Your brain hallucinates your conscious reality | Anil Seth | TED
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Published 2017-07-18
Right now, billions of neurons in your brain are working together to generate a conscious experience -- and not just any conscious experience, your experience of the world around you and of yourself within it. How does this happen? According to neuroscientist Anil Seth, we're all hallucinating all the time; when we agree about our hallucinations, we call it "reality." Join Seth for a delightfully disorienting talk that may leave you questioning the very nature of your existence.
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All Comments (21)
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Ah yes watching this during an existential crisis in the middle of the night was a great idea
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"Brain is the most important organ" says the Brain.
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“With a greater sense of understanding comes a greater sense of wonder” ♥️
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The Buddha once said “we are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts, and with our thoughts we create the world”. The 1st time I ever read that quote, I instantly understood it was meant in the literal sense.
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“Imagine being a brain” My brain: Tries to imagine being a brain
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"We're all hallucinating all the time, even right now. It's just that when we agree about our hallucinations, we call that reality" - Anil Seth Best. Quote. Ever!!!
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Saw this video a while ago but I just rewatched it, and I have to say this is one of the best videos I've seen on YouTube. His presentation is wonderful and engaging, and what he says is up to date with neuroscience. Great speaker and great video!
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A masterpiece of speech, especially his final, closing words. Thank you.
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"When we agree about our hallucination, we call that reality.."..nailed it with that one
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"We dont just passively perceive the world, we actively generate it"
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Right off the bat you got me with you because when I had surgery and I got put under, I remember my eyes getting heavy and I fell asleep and right as my eyes closed, they opened back up again. That's how it felt to me. I woke up in the recovery room after surgery and it felt like I had fallen asleep and woke up again immediately like when you're in class and tired and catch yourself drifting. It'd actually even several hours
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Our individual consciousness never dies ,we travel to an existence that until we die is unknown to us. When I went into a deep meditation once I experienced leaving my body and seeing a vast expansion of universal space , nobody can take this away from me, it was real and the conscious mind does not need the body to survive. Science does not have an answer for everything !
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"What we call reality is, in fact, nothing more than a culturally sanctioned and linguistically reinforced hallucination." - Terence McKenna
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"There's nothing to be afraid of. Nothing at all"....he knows something....
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"We predicted ourselves to reality" What a statement because of these i can understand how other creatures perceive the same reality In different ways because they predicted themselves as they are right now.
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"With a greater sense of understanding comes a greater sense of wonder and a greater realisation that we are a part of and not a part from nature" The guy has a way with words. that's a powerful statement. I love it.
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That's the type of title that cause an existential crisis in my mind before I even click on the video..
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As a musician, after spending a lifetime (over 50 years) playing piano, the instrument feels like an extension of my body and as much a tool for self expression as my lungs, larynx, mouth and tongue. Could it be that mastery (of anything) is when the brain assimilates the tools of expression as part of the human body, and that that is what is meant when a samurai says, ‘I and the sword are one.’ 🤔
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Psychedelics seem to allow you to break the cycle of human perceptual contiguity just like anesthesia. Good vid.
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To be relaxed, present and accepting of what is, in my current surroundings, is quite possibly the best method I've ever found of dissolving my many negative emotions.
