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Ask Lemmy
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What are things? What is energy? What is my soul? Where did it come from? Is it even in this spacetime, or is the body an avatar and I'm connecting into to it via some process? How was my soul created? Why do I experience rather than my body function solely as a biochemical robot? Where does my soul go when my body dies? Is there an end to eternity? If so, what happens or doesn't happen? If not, how does change continue? What does my soul do until then? I understand life. I don't understand experience.
One time I heard an assumption that every single electron is the same electron in different places and times. I asked a physicist what they thought of that idea. He thought for a moment and responded, "Would it even matter?" Sometimes I imagine that we are all the same person in different bodies living different lives. Every normal person, every genius, philanthropist, every monster, every slave, every billionaire, every dead fetus, every person I've dated, my parents,...we're all the same person living in a different body going through every single experience of life. When I do that, everything seems so simple.
So would it even matter? Yes, because what if individuality is false? What if we're all one thing, but the current structure of life doesn't allow us to experience it as such so we incorrectly think that each individual medium of perception is completely independent? Giving everything to others would be selfish. Working as a team for the benefit of everyone would be the ultimate selfish move. We could stop all competition, treat each other with utmost compassion, and maximize our limited time in each body. But alas, the selfish versions of us are too underdeveloped in that dimension to let that happen just yet. I wonder what it would take for each of us to reach the understanding that we're all the same soul.
I have a friend like you whom I love to send into the chasm that is his own mind. The physicist has the attitude needed to deal with these thoughts - does it even matter? Ultimately, until we know our existence is false, we might as well keep on appreciating what we experience, right?