On The Nature of Perception

The universe if far too complex to be explained fully. It needs categories. To divide the aesthetic from anaesthetic. The productive from the leisurely. The useful from the playful. Oneself from others. Others from oneself.

We taxonomise the world around us — hoping that if each individual category is small enough, we might have a chance, however infinitesimal, to understand it.

The human mind is an arrogant beast. From the moment we’re born, it starts pattern matching the material world around us, confident that it can understand all things which surround us. But very early in life and in our quest to know the nature of reality — we realise the futility of that task, and stumble onto the eternal paradox — that the one which is part of a universe, can never fully understand the universe of which it is a part of.

The best we can ever hope to do is to approximate. To try and reduce the unfathomable amount of information into an actionable stream of consciousness. To do this requires an immense amount of heuristic reduction. To have any chance of usefully perceiving the world around us, we cannot afford to see reality for how it really is — continuous and infinite. We must compress it until it becomes discreet and finite.

Truly — all of reality is just atoms suspended in space. There is no border between the table and the TV. There is no true, physical difference between myself and a tree, or a skyscraper, or a rock on the bank of a river. At best, what we consider reality is just a highly processed set of sensory inputs from our eyes, ears and the rest of our body. Our mind takes the inputs, creates categories for each one and allows us to imagine a skyscraper, a tree or a rock. The best party trick your brain has though? It’s the ability to imagine yourself!

We all perceive ourselves as separate from the world surrounding us — a conscious observer of things around us. You exist, right? I’d like to argue that — in the most physical, material sense of the word — you kind of… don’t.

You, or what you perceive to be you - is just a collection of atoms merged into cells, cells into tissue, tissue into organs and organs into a body. Which part of this entire system is you?

If you think your mind is the thing which contains you, you would be sorely mistaken — your brain cannot create the thing you perceive as you without your body or the trillion microbes that live in it. Without the eyes from which you see, the ears from which you hear and the organs which sustain you.

Your brain in a vat would not create “you” without input from billions of separate systems and organisms that inhabit your body. So “You” are nothing more than an emergent behaviour, a whole that is only seemingly bigger than the sum of its parts.

Taking this into account, if a person should allow themselves to disregard the categorical divide between them and the world - they will realise that they are not an observer within Universe, but they are the Universe — perceiving itself. Any separation of the observer and the observed will reveal itself to be nothing but a clever illusion. An evolutionary mirage.

For to perceive everything as it really is — might be as useless as perceiving nothing at all. Humans with unsorted streams of sensory input, unable to differentiate between a piece of rock and the river bank on which is resides — surely wouldn’t make for good doctors, engineers or teachers.

Categories are useful, hugely so, but caution is to be exercised. While categories are absolutely necessary — they can obscure just as much as they illuminate.

Category makes all perception a slave to action. To explore the world within ourselves becomes justified only if it affects the material world around us. To perceive just for the sake of perceiving becomes a wasteful exercise in futility — practiced only the eccentric. Even religion, which pretends to contend with the world within, categorises the world heavily and often disregards (even actively punishes) any true shift in how we perceive reality. Mindful self-reflection becomes a waste of time at worst and a tool for mood improvement at best. However — looking within and finding the limits of our perception is one of the most impressive tools humans have on our disposal.

To explore the world within ourselves and to truly, intuitively and fully understand we are one with the universe is an awe inducing experience. To find yourself inseparable — at the most fundamental level of reality — from the world that surrounds you is a realisation which can comfort you through the hardest of times in life. It almost seems impossible to think, without having somebody do the thinking. Without feeling as if you’re observing something.

But it is possible.

By erasing the border between us and things which surround us, we can realise that to consciously perceive the beauty of creation, even for measly seventy-ish years is a blessing, however ephemeral, granted only to a minuscule subset of existing things. Rocks do not perceive, neither do skyscrapers, nor do atoms — but we do.

And so we must realise that — to see ourself as separate from the world is foolish. But to separate ourselves from other perceiving, living beings — is borderline sacrilegious.

Removing the perceptual bound between yourself and the universe you observe is not an easy task by any stretch of imagination. While anyone can read and understand how oneself could be just an extension of the atoms of the couch they are sitting on, to actually feel this sense of unity is a whole different beast.

Your brain doesn’t want to feel this way. It likes the strict border between you and the world. If you decide to pursue this feeling, even just for the sake of curiosity — your mind will fight you every step of the way. But with dedication, months of practice and diligent meditation — you can be rewarded with the most wonderful, humbling experience of your life. And you will never be the same for it.

Or alternatively — take a tab of acid, sit back and have a good trip.