roughly zero percent of reality. Wow.
Because we only can make assumptions that we assume without knowing that they're true or not. Sure. And What we really don't do in science is assume that our assumptions are true.
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Chapter 4: How can we practice stepping outside our emotions?
We don't need to assume that they're true because in some sense we know this is just provisional, right? I'm making these assumptions because this is the best we can do right now. That doesn't mean my assumptions are true. It just means that they're the best we can do right now with what we know and what we've learned. So what we can do, though, is make sure that our assumptions are consistent.
I don't want to have contradictory assumptions because then you could prove anything and there's no rigor. So what I'm really doing now with Darwin is I'm saying his assumptions are consistent, but I don't need to assume that they're true. So I don't have to assume any theory I propose. I'm not assuming that my assumptions are true. I just want to make sure that they're consistent.
I'm hoping in my lifetime someone will overthrow my theory with a deeper theory, and then I'll know that my assumptions were at least a provisional, you know, at best a provisional way to go.
So it's not a logical contradiction to take the assumptions of a scientific theory and use them to prove that that theory is not the theory of everything, because we already knew that that theory was not the theory of everything. And the best example of this that we have to date is Einstein's theory together with quantum theory.
So Einstein's theory of space-time, flat and curved space-time, is general relativity theory. And that together with quantum theory, both assume space and time are fundamental. And yet, Einstein's theory with quantum field theory also tell us precisely when that assumption is false.
When you go small enough to what they call the Planck scale, so 10 to the minus 33 centimeters, 10 to the minus 43 seconds, space-time ceases to have any operational meaning. And so space-time is a great framework for a lot of physics, and most physicists don't need to worry about the Planck scale, but the high energy theoretical physicists do.
They're the ones that are pressing the limits of space-time, and they're the ones that are talking about energies that are high enough that space-time falls apart. What are these energies that are high enough that space-time fall apart? Well, so the kinds of things past even our collider, our current collider technology.
But the idea is this, that if you want to look at smaller and smaller regions of space, you need to have a better and better microscope that can give you smaller and smaller wavelengths of light or whatever radiation, but say light. So as you get smaller wavelengths of light, then you can resolve smaller and smaller details.
Now, but what we know from physics is that as you make the light wavelengths smaller, the energy is going up. So the energy, it takes more energy. That's why you have to put all this energy into the Large Hadron Collider to get the high, you know, it's like a big microscope. So you need lots of energy.
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Chapter 5: What does Hoffman mean by saying that the brain has no causal power?
Now, I don't want to say that Darwin is the final word, right? I'm not saying that at all. It's the best we've got right now, and so that's why I'm talking about it. And it's a wonderful theory. I use it, and it's powerful. I hope that we'll transcend it very, very soon. But right now, Darwin's theory says this is just a game, and it's a headset designed to help you play the game well.
So with that theory, we are just essentially watching through a headset. That's right. So we're not actually in the reality of this world, but we're watching the reality of this world through a device.
Yes, you are effectively, whatever you are, you are not a physical body in space and time. That is not who you are. So here, here, here you are 200 pound, 300 pound person, whatever it might be, six foot, whatever, or five foot, whatever. And most of us think that's who I am.
Chapter 6: How does consciousness relate to the concept of reality?
And I'm saying, no, that's just your avatar in a particular headset. And, um, you're not confined to that avatar. You're not identified with that. You might think you're your avatar, and I understand. I mean, I'm easily identified with my avatar. But it's just an avatar, and it's a headset that you can take off. And we all do.
So with this information... How does someone take off the virtual reality headset of the game they're playing in this world to optimize their experience, to optimize their life, to have a better, more meaningful, more rich and fulfilling experience?
Well, of course, we all eventually take it off, even if we don't want to. So we'll all eventually face that. But we can take it off now. There are various meditative practices, for example, where you can see that you're not the headset and that you're just looking through the headset and see yourself identifying with the headset, which you can step back.
So I spend time in meditation and basically just letting go of thought. Literally just, you know, if you ask yourself the question, I wonder what my next stop is going to be? And you wait in silence. that space where you don't have any thoughts is, I think, the deepest pointer that I can give to who you really are. And that silent awareness is you beyond the headset.
And as soon as then you start going into thoughts, then you re-identify with this body and your problems and so forth. But I think Ultimately, my own view about things is that reality infinitely transcends space and time. You are that reality. And in some sense, you, your consciousness, is just choosing to look through an infinite number of headsets. So there's a Lewis headset and a Don headset.
And this one consciousness is having a conversation with itself between two headsets and enjoying and learning. So it's almost like the one consciousness views itself from an infinite number of perspectives, chooses to put on an infinite number of headsets and enjoy that perspective, maybe get lost in it, completely identify with it.
feel pain feel joy you know the whole range of emotions discoveries and so forth get completely lost in it and then slowly wake up and realize oh that was just a headset and boy did i learn a lot from that perspective and and um and now it's time to there's an infinite number of other headsets to go and try out so would you say that there is no reality there's just perspective of what we're experiencing
Yeah, I would say that you are reality. You in silence. Not any story you tell. Any story you tell about yourself is not you. You are much, much deeper. So whatever you are is that which can entertain any story, every story, enjoy it, and then not identify with it and let it go.
So whatever you are is infinitely beyond any headset, but you are looking at yourself through an infinite number of different perspectives.
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Chapter 7: What role does silence play in understanding our true nature?
And there's no red Ferrari in the supercomputer. You can look in the supercomputer. There's no red Ferrari there.
There's bits in there. It's only when you start to perceive an area, then it enters your frame of sight.
That's right. And that's the only existence that it has. The red Ferrari in the VR game is only there as a perception and only as long as you choose to perceive it. As soon as you look away, that's gone. So neurons are what we perceive. what we render in the headset when we look inside brains. but they're not the reality. But I should be very, very careful.
I want to say neuroscience is very, very important. We actually need more money for neuroscience because what we have to do is look at the neuroscience and reverse engineer it. There's something outside, there's software outside the headset, just like in the VR game, right? There's software rendering that Ferrari.
And if you want to understand how that Ferrari is rendered, you've got to go to the supercomputer and look at the code. Well, so that's what we have to do. We have to study the brain, study the 86 billion neurons, trillions of synapses. That's just the data for the next step out of the headset.
What is the code that's rendering the space-time headset and rendering the 86 billion neurons and trillions of synapses? So neuroscience is very, very important, and we should study it. But brains don't exist when they're not perceived, and they cause none of our behavior.
So what is creating our thoughts, feelings, and our behavior if it's not the brain? So it's...
It's our consciousness plunging itself into a particular avatar and choosing to have that perspective on things. So that's what's really going on is a consciousness is choosing to limit itself in certain ways, give itself certain obstacle courses with a certain kind of headset and play the game.
And the smartest scientists on the planet and philosophers and researchers have been studying the brain for hundreds or maybe thousands of years, trying to figure out where consciousness comes from. Do we know where consciousness comes from now?
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Chapter 8: What are the three truths Hoffman would leave behind?
And that's where we are with consciousness. There are all these theories of consciousness and not a one of them can explain a single conscious experience.
Wow.
That's where we are. And so, and so that we're in a dangerous place too, because we cannot, if we have a theory that can't be tested on a single conscious experience, we better not use it for other things. Like for example, making life and death decisions, right? A theory that can't be tested on specific conscious experiences should not be used to make life and death decisions.
So what do we know about consciousness? The way I like to think about it is now as a scientist, so there's two ways I can try to address that. One is from a personal point of view versus a more technical, which would you rather go with? One of each, personal point of view and then as a scientist. Okay.
From the personal point of view, what I would say really helps me as a person in this is to realize I'm not my body. I am in this body, and I, of course, have to take care of it. And if I get kicked, it hurts and so forth. I'm careful when I drive. So there are rules of the road for this game, but it's just a game. And for me, the practical thing is...
that I take away from this that helps me in my everyday life is first dealing with my emotions. I'm not my emotions. I have the ability to watch them and be with them and just let them be. Just feel the emotions without condemning myself, without putting any pressure on myself. Just the ability to feel the raw pain, perhaps, of an emotion. or the joy of an emotion, whatever it might be.
And just be the watcher is very liberating. It's extremely liberating. And all of a sudden you're not identified with frustrations. You just watch the frustrations and eventually you can smile at the frustrations. And And you can smile at them in the same way that if you look back at your five-year-old child in the sandbox and how their world fell apart when someone stole their toy.
And you realize, oh, I completely fell apart. And that was so important to me. And it was trivial. It was absolutely trivial. And then as a teenager... You know, I didn't get that date or whatever it might be. I didn't pass a test in high school. And I was crushed. And I look back and really not a big deal. That's right. And now as an adult, I've got my business. I'm in there with both feet.
I'm identified with it. Any setback, I take it very personally. I get upset. But on my deathbed, I'll look back and go, that wasn't me.
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