Reflections of a Selfie

Every year at this time, I reflect on how my time was spent & the life of those living moments. I'm not sure might be reflection number forty-something or not, nevertheless, it begs the question. A selfie taken without a mirror does it reflect? I was watching a video blog on YouTube that a friend suggested and one thing that stood out the most was the old quandary. If a tree falls in the forest and nobody's there to see it does it make a sound? Based on the philosopher George Berkeley's observation, also a concept approached in the holographic universe theory, as well as a quantum field theory, essentially stating when something is observed there is a perceptive acknowledgment, but when it is not observed, what we first perceived to be fact are simply the opposite. Ex. because no one saw the tree, therefore, it made no sound. This leads to my other inquisitive quote "nothing unreal exists" so we go through the adaptation of reality vs abstraction? I remember thinking about how advanced we are in technology and how the last 30 years have seen so much evolution in artificial intelligence, where IBM had a super-intelligent computer playing and winning a Jeopardy game show. The more I come across these things and put into account these theories of nothing unreal existing the more it makes me ponder our existence.

Take for example an interview that Elon Musk had, where he was asked if he believed machines learning could eventually lead to the end of humanity? he stated that his worry was more than the machines learning has a high probability of replicating or mimicking consciousness. A while back, there were a few videos on Facebook about a virtual reality, where this person gave you a first-person view of themselves walking, jumping from rooftops of big skyscrapers to rooftops. The intriguing aspect of it was the peculiar feeling this video evoked as if you were going through this all while comfortably sitting on your couch and watching the video through your computer screen.

I say that to say this if virtual reality can have such a distinct effect on the actual brain, imagine having the access to relocate your world in a virtual space. What then? when this consciousness is learned and you can be subject to it unbeknown. One of my favorite scenes in the matrix is when Neo realizes he's been living in a virtual world the whole time. Plugged to the machine and fed consciousness.  Nothing real can be threatened but first, we must establish realism in a virtually evolving universe while we watch. What Elon Musk theorized was if such a scenario were to be, then it's fair to assume it's been replicated and perhaps we're in it. There are a lot of theories and beliefs out there, I just hope to enjoy this moment and be happy in the reflection.





ref:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KK_kzrJPS8&feature=youtu.be