Is Reality an Illusion? - Professor Donald Hoffman, PhD

If I have a visual experience that I describe as a red tomato a meter away, then I am inclined to believe that there is, in fact, a red tomato a meter away, even if I close my eyes. I believe that my perceptions are, in the normal case, veridical—that they accurately depict aspects of the real world. But is my belief supported by our best science? In particular: Does evolution by natural selection favor veridical perceptions? Many scientists and philosophers claim that it does. But this claim, though plausible, has not been properly tested. In this talk, I present a new theorem: Veridical perceptions are never more fit than non-veridical perceptions which are simply tuned to the relevant fitness functions. This entails that perception is not a window on reality; it is more like a desktop interface on your laptop. I discuss this interface theory of perception and its implications for one of the most puzzling unsolved problems in science: the relationship between brain activity and conscious experiences.

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Prof. Donald Hoffman, PhD received his PhD from MIT, and joined the faculty of the University of California, Irvine in 1983, where he is a Professor Emeritus of Cognitive Sciences. He is an author of over 100 scientific papers and three books, including Visual Intelligence, and The Case Against Reality. He received a Distinguished Scientific Award from the American Psychological Association for early career research, the Rustum Roy Award of the Chopra Foundation, and the Troland Research Award of the US National Academy of Sciences. His writing has appeared in Edge, New Scientist, LA Review of Books, and Scientific American and his work has been featured in Wired, Quanta, The Atlantic, and Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman. You can watch his TED Talk titled “Do we see reality as it is?” and you can follow him on Twitter @donalddhoffman.

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[manojpathak]

And in India this fact was always known. The whole existence itself has been called interplay of Consciousness ( Shiva) and Energy ( Shakti) and everything has been seen as MAYA, The Grand illusionist

[Incognito-vcwj]

It's nice to hear an uninterrupted flow of Professors Hoffman's theories, I found the interviews a little hard to follow.. Thankyou for this!

[marinawong]

I have listened to 2 interviews of his conscious agents before looking for more interviews of his. This lecture is better than some interviews I have watched. Most hosts can’t grasp the idea he is trying to convey. Their questions can’t add to the clarity of Professor Hoffman’s research. I have listened to many NDE (near death experience) stories, read a few books about soul journey and I find the idea “consciousness is here to explore” is very in line with people who converse with the other side. Our souls (if this is one and the same as consciousness) is indeed here to experience.

[MMCEnsemble]

Really enjoy Hoffmann’s lectures. It’s nice how his work is in a state of transition, what I mean is that he always presents new information and new studies, expanding his current work. You always learn something new. He is also great at acknowledging other viewpoints. Great stuff!

[afshinzand]

There is always been one answer to a question I’m asking myself for the last few years. The question is:
“What is really left there in life, which I truly enjoy?”, and the consistent answer has been:”Nothing!”
Thank god, since I experienced the sweet feeling of joy again after soooo long by watching the entire of this wonderful lecture.
Thanks professor Hoffmann and everyone who recorded this precious video and made it available on YouTube!
🙏🏼🌺❤️

[OilfieldSmokeEater]

What amazes me is how many of us believe in this theory and have no idea, and in fact, push back against it.

This furthers the theory that it's all about perception.

[HeronMarkBlade]

Excellent presentation, very grateful.

[mikekennedy]

I assure you that when I woke up after open heart surgery the pain was so intense even with the most drugs a person can take and still be self aware that we are here it is not a dream this body is what we are living in reality.

[howieduin]

I wish the ads every 5mins. were an illusion.

[michaelg]

Human consciousness is a spark from infinite conscious. Eventually the spark that is you and me returns to the source when tire of the folly of creating stories. The study of consciousness is a never ending story.

[javadkhakbaz]

What a fantastic presentation. Very clear, very comprehensive and very rigorous! I truly appreciate Professor Hoffman's honesty as exemplified by his comments at the end of the lecture about him being like other "normal" people and behaving as if space-time is real, while he knows that it is not. I will be forwarding the link to many of my friends and colleagues who will undoubtedly be inspired by this lecture, as I have been. THANK YOU!

[mutinG]

It’s amazing to me that I, personally, know people who are not, in the least, interested in this marvelous information in which I have no experience but I am wise enough to access knowledgeable scientific sites on YT. Thank you, especially since I know that everything in all
the universes are connected-I like the reality that I’ve created. Hallelujah 💥🌸🎶

[peterkuhn]

This is brilliant. It shows a convergence of science and spirituality. And Donald Hoffman is one of the most sincere persons, when he talks about his own illness and how he experienced it in spacetime spacetime.

[annabelilo]

This is a beautiful knowledge to acquire. Makes me perceive how limited I am as a human, but also marvel at the wonder of experiencing life as a human.
For me, It's best to enjoy this limited consciousness.

[LG-jztj]

Loved it thank you. Enjoy the game of life everyone

[adwaitvedant]

*Jagaat mithya, brahma/atma satya*
(The material objective world is an illusion and not nitya, onely pure absolute consciousness is the truth) ~ Adi Shankaracharya ( 2nd century CE)

[jamboreez]

Thank You for very wide explanation. Because of my mental problems I was speculating and reading some sources about consciousness and it seems to me as an connection between our brain and the universal "Cpu". Consciousness is main factor in forming reality, but what is reality is question because it is to much changable and depends of many competitive structures which are forming it. We could like it or not but there is something like the matrix with the ocean of sub matrixes; every exposed, successful individual has his sub matrix with orbiting trabants, and what is than with great organisations with millions or even billions envolved persons. How we could successfuly compete in forming our own true reality. And there are too much of us with own Pseudologia phantastica, perhaps I am writing this exactly because of my Pseudologia phantastica and searching in Your explanation for confirmation of it regardless of the fact that I am aware of the tendency for confirmation. What is true reality, and is it possible?

[rsalskov]

Buddhism, especially the "Mind Only" and Yogachara schools have posited for almost 2000 years that "mind" is fundamental. Consciousness arises out of fundamental mind and appearance of external objects arise out of consciousness.

[mona]

I deeply appreciate the work of Donald Hoffman and it blows my mind. Listening to this, the question came up to me, why we still are truthseekers ... we are designed for fitness and survival of our species, but still there is this curiosity in human beings like in all these impressive scientists ...

[sibbyeskie]

It's fascinating how nothing is more intimate to our personal experience than our own consciousness. And yet as we go through life, most people receive no education on it, or reflect much on its great mystery. I recall some time in my later teenage years I looked down at my hands, opening and closing them as I was just sitting, lost and thought. And asked myself "how the hell am I doing this?" It was a serious question, and had nothing to do with stereotypical drug-induced tropes.

That moment set off a cascade of questions that I later learned was a thing called "philosophy", which then later led to attempts at concrete answers through science. The deeper I went, the more of a mystery it became.

It's not surprising that Don is trained in computer science. I feel like a great deal of my intuition about consciousness started to develop as I moved into computer science. A lot of the metaphors he uses sound insane to average people. But to a programmer, it's startlingly plausible.

When we develop complex systems, as programmers, a great deal of the effort goes into "hiding" information complexity, and instead making elaborate fictions that seem to relate but aren't at all the same.

For example when Don posits that perhaps the brain itself is just a fictional indicator, it seems wildly off base. But I think about when we program a video game and every time the player uses a sword, they see an indicator in a slot that correlates. When we play the game we know that the icon of the sword is not "the sword" we are holding. Or even that the sword we are holding is really a sword! But we do know there's a programmatic relationship between the icon and some underlying process. In other words, a programmer has ensured that we don't get confused. When we see the icon of a sword, we expect our character to hold a sword.

The crucial point is that we still know that that's only a bit of code that only correlates that icon to the player holding the sword. We wouldn't be shocked if one day the icon glitched out, and yet we're still there standing with a sword in our hands. And yet, we have trouble seeing how our brain could be like the icon. In other words, linked to our consciousness through some (generally unfailing) programmatic relationship, but nothing more.

Evolution as we know it has created absurdly complex systems out of adaptation. It would actually be a shock if it didn't shape our perceptual systems in equally dramatic ways. Nature really is the most impressive programmer we know of. Wherever we look, it has already discovered and used our clever algorithms, data manipulation, function encapsulation and information hiding well before we even started working with crude tools.

I think as we move forward and switch out the old metaphors of mechanics and hardware, and adopt new ones of information and algorithms, these concepts that Don speaks of will not seem so foreign to average people. And there will be a path forward where we no longer live in mutually exclusive universes where one is made of "stuff" and the other "consciousness." Which is probably the most absurd place to be, if we are allowed to reflect on our moment in history.