Attention to Transformation

Like everything else EnlightenLinks The Blog has changed.
The EnlightenLinks philosophy outlet is merging with the one of sister site Reality, Backstage.
So, from this point in time and onward articles and investigations will be posted at RealityBackstage.blogspot.com.
Older entries have been moved and are to be found there also.

Friday, June 12, 2009

The Observer and The Observed

WARNING: Before you read this you should know, that when one begins to look inward and observe one's thoughts and consciousness, it can become quite a ride. There is a reason to the often sited comparison with Alice in wonderland going down the rabbit hole. Introspection will lead one to something true, but in the process one might go through some "mental instability". Some don't and that's great, but others do and that can be something of an adventure. When that is said, if I was asked if I’d do it again, I’d say “no doubt!”. So, if you decide to read any further, I strongly recommend that you read the whole thing, don't stop half way. The reason is that this text is a process, an introspective process. And so, if you during this process see what I have seen right away, it might place you, let’s just say beside yourself. Therefore I want to indicate an antidote to confusion and fear; observation. Whatever you think is happening to you, don’t worry, don’t argue, simply observe. Observe where you are and how you are, don’t think about it, just look at what’s in front of you and realize that you’re absolutely fine.

The indubitable nature of perception.

So it begins. The philosopher Descartes once said "I think, therefore I am.” But as he himself explains, this is not meant as a strictly rational argument. The fact that I am thinking is something evident. It is evident that I am thinking in force of the mere observation. I perceive my thoughts, I observe them, and since perception itself is indubitable I know (without a doubt) that I am thinking. To make this point absolutely clear before I continue to the really mind shaking stuff, I will exemplify with the so called “brain-in-a-vat” thought experiment. It goes something like this; I can doubt everything I know including my own reality. I might be a brain in a jar stored away somewhere and my reality just an electrochemically induced illusion. If you’ve seen the movie “The Matrix” you know exactly what this is about. Now, while it is true that this brain-in-a-vat idea is absolutely possible, there’s still something I cannot doubt; my subjective experience. Yes, it might be that while I think I am writing on a computer now, what is really happening is that a brain in a jar I being subjected to electrical stimuli. But the experience of this from my point of view is real. I feel, taste, smell, hear and see – I perceive – something; that something might not be the “real thing”, but the perception itself is indubitable. If you’re not yet convinced, try closing your eyes and then lift your hands up in front of your face and ask yourself the following question; how do I know that I have hands?

Do I then perceive my thoughts? Yes, if I didn't perceive my thoughts I wouldn't know what I was thinking. So I do, I am able to observe my thoughts. Now, as I am writing this I observe my thoughts being manifested into the world as symbols on a screen. So I observe that there is thought and I observe that there is something which I call the world. The world and thought is thus the observed.

Who am I?

When Descartes pondered the question of “Who I am?” he concluded that “I am a thinking thing.” But I will not take his word for it, I will introspect.

What is thought? I observe that thought consists of mental images. Images that can be bent, stretched, enlarged, combined, overlapped and manipulated in every thinkable way. This is evident when I close my eyes and imagine a two foot pink elephant standing on its trunk on a chair in my apartment. Also sounds, smells, tastes and other feelings can be imagined. I can imagine myself eating a steak while watching the elephant, everything included, the taste of the steak, the smell of the sauce and the funny noise the elephant makes when breathing through the half squished trunk. The philosopher David Hume called these "thought objects" or "the objects of thought". These objects are like copies of previous sense perceptions. Therefore thoughts can take any form not only images, but also sounds, smells, tastes and tactile feelings. When dreaming these images become like a world complete with everything and me in it. But when opening my eyes and returning attention to the "real" world, there are no images. Right now, when looking at my computer monitor, the thoughts appear only as (auditory) words in my head and then as symbols constituting what I read as words on this screen. Furthermore when I read them, I can almost hear the words in my head. I do seem to discuss things with myself in my head, there's both reasoning and a lot of mumbo jumbo. Actually I observe that I constantly talk to myself in my head. Whenever I am not talking to others, I am talking to myself internally, I observe that there is a continuous internal dialogue.

So, who am I? When I think that I am, and that I am thinking, who is the one thinking? Normally if someone asks me who I am, I will answer with my name, my age, where I’m from, basically what my passport states. When thinking these things, I realize that the words in my head are describing what I call “my person”. This description is then identified with what I call “me, myself, my person, I”. Really, whatever I find I am, when thinking, it would be a thought. For now I will agree with Descartes and go with “I am a thinking thing.” But I need to emphasize something here. “I am a thinking thing” can be understood in two different ways. As in “I am the one that thinks, a thing that thinks” or “I am a thinking thing, the one thinking is thought itself”. I must admit that if “I” is a word in thought as any other, then it is thought. Again, if whatever I think I am will be a thought, then not only am I a thing that thinks, I am thought itself. The one thinking is thought itself!

The distinction between the description and what it is.

If I am thought, then I am the internal dialog. What then is this dialogue? It is words, and what are words? They are descriptors, they describe. And what do they describe? Aah! Something else! The words describe something which is not itself a description. First I perceive something, and then I describe it with words. If I point to for instance a table and say “this is a table” it is in essence false. Because when pointing I am indicating something, then I proceed to say that it is “a table”. But “a table” is merely a description, and when I say that it is “a table” I am identifying that which I am indicating with my finger with the words that come out of my mouth; “a table”. And those two things are evidently not the same. The words – in this case uttered, but they could be thoughts as well – and the wooden structure I call a table are obviously not identical. So, let me emphasize this point. There is an important distinction between the description and that which the description indicates. And I seem to be unable to say or think of anything in that which I call "the world" without describing it. I could close my eyes again and imagine the world, but that would still not be the "real" world but that which I call thought objects. In other words, the world I can imagine with my eyes closed, is not what I would call the world, but rather a world. So, eyes open, what is it I see? I cannot name it without describing it! The only thing I can say or think of it without contradiction, is that it is ... there, there is something there. I would be cheating myself if I said that "what I see is the world", because as I just found "the world" is just words and thus a description, and not that which I know I am seeing! What is it? It is ... what it is. That I can also say without contradiction, but it does not bring me any closer to what it is.

Taking a step back, I observe that thought is an internal dialogue. Since "I am" are also words in this dialogue I find what Descartes found, that I am a thinking thing. The thing that thinks is me. I am internal dialogue. I observe that the dialogue consists of words that are a description of something which is not itself a description but something else. To make things a little easier, I will call that something else "perception" - keeping in mind, that "perception" is also a word describing something which is not itself a description. For now, I am left with a distinction between the description and that which I wish to describe, "perception".

Who is the observer?

A question comes to mind; how is it, that I am thought when I am aware that I am observing thought? There cannot be any doubt that thought is the observed, and I have just found that I am thought, therefore it would seem that I am thought observing itself. But there’s something wrong with this picture, I will introspect.

At first glance this would mean that I am both the observer and the observed, since I am thought observing itself. I am tempted to say that I perceive that which I call the world. And as such when it comes to my relationship to the world, I am the observer observing the observed. So in the first case in relation to thought, I am both the observer and the observed, and in the second case, in relation to the world I am not both observer and the observed. I smell contradiction… If I am the internal dialogue and then proceed to say; when I speak of the world I am describing my perception, I am describing what I perceive, I am implying that thoughts can perceive! Aha! If I am the internal dialogue, I am a continuous stream of words, but the words in the dialogue are describing, they cannot perceive! I want to say "it is me perceiving"! And yet, "me" is another word in that same dialogue. Thus, when I say "I am perceiving" it is false, because every word in that sentence are mere thoughts and the thoughts themselves do not perceive, they are perceived. But what I can say is that "there is that which I call perception", just not that it is me perceiving. It is very weird, but indubitable that it is not myself as in me the internal dialogue that is perceiving anything. There is perception though, and this perception includes both that which I call the world and that which I call thought. Obviously, there is a perception of thought, because as I found earlier, I wouldn't know what I am thinking if there wasn't a perception of it. Again, I feel tempted to say that of course I perceive the world and my thoughts. Refraining from saying that it is directly false, since it is so intuitively true that I am perceiving the world and my thoughts, it would though be more precise to say that there is a perception of the world and thoughts.

Why does it feel so intuitively true that it is me perceiving and that I am the observer? It seems that it has to do with the structure and movement of thought. Thought initially takes ownership of the whole of “my being”. It’s my body, my thoughts and my perception. Now, I can surely say that the common denominator for the above mentioned facets of my being is perception, not thought. Without perception there would be no thought. Perception can be said to be primary. Still, I the thinking thing takes ownership of perception too when I say that it is “my perception”, as if it were me the thinking thing that is perceiving. But at this stage it is evident that thought does not perceive, rather it is being perceived. If I am thought, a thinking thing, then I am a describing thing, not a perceiving thing, and thus I cannot be the observer! It becomes clear now that I - the internal dialogue - am not the observer. There is no I that thinks, there’s only the perception of the continuous movement of thought that describes itself as “I” and thereby creates the illusion of an “I” that thinks. So now I see that I do not see. I am left with a question that begs answering; if I am not the observer, then who or what is? Who or what is perceiving if it’s not me?

I cannot name the observer. Everything I could say or think the observer is, will not be the observer since whatever I’d say or think would be a description and the description is not that which it indicates, and I would thus be mistaken. That which perceives is everything but that which I think it is. The observer cannot be found by thought. The description though always indicates something that is in that which I call perception. Perception is the fundamental. Everything is perceived and perception is everything. Maybe this is the best answer I can conjure up. Since everything is in perception, the observer must be so too. And if the observer can be found, then that which finds it has to have perception and be able to observe. Thus, only an observer can find the observer.

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