The Reflections Theory of Memory

When you close your eyes and open them again, you are most likely not shocked by your immediate surroundings. Why? Because there is usually nothing out of the expected, that is, you remain in the time and place where you would have expected or believed that you last left off before you closed your eyes. But what you do not question further is why and how you came to expect the continuation of your existence in this particular point in spacetime after opening your eyes – not just your existence in this particular point, but also your existence as you.

The key is that you cannot prove or disprove the state of existence of anything or any event unless you are constantly perceiving it and/or direct evidence of it. Assuming you could not possibly perceive every and any event simultaneously forever, there always exist an infinite number of possible alternate events that could have happened, are happening, or will happen outside of your perception. Therefore the way you choose to interpret, invent, or interact with your memory of the past dictates the way you exist in the present. But what is memory exactly? And what is its relationship with reality?

How do you know if what you remember as having happened actually happened in reality or whether an alternate story happened instead that led to the same exact outcomes? Or perhaps you only ever came into existence in the present moment with your memories pre-installed into your mind? And what about a moment into the future when the present will inevitably become the past? Depending on the level of skepticism you raise toward your continuous existence from the past to the present moment in such a particular time and place as such a particular person, however, you have varying degrees of ultimately unlimited freedom to manipulate the reality of the state of your existence depending on what exactly you are able to convince yourself into believing.

There seems to be an obvious but inescapably circular relationship between the perception of memory and the reality of the past. Compare the reflections of physical objects through mirrors with the recall of events through memories. A real object serves as an initial source of light that is then reflected onto a mirror and then into the perceiver's eyes. If the mirror is perfectly flat, then the image transferred from the mirror will be a perfect mirror-imaged representation of that object. However, if the mirror is warped or colored, then the image reflected off of that mirror into the perceiver's eyes will not be of accurate resemblance of the real object.

The only way to know whether an image reflected by a mirror were an accurate representation of the original object would be to directly look at the original object and compare it with the reflection, just as the only way to verify the accuracy of a memory of an event would be to look at a recording of the past. But the point we revisit is that unless we constantly perceive the original object or the recording of the actual event in the past, there is no way of proving or disproving the true state of anything outside of conscious perception. In other words, if you closed your eyes and stopped all your sensory perceptions, then the external state of reality may as well be the equivalent of the internal state of your mind.

What's more, even if not on a metaphysical level, the encoding of events in human memory is already contaminated with all sorts of secondary information that form the subjective human realm of experience, such as emotions or thought – if memory were a mirror, it would most certainly not be a flat one. Also our recall of the past is not usually a direct remembrance of an event through one memory, but instead through the memory of a memory of a memory and so on. The farther away from the original object or event, the more mirrors, the more room for manipulation of the reflection of an image, since any or all mirrors along the set of mirrors reflecting light from the original object to the eyes of the perceiver could be warped. 

In the end, what reaches the eyes of the perceiver is not an image of an event but a reflection of a reflection of reflections which may or may not bare any accurate resemblance of the event that actually happened. So memory does not teach you anything about your current state of existence by giving you accurate information about the past – it's not a matter of knowing about the past; it's purely a matter of believing what you think you know about the past. No matter what may have happened in the past, it is only through recalling them in the present moment through perception that they even begin bare any existence at all. And for that matter, any memory is as good as another, so long as they lead to the same outcomes.

On the other hand, changing the past to affect the present and ultimately the future may not be a matter of changing the outcomes, but changing what you choose to believe as the reality of the process. Existence and identity are never dictated by the past since they can only ever be defined by how you choose to perceive your past within the present moment. In a circular way then, the past seems to be dependent on the present as much as the present seems to be dependent on the past, at least theoretically - but in a world where there are no true or false answers, what difference would it make? In a subjective universe where the exact way any given set of events happened in the past can never be objectively proven, all that could ever matter is how you actively perceive that set of events as having happened in the present moment. 

Here is a list of questions to constantly consider:

Who was I yesterday?
Who will I be tomorrow?
Who am I today?
How many times have I lived my life?
How many times have I lived the same exact life?
How many different lives of different people have I already lived?
Have I ever actually lived, or have I been stuck in this very moment for all eternity?

In a universe where nothing can even seem to exist objectively without first being subjectively perceived, it matters not what anyone else tells you they perceive; it matters not what you think you have perceived; it matters not what you think you perceive. All that matters is what you believe you perceive.

Q&A

Q: "I'm not sure the sci-fi depiction of reality is feasible. What if there are billions of universes that exist in the theoretical realm, (the realm of perfection as plato called it, of the fibinacci sequences nature, and time) their existence is arguably just as real as ours, simply the collision of probability and predestination and manipulation by man(free will) determines the path of the reality we perceive subjectively."

A: What exactly is “the sci-fi depiction of reality”? Infinite universes already exist in the theoretical realm, and their existence as “real” depends entirely on your definition of “real” which becomes quite a meaningless distinction. Does “objective perception” have any meaning at all? To perceive is an inherently subjective act unless of course you suppose that all you perceive is all there will ever be, which can neither be proved nor disproved, but in the case that it’s true, there would be no distinction between objective and subjective, would there?

Theory as Art and as Escape (1)

Sometimes people don’t seem to understand why/how there is so much for me to think about. It’s like, once you’ve drawn a conclusion - which I seem to have (i.e., there is no objective truth in anything at all, and reality IS exactly what you perceive through belief subjectively) - what’s the point of continuing with all this theorizing of reality? What’s the point of theory if it’s just that? Where does it ever get you?

Well, I think I have two answers to these questions that aren’t really related: 1. It’s not as if I’m after some sort of answer (as I’ve mentioned over and over again), I just like becoming immersed in the process of it, thought. The product is always secondary if of any importance at all. It’s like art. 2. It’s not as if I can’t see reality in the “normal” not bewildered state that most people seem to see it, it’s kind of like a search for any possible reason at all to live in a reality, to morph my reality to something that is completely detached from “ordinary unquestioning perception”. It’s like a vessel, like an escape. From whatever reasons, I cannot stay put in “reality”.

I will elaborate:

1. I think I have come to believe that philosophy in the academic sense is terribly boring and rather meaningless. I cannot read “philosophy”* even though I guess you would classify what I write as philosophy wouldn’t you? Maybe I should just give it a different name. I’ll just call it theory. Theorizing. I am a theorist. That is what I’ll say I do.

I would like to speak of philosophy as a medium and compare it with a set of watercolors. Academic philosophy is like when you focus on all the techniques of painting and try to figure out and argue which techniques are better and which will allow you to paint the best picture of the universe and such. Theorizing (what I’m calling it) would be like just painting freely and losing it and not caring, just going with it for the sake of it just because the process is so incredibly captivating, and then ending up with some sort of picture of the universe that happens to be amazing anyways. Yes, you see the clear bias from my words, but I’m not arguing that academic philosophy is objectively meaningless. I don’t want to argue or “prove” anything. That has no point to me. It’s just my view on art. I do not think the former use of watercolors is what art is, and to me theory is an art where the medium is reality itself.

I think a great many people paint for the sake of perfection of skill and satisfaction in the production of a precise painting, but I don’t think that is what artists do. It seems strange to go and ask an experienced artist “Why do you paint?” “What is the point of continuing with painting if you already have such skill and have decided which techniques are your preferred?” “Where does painting ever get you?” So why should you ask me the same questions when reality is my set of paints? Don’t you understand the point of painting at all? Haven’t you ever painted anything yourself? Do you not know/can you not relate to what it feels like to paint?

I fear I have already presented myself as a terrible romanticist, but it pains me to think about how much the world (of artists) is missing out on the unbelievably extraordinary medium of reality. Talk of creativity - paints, pencils, music, words, whatever, those are just media, as is reality. But what is reality? With what could you possibly create with more freedom, more space for vision, more enchantment, wonder, than with the manipulation of reality itself?! How could anyone not realize!?

And then you would probably say, “What do you mean “manipulation” of reality? You can’t just change reality the way you create whatever you want on paper when you paint with watercolors.” But you would be missing the point! You can manipulate reality though! That’s what you do all the time! And I am NOT talking about it as if it were some sort of figurative thing. It is absolutely LITERAL!!*** (also see: reality the strange loop) You change reality into exactly what you (at the present moment) believe it is**. That is your creation. It is your work of art, just like everything else.

And how could I not be constantly addicted to this most inordinately immense field of freely floating imagination? Where would you possibly find more room for imagination than in the state of reality itself? This is infuriating! It’s like the most enjoyably possible explosion of my brain and my mind. It’s like, “Ughhhhhhhhhh, I can’t! All I can do is stare..”

But anyhow, this is why I don’t especially enjoy reading academic philosophy, academic “reality”. It’s like painters and painters painting so many paintings and for the primary purpose of presenting their painting as THE painting of the universe. That is absurd. It’s a painting. We enjoy its distinct aesthetic profoundly, but not nearly its attempt at persuasion. There is no “best” painting. The act of “comparison” based on subjective perceptions is bizarre. There are only paintings, all marvelous, magnificent, magical, each and every single one. That is why you keep on looking, living more paintings. Why would you just stop at one?

//Part 2 to be continued…//

*Most if not all of it angers/infuriates me. I cannot handle the restricted/narrow-mindedness of it. Can’t you at least leave your human mind behind first before you start floating in theory?

**This is why the inverted spectrum applied to perception of present moment time create a whole convoluted “mess” of overlapping realities assuming that other minds do exist, and other “realities” of all different natures would exist at the same instances in time (in space?). How? What?

***But of course - this is my universe, and this is what I believe. (And yes, of course it’s circular? What isn’t? What’s wrong with circularity? What’s not wrong about being non-circular?)