Reality

Preface: I just re-read the entry below and none of my thoughts flow into the next one. Be prepared for a pretty scattered mess of ideas...Ready, set, go!

I've been thinking more about reality, consciousness, and illusions more this week than I think I ever have in my life. I remember when I was a lot younger, maybe around 10 or so, I would stare at myself in the mirror without focusing until my features and expression started to blend and morph into a person I didn't recognize. If you've never done that, then I recommend trying it. I don't remember why I started doing it...perhaps I was just randomly staring at my reflection and soon felt like I was looking at a different person. But in any case, whenever I saw someone else staring back at me, I wondered about what that person's life would be like or who they might be if they were real. Of course, none of these people actually existed and I only saw them because I let my vision blur a little bit. Sometimes I saw my relatives, other times I saw images that were really frightening and caused me to refocus my vision immediately on the comforting image of my own face that had been there all along. But everything I've been thinking about recently has reminded me of this story. Maybe it is simply that I'm skewing my vision to see these varying reflections...but what if it's not? I'm growing really interested in the concepts of hallucinations and illusions.

What does it mean to be real? And similarly, what does it mean to have a "soul" as humans are often considered to possess. Does it mean that we can communicate and feel? Does it mean that we can love or have a sense of "self"?
Could a robot have a soul?
What if that robot was taught how to speak and respond to english? What if they were also taught emotions, like being sad or happy? And what if they could grow attached to something, or fall in love? Then would they have a soul? Does an insect have a soul? A plant? Where do we really draw the line?

Sometimes I feel like I don't exist. Actually, not sometimes, most of the time. But then I battle with the word "existence" and what that even means. What does it mean to even be "existing" or "alive"? Am I more alive than the carpet on the floor? Why? What does that even mean? Sometimes I wonder if I'm just an illusion of my own mind...If each of our minds are God and that we each create our own realities in our heads. Maybe we're only really awake when we're sleeping. Maybe not ever.

I was in my Religious Studies discussion the other day and we were talking about the theory of evolution. I listened slightly to what people were saying, but then I started looking around the room and noticed that almost EVERYONE was itching, picking at a scab, tapping their feet, rubbing their legs or arms, or doing SOMETHING to their bodies. They reminded me of monkeys. They looked like monkeys picking at bugs in their fur. It was a really eery feeling, especially given the topic we were discussing.

Next, why do things sometimes fall the way they do? Like when you're just watching TV and a book falls off a shelf near you. And that book was set on that shelf over a year ago and you haven't touched it since. Was it moving extremely slightly during that entire year until it finally fell? Or was it something else? I had a paddle propped on my desk a couple months ago and it rested there silently for months and then one day it just slid off and knocked a bunch of things off with it. I hadn't touched the paddle or my desk.

Last thought...does anyone ever get a feeling that you're not alone? It's a really weird feeling that I get sometimes. I don't mean in the alien kind of way. I mean in the kind of way where you'll be brushing your teeth in the bathroom by yourself or sitting in your bedroom reading a book alone and your ears ring a little and for some reason you can almost feel something around you. It's really freaking weird. I feel like this happens to most poeple.

I think I'm going crazy.