How do we know the whole universe isn't just an illusion created by God? Have you ever seen the movie "the Matrix"? How do we know we're not all living in the matrix?

We have a fire ball that goes across the sky and gives us light. Is that real? All the rivers flow into the oceans yet the oceans never overfill thier banks. Can you really remove that much water through evaporation? How do we know any of this world is real? It could all be an illusion.

It is an illusion, we only see what our eyes allow us to see.

I thought we only see wat our eyes wanna see...

and if were only allowed to see illusions wat arent we allowed to see?

Well now, if you had watched the Matrix, you'd have noted that what we perceive as real are electric signals that are interpreted by our mind. But the truth is that life is not an illusion created by god(s). The point is that what you are asking is basically, what is the meaning of life? Besides, that's the thing with the world, with the things we know we're content with. Say we never learn what is outside of your so-called illusion, would it make a difference? Obviously one who asks a question like this has some sort of trouble with his own world and I must ask you, do you have a problem with your own world, or is it that you just like being owned by something, even god?

There are many many illusions we have been fed into our lives by the controlling forces of this world*, not to mention the whole Godly matrix "brain in a beaker" worries.

Truth only reveals itself when one gives up all preconceived ideas. ~ Shoseki


nn23


*the possibility even that the biblical version of God is an illusion created by man, nevermind vice verca

I like that question but I don't have any troubles with my world, it is just that I have love learning about anything and everything that has a question or thought about such a thing that we humans just do not understand. Any and everything has a thought and memory behind it but the more memory or time brought about in the mind the more the mind is aware of the possibilities, and time space continuum not existing but being created second by second or thought by thought of a collectives consciousness thrown into the universe to analyze and create what our minds wants to see or is not aware of. We are aware of much more than what we perceive as time space and perception; we are not seeing the source, the thought, the energy, the self right in front of us. Why? Because all answers lie beyond what your eyes see to what the mind experiences and analyzes to become the now and future. Our reality is held together by many consciousnesses believing the one fact that it exists to get money, skin color, race, or a body, mind, or spirit status. If an individual would look beyond all that has been told all that has been experienced and all that will be then the mind can only see one thing and that is the truth about the world and your place in it. Your little space in this universal thought is only the illusion that when the first time you look into space that you are this small being placed into this world of order. But merely it is the best illusion because when you are born your eyes are closed because all that needs to be self or the changing of yourself is not there because there is no urge to become or what has been. The universe is infinite with many galaxies and universes interacting with each other by energy and attraction. The main universe is the individual universe as when you close your eyes there is nothing but an infinite possibilities of what you either want to happen, visualize to be in the outside reality of your mind, or dreams of the mind unfolding itself of all seen to become what you want. The only world you control is yours, why is this said is because you mind is its own world. You control everything that enters, leaves, and analyzes in the mind the problem is that you have to be aware of this to either a simple degree or fully. Because everything is a dream; while dreaming that is another world where we have all five senses and can do anything our mind desires, sort of like the last step before the group consciousness that you perceive when you wake up.

All is a dream until you wake-up from this dream and go into the next step of consciousness to where you are into a more advanced consciousness of a universal thought of everyone. This is the test to see if we are to wake-up and see what is on the other side of what we want to be(dreaming) and soon wake-up to another dream or step of consciousness or life. This could explain why people have Deja-Vu because their minds have for a second woken up to the next step of consciousness. Without wants and material need we have no need for this dream so we are then to wake up o be re-born into the next world where we have to find out the answer to waking up to what is right in front of what we cannot see with our eyes!!! All dreams are a link into you past consciousness, a link to the future already dreamed of by your next level consciousness. Maybe this is why we can some can see into the future because it has already happened from the dreams we have in the next level consciousness where senses, perceptions, and minds are different to gain another level maybe another sense for a sixth sense.

All has levels but never limits by what we see outside of our minds. We will we could be born again into another the same world or just see the world with no rules, limits, and pre-conceived ideas of what is should be and can be. Either way your level of consciousness is boosted to be learned and started over to learn more until that time when it is boosted to another dimension or perception of what time and space interact with!!! The next level or perception could have more senses, more laws or lesser laws, or even have more elements that govern our being!!

DhA...OraCle
-Randy W.

universe is real
there is no doubt about it
but the link between the universe and the brain is temporary

The brain evolved only to comprehend signals necessary for survival. These signals, though they may be true to the real nature of things, may not be interpreted correctly by the brain. So far, our interpretations, however distorted or falsified they may be, have served to continue our survival. Just because something works well, doesn't mean that it works with 100% efficiency. The brain could just as easily interpret certain signals as being matter or, in other words, certain waves as being particles. Matter doesn't have to exist. It's all eye candy.

Here's two mind-tripping theories:

We, as well as all objects or forms, are fixed points on a multi-dimensional array or matrix. All objects propagate waves. These waves are signals that identify the objects and their relative position to other objects. Although an object on the array could be a thousand miles away, it could appear next to us if the signals that we receive are interpreted as being close by. We never actually move from our fixed locations. It is our environment that is moving around us. Movement from one location to another is only an illusion.

Another theory is that the earth is a prison planet where convicted souls of an advanced spiritual race are imprisoned within certain life forms. Since souls can neither be created nor destroyed, possessing the bodies of indigenous life forms can confine them indefinitely. The process of reincarnation is an automated process. This imprisonment not only removes unwanted souls from the advanced community, but it also provides rehabilitation. Unfortunately, it also causes sudden technological advancement. Once mankind has determined the true nature of his advancement, and his role as hosts to parasitic souls, the souls will have to be removed and taken to a more primitive planet.

The trueman show also kinda shows the matrix- in a very differnt angle.

But sometimes i wonder the same- how do we know its not all staged, and we believe things because the higher power makes us believe their are stars, moons, suns, skies, oceans??

But then, it comes back to my belife in a creater and that it is real....

Very interesting topic.
Even if this world is staged; would it really matter? I have a good life, I hope all of you do
Well atleast to me it wouldn't really matter.
I believe that the only thing you can acheive by finding this truth ; is a worse life. It would ruin everything if this would be true and we would find out.

I will probably buy into another "discussion" with Brave New world with this reply, but it is really very simple.

Reality exists independent of your personal consciousness, and also of any "group consciousness' which may or may not exist. Reality would go on happily (or not) without any consciousness in existence.

Illusion is a product of either a single consciousness or, sometimes, a " mass consciousness" such as group hysteria. The simplest (sorry more like most common), manifestation of an illusion is a dream. Hallucinations, either drug or emotionally induced, are others.Hypnotism/trance induction may produce a third, but i am not knowledgable in this area.

Despite others protestations, there are two fairly definitive ways to tell the difference. The easiest, but least accurate, is to see if an experience stands up to independent verification. How many others experienced exactly the same thing, and did mechanical devices also record it. (In the case of mass hallucination this is particularly important)

A second determinant is, how did the experience fit within established scientific parameters? While not completely conclusive, if you see things that are"scientifically impossible" they are probably not real.

This works very well in dreamscapes. It is not foolproof, because sometimes in life we experience things which are not scientifically explicable, and yet they produce verifiable evidence that they occurred. It helps if you realise that even a century or two ago this was a much more common occurence, and to primitive people it occurred daily.

Eg first case gravity, second case a rainbow.

But the brain is energy. Energy can never be destroyed. Why would the brain care about survival?

I was talking about greymatter, not the mind.

Grey matter is energy. Why would it care whether it survived or not? It is energy so it is always gonna exist.

I'd rather that this energy stay within the confines of my skull and not inside the entrails of a saber-toothed tiger. The brain processes the signals received from sensory organs to avoid such a dilemma. The direction that I was headed concerned the interpretation of those signals and possibly many others that we don't process at all.

I'm sure brains that didn't care were slain and eaten by preditors and therefore unable to reproduce more apathetic brains like themselves. I'm not sure where you're coming from or going to with the energy aspect of it, but I'm sure it's going to be a doozy.

All the energy is interconnected. Why would it matter whether it was in the entrails of saber-tooth tiger or in your skull? When does it stop being energy? What is the fundamental difference? All energy is the same.

I fail to understand what you are getting at and how it relates to this thread. If you want to discuss energy and the laws of conservation, then you should start a new thread.

How do you know life isn't an illusion created by God? Just because it seems real doesn't mean that it is real. No, I'm not asking what is the meaning of life. This has nothing to do with the meaning of life. I'm merely pointing out that the universe as we perceive it might not be the universe as it is. We have no way of knowing if things are really the way we perceive them to be. The movie "the matrix" brings up an interesting philosophical question. Are things really the way we perceive them to be.

I'm not about to get into a debate with you about the existence of God. That's pointless, nobody can prove anything one way or the other. Whether God exists or not is really irrelevant to the point I'm trying to make. If you have trouble believing God created the illusion then how do you know you're not dreaming? This could all be a dream.

Im just saying. Why does energy in whatever form it is i.e brain want to survive when it will always exist?

Right !

A tiny candle brings Light into darkness , its wax definitely melts .. but the energy just IS .. The candle doesn't ask why it is there .

Now , the original question in this argument was : How do we know the universe we see is real ?

Do you REALLY think someone has the POTENTIAL to answer that ?

Our 15 minutes of fake fame inside our arrogant ego !

No Sir , WE just don't know .

Plain and simple .

There are no inventions ....just discoveries ..

Cognitive , Intrinsic , Lab tested... whatever !

It is the " HOW DO WE KNOW " that is interesting here .

It might be like any other shred of knowledge we "THINK" to have tamed .

We just "BELIEVE" , that we "KNOW" ....for a while .. amused by the illusion of our own capacity of decyphering eternal codes ..

Well , if we start thinking that WE ARE an undecyphered code ourselves , and thus PART of the Whole eternal undecyphered .. we might have a chance ..

Brave New World would call that FAITH . And he would be right .

And without that Faith , all those questions will haunt us again and again and again .

"Is the universe real ?"

Well , it is a real illusion , in which we accept to blend in and wander as an everlasting energy ..born by the supreme Doer and Giver , carrying His knowledge deep within , not always being aware of it , potentially returning .


If you can't embrace the idea of eternity ... then how can you start to follow your own "knowledge " thread .

And .. it is my deep belief , that the difference between Believers and " Science Worshipers" is humility .

How do we know the universe we see is real ?

We are humble towards it and know our limitations .



" True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us. "
Socrates


Sama

And if you like to "see " the universe .. check out the following link ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcBV-cXVWFw "The Hubble Deep Field: The Most Important Image Ever Taken"

This is life, the universe is real. If it weren't real there'd be nothing here. But the question is, are YOU real?

Great post.

I didn't expect anybody could answer that question. I just wanted to get people's opinions on it.



Not necessarily. The universe we know could all be an illusion and the substance could exist outside this universe. We could all be in virtual reality simulators, kind of like in the movie the matrix.

I might not be real. I could be figment of your imagination or just part of the illusion you know as the universe.

If this universe would be an illusion, who would have created it? Who would do this much effort just to make as believe in the universe as it is now?
And even if this would be an illusion; would it really matter to you, If it was true; I wouldn't want to know. Would you?
It's possible ofcourse but I highly doubt it.


Curiosity killed the cat

That the energy would always exist is (probably) true. However it is the form of it's existence that is important here. A brain is designed to interpret signals from ourselves and our environment to help us survive. If the brain matter was simply free energy floating around in space I doubt it would be very helpful to this purpose. The energy which is the matter/energy complex of our brain must be in the form it takes (within certain parameters) to suit this purpose.

Use your imagination. Who do you think would have created it?



Of course it would matter to me. If it was true then I would want to know.

If the universe we know is just an illusion, that's not necessarily bad. It doesn't mean we are being used as batteries or anything like that. We could experience more in an illusionary universe than we could in a real universe. Things we take for granted might not even be possible in the real universe.

Thank you, Leo!

We only observe what our minds deem neccessary.

How did the energy come in to existance though??/ What caused it- something would of needed to causse the energy...
And how will the nergy always exist?

Why should the form matter? Like what difference does it make whether water is in a bottle shaped like a square or whether it is in a bottle shaped like a circle? Or why does t matter whether it be frozen, vapur or liquid? It is still the same water just existing in a different form. Nothing has been added and nothing taken away?



All the signals, the brain etc are all the same energy. What purpose does this energy have when everything it does results in energy?

If the energy is eternal then it has no beginning......so it is beyond cause and effect.

However if it isnt eternal and does have a cause........then I dont know how it came to being.



Satisfaction brought it back!@!

Because, in this universe we have a perception of, the form defines the purpose (or the purpose might define the form). Your water analogy isn't relevant because what is the purpose of the water? If it has no purpose then form is irrelevant.

You can argue that there is no form, that all form is illusion, however I choose not to travel this, very dangerous, road towards solipsism. A true believer of this would simply stop interacting with the universe as there can be nothing gleaned that could not be taken as 'truth' or 'real'. Those who simply pay lip service to this philosophy and continue to try to 'learn' by interacting with the reality around them are showing by their actions the nature of their belief - that the universe is real but they simply wish it wasn't so.

Not saying this is how I see anyone here behaving, nor am I personally attacking anyone's belief. It is something, though, that one must be very wary of.

Exactly. Hence the form of the brain is irrelevant also. Energy is always gonna survive regardless its form so why would it care about surviving?



Whether the form is illusion or not all form is energy and all energy exists always. So why should concern of survival come into it?



Why is that? The whole universe is energy. A true believer may simply be indifferent to what happens in the universe. Because he understands that it is alllllllll him/her/it



Why is it real if we interact with it? People in virtual reality know it isnt real but still interact with it when they plug into it.



Why should we be wary? All is energy? Energy is never destroyed and always eixsts so why is there to worry about?

brave,

If everything is formless energy (and energy has form - think waves) and all this energy is simply you, then what do you hope to learn by interacting with this energy?

Are you trying to convince yourself that what you believe is correct? If so, why? What you believe is what you believe. If you're unsure of it then you don't believe it - you just want to.

Are you trying to convince others of what you believe? Again, if you consider everything to be energy and all energy to be you, you are trying to convince no-one.

I cannot think of anything that has a purpose, yet has no form (not no known form, but no form). Of course we don't know everything, but within the limitations of what we do know I'm unaware of any such thing as 'formless purpose'. If you know of something I'd appreciate your insight.

If we are everything.........all this energy.......then what is there to learn?



Not convincing myself, just stating forth valid arguments.



When I say me I dont mean the personality me. I mean consciousness itself or energy itself. Exactly the paradox. It is beyond logic. Everything is energy and all the energy is one so why do we think of ourselves as separate?


What is the form of consciousness itself? Dont say the brain beause they still too this very day cannot localize consciousness in matter.



Why does the energy have to have purpose?????? The purpose and the fulfilment is all energy. So nothing changes anyway. It is a specious change and not real.

Also these waves are intuited more than seen. They are not waves of things but waves of potential....what is the form of potential.

Good question, but I asked if you knew of anything that had purpose without any form. We don't know if consciousness has form.

I see you've added another post. Energy can be described in wave-form. Anything that can be described has form - it may be mathematical, but it's still form. The form of potential is a wave.

But we know it is there. Well formlessness is the form of no forms so in that sense nothing is without form.



But the more we magnify the "wave" we see that there is nothing there. The potential could be potentially anything so even though some potential has form other potential may have something completely different.

Does any form have purpose? It is all energy and always will be energy so why does it need purpose? It is always as it is so why does it need purpose?

mmm, its interesting that consciousness is formless but yet we refer to all it brings us to witness as having form. How can something formless create form?

I guess thats a question of belief...do you believe what you are seeing infront of you to exist more than sight itself?

Is it formless? Formlessness is the form of no form and so it is still a form. Also energy only has form to our perception. It may be formless but we dont percieve it that way. According to science everything we see with our visual cortex would be all squiggly waves and frequency. Our brain actually decodes it into holographic reality.

Sorry to but in, i know you were addressing Brave with this, but i had these thoughts...

Why do the things that one knows need to limit our awareness of potentials? Perhaps realising that there is no limitation is what allows for discoveries about the Universe with which we are part of to be made.


NICE ONE!!
nn23

What is the purpose of energy itself? We may say for arguments sake that it has form but what is its purpose?

Also the waves of potentail arn't anything in particular. They just are so to speak. We say waves of potenial but we could exclude wave and just say potential. Potential of forms? Potential of formlessness? Who knows!

This does not correlate with the realisation of the Self. What you say is some scientific perspective yes, but it does not apply and this is the cause for so much conflict on the subject.

We are everthing, everything is, but no description of this can define it for it is a realisation and not a perspective or theory. It is impossible to define a oneness with the Universe with words because they always make a distinction between the subject and the object which then creates a duality which defys the meaning/point.

What comes with realising it as i think you already have, is the infinity of potentials that are encompassed by it.


nn23

What I am applying is that everything is energy. This energy is always gonna exist. So why the fear of death or concern for survival or the need to learn anything? It all amounts to energy interacting with energy as it always has been.






Ya here you are right. However I have only realized it intellectually and not directly like I'd like (even though according to the Gurus and mystics we are all always realized at all times) ,words or thoughts cannot describe it. It is beyond knowledge and knower, knowledge and ignorance, liberation and bondage, subject and object, life and death etc etc yet includes them all. I just like being Socratic when I can because it is a great way of stimulating my mind other than using drugs all the time.

LMAO ...funny

I believe i have realised and am aware although i am still bound by the judgments that i make which distinguish me as a human being. Yeah, and debates are great its all relavent.


nn23

if there is only one real , what about the illusion ?

if you have a subject experiencing oneness , where did the experiencing illusion came from ?

Godel's Incompleteness Theorem , you can't reduce everything.

illusions ahve reality too.

I understand what you are trying to say, but I'd like to make the distinction between awareness and imagination. We can imagine there are no limitations to potentials vis-a-vis what may or may not be actual, however we are only aware of what we can perceive, interpret and, perhaps, understand.

Imagination drives discovery, once that discovery is made we are then aware of its actuality.

The map is not the territory.~ Alfred Korzybski

To further clarify, oneness is just a description of an ineffable state that can only be defined by its realisation. The state of realisatiuon that comes with "oneness" neutralizes all illusions and brings balance and meaning to everything.

If illusion is something that decieves the senses of the mind then oneness is the truth behind the deception.


nn23

Because God does not exit?

Then what's your theory about this eh?