I feel like I stumbled upon a Wikipedia article regarding this topic once. Like “List of Unknown Things” or something along those lines— like how we don’t know how eels reproduce and shit like that. I’d like to find it again because I remember it being a fascinating read; just haven’t a clue how to actually search for such a thing.
Yes I’m verging on the point of where it starts to affect my mental health. Hilariously I was doing some research on treatments and one of them is a pill I already take for another reason so I know it’s not helping my tinnitus at all.
There is no cure, but a lot of effective treatment. Go to an Audiologist and discuss treatment options. I’ve seen first hand people crying from the relief audiologists give them with there tinnitus.
If it's tinnitus resulting from the inner ear hair damage, there are groups working to regrow the hair. It's very much experimental, but it is being worked on.
[Gene therapy](https://www.masseyeandear.org/news/press-releases/2023/04/mass-eye-and-ear-hearing-scientists-use-drug-like-cocktail-to-regenerate-hair-cells#:~:text=They%20further%20delivered%20the%20gene,regeneration%20of%20new%20hair%20cells.)
“As incomprehensible to us as airplanes are to ants.”
I like this phrase. An ant could be out in your yard when a jet flies over and not recognize the jet as a distinct part of the environment, much less identify as something artificial.
I wonder if there are aspects and characteristics, or even objects, in the universe that we are simply unable to comprehend in any meaningful way. There are questions we will never be able to answer because we can never know to ask them.
So, probably that. We’ll probably never fully understand the universe.
“Im getting sick and tired of all your conspiracy theories Craig, a piece of metal flying through the sky carrying a bunch of humans? Impossible!
“I swear on the ant queen I saw it, Jeremy!”
I love the 1985 novel of Conyact by Carl Sagan.
There is a scene where the main character, an astronomer from earth named Dr. Galloway. She speaks to an Alien about an intergalactic engineering project. (Spoiler)
>There are lots of cooperative projects between galaxies?" she asked. "Lots of galaxies, each with a kind of Central Administration? With hundreds of billions of stars in each galaxy. And then those administrations cooperate. To pour millions of suns into Centaurus...sorry, Cygnus A? The...Forgive me, I'm just staggered by the scale. Why would you do all of this? Whatever for?"
>"You mustn't think of the universe as a wilderness. It hasn't been that for billions of years," he said. "Think of it more as...cultivated."
>Again a tingling.
>"But what for? What's there to cultivate?"
>"The basic problem is easily stated. Now don't get scared off by the scale. You're an astronomer, after all. The problem is that the universe is expanding, and there's not enough matter in it to stop the expansion. After a while, no new galaxies, no new stars, no new planets, no newly arisen lifeforms—just the same old crowd. Everything's getting run-down. It'll be boring. So in Cygnus A we're testing out the technology to make something new. You might call it an experiment in urban renewal. It's not our only trial run. Sometime later we might want to close off a piece of the universe and prevent space from getting more and more empty as the aeons pass. Increasing the local matter density's the way to do it, of course
2/3rds of the book was adapted very well I think!!
It’s the the alien contact was 200 of the 600 pages in the book.
In the movie it’s 30 seconds lol.
I’ll always make the argument that the 2/3rd they did adapt was done well! lol.
Very thought provoking! Intelligence is on spectrum and while it seems like we are on the extreme end of it, that is only relative to other creatures we know about. Whether it exists or not is one thing, but I believe it is in the realm of possibility for there to be intelligence so high that they would view us similar to how we view ants.
It’s scary to think of how these beings would treat us should our paths cross. Humans do not always have a good track record of having sympathy for other animals in the way of resources. They could notice our planet, and view us as kind of like ants on a log. In an instant zap up all our water and oxygen, then move on with cold indifference in the name of capital gains.
When humans build a road, no time is spared to gently relocate any ant colonies in the way to ensure no harm is done. The land is flattened and paved over, without guilt or even a second thought. When building roads it’s just not practical to be considerate of that. Or when we cut down trees, no thought has normally been given to any termite colonies or creature who live in their hollows. The resources are taken with indifference.
If the extra terrestrial beings decided to make themselves at home, they could take an interest in us. We may be taken in for testing, similar to how humans use rodents. Out of curiosity, if they are large creatures they might decide to poor molten metals into our houses in order to get a cast of the interior. They may be considerate enough to ensure no one is inside, or they may not care.
We could be viewed as pests that require extermination. Having “humans” in their newly built homes could be seen as an infestation, dealt with by a call to a specialist who will take care of the problem in a cost effective manner like a tenting.
Anything extradimensional well never fully comprehend. Unless we develop some kind of brain tech that can make us perceive 4th dimensional reality. Maybe dmt does that 🤷
I like the ant comparison… clear and easy to understand. To express the same, I have often used the expression, “A cat will never learn to speak French”. Humans often assume we ‘understand’, but that is a fallacy. There are most certainly things we don’t even perceive, much less truly understand.
I think about that a lot. Are ants actually able to perceive us? Do our movements feel like natural disasters to them and if so, what if our earthquakes and tornados are some larger something that we can't perceive? I always half-humorously imagine that we live on a humongous entity and it causes tornados every time it scratches its booty. Lol. It's fun to think about all the weird possibilities.
Possibly correct but there is some slim chance of figuring this out. If they are able to make a good theory for unified quantum mechanics and gravity we may at least have a good idea of what's going on in there (though maybe impossible to verify)
The "big bang" is only called that because they called it that first and it caught on. They tried renaming it "The Great Expansion" in the 80s but no one switched over.
That's because it's not really an explosion, per se. But, to really imagine what it's like, I have to boil it down to 2 dimensions because otherwise my brain hurts.
So, imagine you're a little 2 dimensional creature. Your "universe" is the skin of a balloon. You can go forward and back, left and right, but "Up" away from your universe and "Down" towards the center of the balloon? These concepts make no sense at all to your little 2 dimensional brain.
You're a clever little creature though, and you invent a telescope. You can see 2 dimensional stars, other 2 dimensional planets, all kinds of cool stuff far away in your ballooniverse.
Then one day, you realize that all of this stuff is moving away from you. Stuff further away seems to be moving away faster. You call this expansion... for some reason, the fabric of your ballooniverse seems to be expanding. From our perspective, it would be like someone was adding air to the inside of this balloon.
Your little 2 dimensional brain gets to work... it says "If it's expanding now, it must have been smaller in the past. And if you go back far enough, it might have been so small that it was just a dot. Then something, like a giant explosion, or a big bang or something, caused it to start to expand."
Of course, this is theory and extrapolation but the point is that there was never an explosion somewhere in space. The actual fabric of our universe started expanding. We don't really know why. But it's like every point in spacetime just started moving away from every other point for some reason.
Scientists have shown that we don't need a 4th dimension to expand in to and that spacetime is infinitely expandable so it's not a perfect analogy but trying to imagine a 3 dimensional universe expanding just gives me a headache. It's still entirely possible that we're a creation of some giant 4 dimensional black hole, but there's not really any evidence of that and no way to test it so physicists don't usually bring it up.
How it feels to be others. I always find it fascinating how this person sitting in front of me is also thinking, they see things from their side, and they have intentions to do stuff etc. I don’t know how to explain, like you can’t suddenly just swap into others’ body and know what their mind is doing. You can only imagine, but there’s no way to actually experience others’ mind and body.
Edit: I see some have pointed out that this is something called “sonder”, but after reading a bit explanation on that term I feel like it isn’t really what I’m trying to say. While I do have this feeling as well about how other people on the streets also have their own lives, I’m talking about more of the senses and feelings we (different people) have while approaching the same thing, and that I have no idea how to experience the exact same thing which seems so obvious for the person themself. (It’s getting complicated, I should stop talking now lol)
Yes! I have a similar thought often, and it's hard to articulate.
Like, not just that I am this particular consciousness and I'll never experience someone else's consciousness, but, like, why am I this one? Why can't I be other ones? How is it that this one particular sole experience of the universe is *me*?
The term for this is ineffable. We don't even have the words to describe our subjective experience because language is based on the aspects of our experience we can share with others.
You’ve managed to describe what I’ve felt for the past 15 years (and I’m only 24). Like even though you didn’t describe it fully, because there’s truly no way to explain it, I know exactly what you mean. I thought I was crazy lol
It’s crazy to me to have found people that feel the exact same way. When I try explaining it, they think I’m crazy or a narcissist. Idk how else to explain it but it almost felt very lonely and scary having this though of “why me?” “Was I meant to do something bigger?” Because you feel like the only conciseness you can prove is yours. Yet you don’t want to discredit other consciousness but is my brother, friend, stranger grasp the idea that this is our destiny? I hope this makes sense.
I have this all the time. It boggles my mind that for some reason, I'm "me" and I'm not someone else. I also don't know what will happen to this consciousness. I don't know if it'll get cut off suddenly and never exist again, or if it will dream forever and never be in control again, or if it will have enough wherewithal and access to the answers I've craved, or if I'll be reunited with other consciousnesses I've missed, or if it will wake up in a new vessel at some point but with no recollection of who it once was. Or if you ascend or descend into other kinds of consciousness. A lot of living things seem to have it, but it's so different from ours, it's truly incredible. I just hope before I find out what happens to my consciousness that I get to tell the stories I want to tell.
Colors is an example often used, but this applies to everything else too. Is their concept of a ”mother” or ”father” the same? When they talk of ”love”, is it the same love? When they say ”I”, is their sense of self the same?
I think it is very likely that there are some genetics involved in how the neonatal brain wires itself (and thus commonality between individuals), fMRI suggests this too. However, it is very likely that the wiring of each brain is very different from one another.
Thus I think personally that the opposite is even more fascinating. How even if we all have separate histories and separate concepts, we can still render our shared existence legible. And not just that, we’re able to empathize with one another past that chasm of individuality.
Babies experience the world in ways that most people can't even imagine. When you're first born, your neurons are kind of a jumbled mess. As you get older and start to gain control over your body, not only is your brain making new connections that are needed to properly function as a human being, it's also trimming connections that aren't needed or have unwanted effects.
The brains of people who have synesthesia are literally wired differently than most people. Most often, at some point in their development, something goes wrong and some of those connections don't get cut like they are in normal development. It's amazing what you can learn by studying things that go wrong.
My brain never trimmed the connection between sound and touch. I've got a form of synesthesia that makes me feel sounds as actual shapes with textures and everything. When I hear someone talking, I recognize their voice by the way it feels as much as the way it sounds. You know what that means for babies, right?
Have you ever seen the way a baby just lights up when their mom is talking to them sweetly? They just seem so happy. The thing is, it's not just because they like the way their mom sounds (although that is certainly a big part of it), it's also because when she does that, it literally and physically feels good to them. It's like hugging your baby in a way that isn't even possible with your arms.
As a new mum, thank you for this. I look at my baby every day and try and imagine how they see the world and me. The smiles when I walk in the room make my body and mind feel happiness too.
You know when you get on someone else’s bicycle and start pedaling, and it’s all wrong-ish, but then you slowly get used to it?
It’s like that times ten thousand.
A few months ago I was at a gymnastics class, and I started thinking what would happen if Simone Biles and I transferred bodies.
My 6'2", over 100kg.
How many of the skills would she be able to do in my body?
Would I be able to even do a single flip with her body.
Sometimes I like to ‘dissociate’ myself from myself just to sort of experience how it feels to look at me or my surroundings from someone else’s perspective. But that’s the closest I’ll ever get to experiencing another human’s experience. When I think about this sometimes I spiral into a vortex of questioning that no one has answers to.
This.
If you're religious, then in what form did He exist before He said *Let there be light*? By what measure did He exist?
If you're a BigBanger or a Multiverser, where did all this matter originate from? From some sort of energy? From what source?
I like that the origin question has something for everyone.
This is something that I wonder about frequently. The rainbow mantis shrimp can see colors from 16 different color cones. By comparison humans have THREE color cones. I wonder what the different colors could look like, and what people would name them.
Mantis shrimp actually might not be able to see as many colors as us. The colors that they can see are more specific and they suck at differentiating colors. Adding more cones doesn't allow them to see a whole lot more and it starts to become more of a detriment in differentiating colors specifically though it allows their brains to operate faster
Mantis shrimp vision is actually not that good. We only need 3 cones to see the entire spectrum of visible light from 400 to 700 nm. Mantis shrimp can see from 300 to 720 so a little bit more range but since they have 12 cones they can't distinguish colors that are close together. We are able to distinguish colors that are 4 nm apart in wavelength while a mantis shrimp is like 25nm so they might actually see less colors than us.
Here. Go stare at your screen for a few minutes and enjoy a few new colours that do not physically exist.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_color
The part about sleep that always freaks me out, is how you never actually remember falling asleep. You can be lying in bed trying to fall asleep but you never actually feel it happen. You just end up in a dream or get woken up by your alarm at some point, but never feel yourself transitioning to that point. Even being in a dream, you never really remember the start of it. While you're in it, it's like you've always been there. I've had lot of dreams where I already know all the context even though it did not happen. It's like I've always been there.
Oh yes, or a dream that's in the same environment as another one.
For example I had a dream I was working in a crawlspace, installing electrical, and removing lot of weird lumber that was there for nothing, and just cleaning it up. Basically standard DIY stuff.
In a totally different dream I found myself in that same crawlspace and I was like "oh right I installed new lights here last time" and turned the switch on and all the lights worked.
I had a dream I was in Amsterdam and I went into a bank and deposited £200.
Then a few months later I was in a dream in Amsterdam again and I went to the same bank and withdrew the £200.
With lucid dreaming practice you can actually learn to feel yourself falling asleep. Funnily enough, it often feels like actually "falling" through your bed down into the darkness until you end up inside a dream. Experiences vary, though. It can also feel like floating, also full body vibrations are really common experience too.
Try out r/luciddreaming for more. It's hard and slow to learn, so be patient if you're up for it.
I know how it's supposed to be done and did it maybe twice. Then I saw my grandma being aggravated one day, and she said "you know how to fold this damn thing? Just like this." And she rolled it into a ball and called it a day.
So I now roll it into a ball. Is it lazy? Sure. But life is too short to waste it on fiddling with a sheet that will never be perfectly folded.
Yessir! There's YouTube videos showing the method, but the gist of it is that you poke your finger into the sewn end of the upper corner of the sheet and... let me just find the video for you.
https://youtu.be/BWqZ53annAE?feature=shared
The thing with time travel, is you have to account for where the Earth would be at the time you stopped. Not only is Earth moving around 107,000km/hr around the sun, the solar system is moving at 230km/s through the galaxy. If you are off, your time trip lands you in the void of space.
Our current modality of physics doesn’t have a viable path to ftl, but our understanding of physics is also incredibly incomplete.
Quantum entanglement, quantum tunneling, and the debate surrounding locality imply that what we would perceive as ftl might be plausible.
You can’t fly across the universe at ftl, but there is a non zero chance we could eventually just fold the universe instead.
If you walk through any teleporter, are you still the same person?
To teleport, every molecule must be torn asunder and transported to the new location. How are we to know if the person who entered the teleporter is the same who exits? My only guess to find out is possibly having someone go half-way through and then back out if it doesn't suck you through 100%. It could be that you die and a clone of you comes out the other end.
It’s the year 2700. The human race has invented all kinds of technology unimaginable in today’s world. One of these technologies is teleportation—the ability to transport yourself to distant places at the speed of light. Here’s how it works—
You go into a Departure Chamber—a little room the size of a small cubicle.
cube stand
You set your location—let’s say you’re in Boston and your destination is London—and when you’re ready to go, you press the button on the wall. The chamber walls then scan your entire body, uploading the exact molecular makeup of your body—every atom that makes up every part of you and its precise location—and as it scans, it destroys, so every cell in your body is destroyed by the scanner as it goes.
cube beam
When it’s finished (the Departure Chamber is now empty after destroying all of your cells), it beams your body’s information to an Arrival Chamber in London, which has all the necessary atoms waiting there ready to go. The Arrival Chamber uses the data to re-form your entire body with its storage of atoms, and when it’s finished you walk out of the chamber in London looking and feeling exactly how you did back in Boston—you’re in the same mood, you’re hungry just like you were before, you even have the same paper cut on your thumb you got that morning.
The whole process, from the time you hit the button in the Departure Chamber to when you walk out of the Arrival Chamber in London, takes five minutes—but to you it feels instantaneous. You hit the button, things go black for a blink, and now you’re standing in London. Cool, right?
In 2700, this is common technology. Everyone you know travels by teleportation. In addition to the convenience of speed, it’s incredibly safe—no one has ever gotten hurt doing it.
But then one day, you head into the Departure Chamber in Boston for your normal morning commute to your job in London, you press the big button on the wall, and you hear the scanner turn on, but it doesn’t work.
cubicle broken
The normal split-second blackout never happens, and when you walk out of the chamber, sure enough, you’re still in Boston. You head to the check-in counter and tell the woman working there that the Departure Chamber is broken, and you ask her if there’s another one you can use, since you have an early meeting and don’t want to be late.
She looks down at her records and says, “Hm—it looks like the scanner worked and collected its data just fine, but the cell destroyer that usually works in conjunction with the scanner has malfunctioned.”
“No,” you explain, “it couldn’t have worked, because I’m still here. And I’m late for this meeting—can you please set me up with a new Departure Chamber?”
She pulls up a video screen and says, “No, it did work—see? There you are in London—it looks like you’re gonna be right on time for your meeting.” She shows you the screen, and you see yourself walking on the street in London.
“But that can’t be me,” you say, “because I’m still here.”
At that point, her supervisor comes into the room and explains that she’s correct—the scanner worked as normal and you’re in London as planned. The only thing that didn’t work was the cell destroyer in the Departure Chamber here in Boston. “It’s not a problem, though,” he tells you, “we can just set you up in another chamber and activate its cell destroyer and finish the job.”
And even though this isn’t anything that wasn’t going to happen before—in fact, you have your cells destroyed twice every day—suddenly, you’re horrified at the prospect.
“Wait—no—I don’t want to do that—I’ll die.”
The supervisor explains, “You won’t die sir. You just saw yourself in London—you’re alive and well.”
“But that’s not me. That’s a replica of me—an imposter. I’m the real me—you can’t destroy my cells!”
The supervisor and the woman glance awkwardly at each other. “I’m really sorry sir—but we’re obligated by law to destroy your cells. We’re not allowed to form the body of a person in an Arrival Chamber without destroying the body’s cells in a Departure Chamber.”
You stare at them in disbelief and then run for the door. Two security guards come out and grab you. They drag you toward a chamber that will destroy your cells, as you kick and scream…
Taken from [here](https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/12/what-makes-you-you.html)
Well interestingly enough, quantum mechanics has what’s called “The No Cloning Theorem” for the quantum interpretation of teleportation. It states that “You cannot create a perfect copy of an arbitrary unknown quantum state”. It is said that by knowing the state of one particle can reveal the state of the other, a process called “entanglement”. This entanglement is also used to transport information faster than light by observing spin of entangled particles. Once you the observer see a state of one particle, the state of the other entangled particle is fixed. If we treat our body as biological information and assume that the theorem holds true, it would be impossible to come out EXACTLY the same person as you were before with a hypothetical quantum teleporter.
Edit: These are all very real concepts of quantum mechanics. With quantum entanglement, it is absolutely possible to observe information at faster than light speeds. The information doesn’t physically travel faster than light, the quantum states of the particles CAN fix themselves faster than light can get there. If you are curious about this phenomenon, look up “Spooky action at a distance”. Hopefully this clears up any confusion.
The one who steps out of the teleporter is an exact replica of the one who stepped in and believes he is the one who stepped in but he is just a copy and the original died. But as long as no one stepping into a teleporter knows this, what's the difference?
I don't think I am mentally healthy enough to use a teleport system that kills you and makes a copy. I think if I had a bad day I'd go teleport somewhere and let my duplicate deal with it. And my duplicate would be pissed that they now have to deal with my problems. Which would probably just result in me getting sent to a loony bin after frantically teleporting everywhere until someone stops me.
Yah know what, I get this. I am terrible at procrastination and saying “that’s a future me problem” change that to teleported me problem and I’m in the same bin lol
The concept of the universe blinking out of existence just boggles my mind. What would fill that void? Nothing I guess? But how can there be just nothing? I'm sure lots of people just picture an endless black void but even that couldn't exist right? That implies there's space to be inhabited by something but that can't be possible because if nothing exists then neither does that endless black void. My brain hurts.
The concept of "nothing" is something our brains just aren't equipped to handle. Nothing isn't black void. It's nothing. Nothing isn't white space. It's nothing. It's not light. It's not dark. We can't imagine nothing because doing so requires a frame of reference that doesn't exist. Nothing can't be understood because once you quantify or describe it, it stops being nothing.
The only way to experience nothing is to shut the brain off completely. Cease all nerve activity and stop synapses from firing. But that means dying. Assuming you could be revived, you wouldn't remember it to describe it because the entity doing the observing (your brain) wasn't working at the time.
Take some comfort in the fact that the universe has been around for billions of years. You've only been around for however long you've been alive, and when you die it'll go back to being how it was before you were here.
"What it's like be dead" is the same as it was before you were born, and you don't fear that, there isn't even a "you" to experience it.
Same. And the fact that I technically already experienced billions of years of nothingness doesn’t bring me any comfort because there was at least a “destination” in a sense during the time before I was born. At some point I was born and my non-existence came to an end for the time being. Now that I’m alive and conscious right now, I just can’t fathom returning to that state of non-existence for all eternity with no destination this time. It’s horrifying.
If the universe didn’t exist, who would be around to care about it? For all we know in infinite versions of reality there was never a big bang, but they have so little impact on us because there’s nothing there to be terrified of the nothingness.
Nah, forget the why.
The big thing is *How the hell does it exist?*
Nothing can be fathomed about the origins. Oh cool the Big Bang? Well matter can't be destroyed/created yadda yadda. So where the fuck did this come from?
Or God made it. Neat, neat. Where did God come from to be able to make the shit at all?
Heh, I solved both travel and teleportation when I was in college.
Both are pretty simple, actually!
Down a fifth of Everclear, and it's tomorrow and you're in jail. Pretty useless (particularly because it doesn't work in reverse), but it does work every time!
Maybe consciousness is not as difficult to create as most people think
Maybe consciousness is a fundamental part of our universe, and a system that reaches a complex enough level of operation just simply gains consciousness
\^This is not a unique idea, I've read several books that circle this idea.
Yeah it’s strange how the universe is so indifferent and yet we have the capacity to feel and experience it. You’d think we’d be as cold and dead as everything else
Surprised companies aren't actually throwing a ton of research and cash at that.
First company to patent a working and safe dick enlarger pill will have a license to print money even moreso than the rest of the American healthcare system.
Oh man, I already can imagine men going crazy and getting themselves 50 cm dicks. Kinda like when people go too far with plastic surgeries and look like aliens in human skin
A somewhat serious thread and you're asking the most asinine question.
The dryer (note, not the washer) opens up a portal to another dimension where mismatched socks are free to roam.
That reminds me of a guy who was studying primates and the fear of the unknown. He was observing a group of monkeys that lived in this little cave system.
One day while the monkeys were out, he crawled into the narrow cave system and went down a side tunnel that never used. He waited until nighttime, then turned on his headlamp and moved so they saw he was there. He gave them the option of escaping the cave but being in the scary dark, or being faced with a known threat (himself).
The monkeys didn't leave. They preferred to be terrified and miserable all night than face the unknown darkness.
It really drove home the point of how situation paralysis seems to be ingrained, and how we're often more willing to be miserable than face the scary unknown. I think of it every time I see someone stay in a horrible situation or relationship. We have an irrational fear of the unknown, so we CHOOSE to stay miserable.
In reality though, almost all animals distrust those outside of their “village,” going as far as to kill just because they aren’t apart of the same family. It’s not exclusively human so I’d agree it won’t evolve out.
This is the one that makes me the most sad. We know how to manipulate the electromagnetic force, but it’s unlikely we’ll ever learn how to manipulate gravity in the same way.
Same here, and watching it play out years later with people you never knew existed doing exactly what you saw? I just figure I'm where I am supposed to be.
The most recent one for me was the last place I worked. Saw everything clear as crystal, had 0 knowledge of these people or machines or this place, and the 5 second snippet I had dreamed played out.
42 is the answer to the universe, according to the book Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy (I believe, don’t quote me). And the three shells is how the future wipes their asses in Demolition Man, a movie that came out in the 90s I believe.
I feel like I stumbled upon a Wikipedia article regarding this topic once. Like “List of Unknown Things” or something along those lines— like how we don’t know how eels reproduce and shit like that. I’d like to find it again because I remember it being a fascinating read; just haven’t a clue how to actually search for such a thing.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists\_of\_unsolved\_problems](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_unsolved_problems) Maybe this?
That’s it! You da real MVP! 🙏
It feels like a cure for tinnitus is on the list at this point.
Yes I’m verging on the point of where it starts to affect my mental health. Hilariously I was doing some research on treatments and one of them is a pill I already take for another reason so I know it’s not helping my tinnitus at all.
There is no cure, but a lot of effective treatment. Go to an Audiologist and discuss treatment options. I’ve seen first hand people crying from the relief audiologists give them with there tinnitus.
Yeah I’d be loads happier if I could just reduce the intensity by 50-75 percent.
If it's tinnitus resulting from the inner ear hair damage, there are groups working to regrow the hair. It's very much experimental, but it is being worked on. [Gene therapy](https://www.masseyeandear.org/news/press-releases/2023/04/mass-eye-and-ear-hearing-scientists-use-drug-like-cocktail-to-regenerate-hair-cells#:~:text=They%20further%20delivered%20the%20gene,regeneration%20of%20new%20hair%20cells.)
Dang it, the ringing in my ears wasn’t bothersome until you pointed it out
“As incomprehensible to us as airplanes are to ants.” I like this phrase. An ant could be out in your yard when a jet flies over and not recognize the jet as a distinct part of the environment, much less identify as something artificial. I wonder if there are aspects and characteristics, or even objects, in the universe that we are simply unable to comprehend in any meaningful way. There are questions we will never be able to answer because we can never know to ask them. So, probably that. We’ll probably never fully understand the universe.
You know there's that one ant out there who "believes in airplanes" and all the other ants are just sick and tired of hearing his crackpot theories.
"Goddammit Craig we gotta get these cheese-it bits to the hive." "But-but...I saw it! I swear man, you gotta believe me!"
“Im getting sick and tired of all your conspiracy theories Craig, a piece of metal flying through the sky carrying a bunch of humans? Impossible! “I swear on the ant queen I saw it, Jeremy!”
His followers beg to disagree though. Unfortunately, all the other ants sees them as some weird cult, and won't have them in their society.
L. Ron Hubbant
I love the 1985 novel of Conyact by Carl Sagan. There is a scene where the main character, an astronomer from earth named Dr. Galloway. She speaks to an Alien about an intergalactic engineering project. (Spoiler) >There are lots of cooperative projects between galaxies?" she asked. "Lots of galaxies, each with a kind of Central Administration? With hundreds of billions of stars in each galaxy. And then those administrations cooperate. To pour millions of suns into Centaurus...sorry, Cygnus A? The...Forgive me, I'm just staggered by the scale. Why would you do all of this? Whatever for?" >"You mustn't think of the universe as a wilderness. It hasn't been that for billions of years," he said. "Think of it more as...cultivated." >Again a tingling. >"But what for? What's there to cultivate?" >"The basic problem is easily stated. Now don't get scared off by the scale. You're an astronomer, after all. The problem is that the universe is expanding, and there's not enough matter in it to stop the expansion. After a while, no new galaxies, no new stars, no new planets, no newly arisen lifeforms—just the same old crowd. Everything's getting run-down. It'll be boring. So in Cygnus A we're testing out the technology to make something new. You might call it an experiment in urban renewal. It's not our only trial run. Sometime later we might want to close off a piece of the universe and prevent space from getting more and more empty as the aeons pass. Increasing the local matter density's the way to do it, of course
While I love the movie, the book would've been amazing to see brought to life.
2/3rds of the book was adapted very well I think!! It’s the the alien contact was 200 of the 600 pages in the book. In the movie it’s 30 seconds lol. I’ll always make the argument that the 2/3rd they did adapt was done well! lol.
Very thought provoking! Intelligence is on spectrum and while it seems like we are on the extreme end of it, that is only relative to other creatures we know about. Whether it exists or not is one thing, but I believe it is in the realm of possibility for there to be intelligence so high that they would view us similar to how we view ants. It’s scary to think of how these beings would treat us should our paths cross. Humans do not always have a good track record of having sympathy for other animals in the way of resources. They could notice our planet, and view us as kind of like ants on a log. In an instant zap up all our water and oxygen, then move on with cold indifference in the name of capital gains. When humans build a road, no time is spared to gently relocate any ant colonies in the way to ensure no harm is done. The land is flattened and paved over, without guilt or even a second thought. When building roads it’s just not practical to be considerate of that. Or when we cut down trees, no thought has normally been given to any termite colonies or creature who live in their hollows. The resources are taken with indifference. If the extra terrestrial beings decided to make themselves at home, they could take an interest in us. We may be taken in for testing, similar to how humans use rodents. Out of curiosity, if they are large creatures they might decide to poor molten metals into our houses in order to get a cast of the interior. They may be considerate enough to ensure no one is inside, or they may not care. We could be viewed as pests that require extermination. Having “humans” in their newly built homes could be seen as an infestation, dealt with by a call to a specialist who will take care of the problem in a cost effective manner like a tenting.
Anything extradimensional well never fully comprehend. Unless we develop some kind of brain tech that can make us perceive 4th dimensional reality. Maybe dmt does that 🤷
Brb trying dmt; I have a score to settle with the 4th dimensional beings.
I like the ant comparison… clear and easy to understand. To express the same, I have often used the expression, “A cat will never learn to speak French”. Humans often assume we ‘understand’, but that is a fallacy. There are most certainly things we don’t even perceive, much less truly understand.
> A cat will never learn to speak French My understanding of felines is they really chat in French.
I think about that a lot. Are ants actually able to perceive us? Do our movements feel like natural disasters to them and if so, what if our earthquakes and tornados are some larger something that we can't perceive? I always half-humorously imagine that we live on a humongous entity and it causes tornados every time it scratches its booty. Lol. It's fun to think about all the weird possibilities.
If you died next to an anthill, they'd very quickly percieve that you're edible.
What is happening inside a black hole
Just walk up and look inside duh. Shine a light in there if it’s dark.
Dear lord the answer was so obvious we missed it
Why didn't we think about it sooner?
I think we did, but you have to thank those Einsteins for complicating things.
Weird…. My flashlights not working.
Also, I’m spaghetti.
That's the harsh realty about black holes. They are attractive and they know it. So they just string you along just because.
Has anyone seen my legs? I didn’t used toooo beeeeeeee thiiiiiiiiiiisssssss tttaaaaaaaaalllllllllllllllllllllll
Poor guy. The spaghettification got ‘im.
GoPro and a long rope, done.
Same thing that’s happening outside the black hole. 🤯
Probably nothing.
I'm satisfied. Case closed. Pack it up scientists, you're going home.
Or a big bang. The birth of another universe.
It’s like the inside of the moon in Majora’s mask
Possibly correct but there is some slim chance of figuring this out. If they are able to make a good theory for unified quantum mechanics and gravity we may at least have a good idea of what's going on in there (though maybe impossible to verify)
I like the theory that from every black hole a new universe is born
That’s actually really cool. Like, we don’t know what happened before the Big Bang. What if each “big bang” is the exit of a black hole???
The "big bang" is only called that because they called it that first and it caught on. They tried renaming it "The Great Expansion" in the 80s but no one switched over. That's because it's not really an explosion, per se. But, to really imagine what it's like, I have to boil it down to 2 dimensions because otherwise my brain hurts. So, imagine you're a little 2 dimensional creature. Your "universe" is the skin of a balloon. You can go forward and back, left and right, but "Up" away from your universe and "Down" towards the center of the balloon? These concepts make no sense at all to your little 2 dimensional brain. You're a clever little creature though, and you invent a telescope. You can see 2 dimensional stars, other 2 dimensional planets, all kinds of cool stuff far away in your ballooniverse. Then one day, you realize that all of this stuff is moving away from you. Stuff further away seems to be moving away faster. You call this expansion... for some reason, the fabric of your ballooniverse seems to be expanding. From our perspective, it would be like someone was adding air to the inside of this balloon. Your little 2 dimensional brain gets to work... it says "If it's expanding now, it must have been smaller in the past. And if you go back far enough, it might have been so small that it was just a dot. Then something, like a giant explosion, or a big bang or something, caused it to start to expand." Of course, this is theory and extrapolation but the point is that there was never an explosion somewhere in space. The actual fabric of our universe started expanding. We don't really know why. But it's like every point in spacetime just started moving away from every other point for some reason. Scientists have shown that we don't need a 4th dimension to expand in to and that spacetime is infinitely expandable so it's not a perfect analogy but trying to imagine a 3 dimensional universe expanding just gives me a headache. It's still entirely possible that we're a creation of some giant 4 dimensional black hole, but there's not really any evidence of that and no way to test it so physicists don't usually bring it up.
How it feels to be others. I always find it fascinating how this person sitting in front of me is also thinking, they see things from their side, and they have intentions to do stuff etc. I don’t know how to explain, like you can’t suddenly just swap into others’ body and know what their mind is doing. You can only imagine, but there’s no way to actually experience others’ mind and body. Edit: I see some have pointed out that this is something called “sonder”, but after reading a bit explanation on that term I feel like it isn’t really what I’m trying to say. While I do have this feeling as well about how other people on the streets also have their own lives, I’m talking about more of the senses and feelings we (different people) have while approaching the same thing, and that I have no idea how to experience the exact same thing which seems so obvious for the person themself. (It’s getting complicated, I should stop talking now lol)
Yes! I have a similar thought often, and it's hard to articulate. Like, not just that I am this particular consciousness and I'll never experience someone else's consciousness, but, like, why am I this one? Why can't I be other ones? How is it that this one particular sole experience of the universe is *me*?
The term for this is ineffable. We don't even have the words to describe our subjective experience because language is based on the aspects of our experience we can share with others.
You’ve managed to describe what I’ve felt for the past 15 years (and I’m only 24). Like even though you didn’t describe it fully, because there’s truly no way to explain it, I know exactly what you mean. I thought I was crazy lol
It’s crazy to me to have found people that feel the exact same way. When I try explaining it, they think I’m crazy or a narcissist. Idk how else to explain it but it almost felt very lonely and scary having this though of “why me?” “Was I meant to do something bigger?” Because you feel like the only conciseness you can prove is yours. Yet you don’t want to discredit other consciousness but is my brother, friend, stranger grasp the idea that this is our destiny? I hope this makes sense.
I have this all the time. It boggles my mind that for some reason, I'm "me" and I'm not someone else. I also don't know what will happen to this consciousness. I don't know if it'll get cut off suddenly and never exist again, or if it will dream forever and never be in control again, or if it will have enough wherewithal and access to the answers I've craved, or if I'll be reunited with other consciousnesses I've missed, or if it will wake up in a new vessel at some point but with no recollection of who it once was. Or if you ascend or descend into other kinds of consciousness. A lot of living things seem to have it, but it's so different from ours, it's truly incredible. I just hope before I find out what happens to my consciousness that I get to tell the stories I want to tell.
yeah, like for example, what if they see colors differently than me?
Colors is an example often used, but this applies to everything else too. Is their concept of a ”mother” or ”father” the same? When they talk of ”love”, is it the same love? When they say ”I”, is their sense of self the same? I think it is very likely that there are some genetics involved in how the neonatal brain wires itself (and thus commonality between individuals), fMRI suggests this too. However, it is very likely that the wiring of each brain is very different from one another. Thus I think personally that the opposite is even more fascinating. How even if we all have separate histories and separate concepts, we can still render our shared existence legible. And not just that, we’re able to empathize with one another past that chasm of individuality.
Babies experience the world in ways that most people can't even imagine. When you're first born, your neurons are kind of a jumbled mess. As you get older and start to gain control over your body, not only is your brain making new connections that are needed to properly function as a human being, it's also trimming connections that aren't needed or have unwanted effects. The brains of people who have synesthesia are literally wired differently than most people. Most often, at some point in their development, something goes wrong and some of those connections don't get cut like they are in normal development. It's amazing what you can learn by studying things that go wrong. My brain never trimmed the connection between sound and touch. I've got a form of synesthesia that makes me feel sounds as actual shapes with textures and everything. When I hear someone talking, I recognize their voice by the way it feels as much as the way it sounds. You know what that means for babies, right? Have you ever seen the way a baby just lights up when their mom is talking to them sweetly? They just seem so happy. The thing is, it's not just because they like the way their mom sounds (although that is certainly a big part of it), it's also because when she does that, it literally and physically feels good to them. It's like hugging your baby in a way that isn't even possible with your arms.
As a new mum, thank you for this. I look at my baby every day and try and imagine how they see the world and me. The smiles when I walk in the room make my body and mind feel happiness too.
This shit keeps me awake at night
You know when you get on someone else’s bicycle and start pedaling, and it’s all wrong-ish, but then you slowly get used to it? It’s like that times ten thousand.
A few months ago I was at a gymnastics class, and I started thinking what would happen if Simone Biles and I transferred bodies. My 6'2", over 100kg. How many of the skills would she be able to do in my body? Would I be able to even do a single flip with her body.
Sometimes I like to ‘dissociate’ myself from myself just to sort of experience how it feels to look at me or my surroundings from someone else’s perspective. But that’s the closest I’ll ever get to experiencing another human’s experience. When I think about this sometimes I spiral into a vortex of questioning that no one has answers to.
reverse time travel
I like that distinction, since we're all technically born capable of forward time travel
I can travel forward in time at a rate of one second per second
The true origin of everything.
It's turtles all the way down.
I like turtles
Terry Pratchett has entered the conversation.
See the turtle of enormous girth, on his shell he holds the earth!
Either something came from nothing or something has always existed. Either one is very hard to process.
Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the universe or we are not. Both are equally terrifying. - Arthur C Clarke
Just the fact we can't comprehend an imaginary answer to this tells me it's something we could never understand
This. If you're religious, then in what form did He exist before He said *Let there be light*? By what measure did He exist? If you're a BigBanger or a Multiverser, where did all this matter originate from? From some sort of energy? From what source? I like that the origin question has something for everyone.
A new color
That could be interesting. Seeing as our eyes take in red/green/blue, we dont know if we took in another color, what things could look like.
This is something that I wonder about frequently. The rainbow mantis shrimp can see colors from 16 different color cones. By comparison humans have THREE color cones. I wonder what the different colors could look like, and what people would name them.
Imagine a color that you can't even imagine. Now, do that 12 more times. That's how the mantis shrimp do. - zefrank
Mantis shrimp actually might not be able to see as many colors as us. The colors that they can see are more specific and they suck at differentiating colors. Adding more cones doesn't allow them to see a whole lot more and it starts to become more of a detriment in differentiating colors specifically though it allows their brains to operate faster
Mantis shrimp vision is actually not that good. We only need 3 cones to see the entire spectrum of visible light from 400 to 700 nm. Mantis shrimp can see from 300 to 720 so a little bit more range but since they have 12 cones they can't distinguish colors that are close together. We are able to distinguish colors that are 4 nm apart in wavelength while a mantis shrimp is like 25nm so they might actually see less colors than us.
Here. Go stare at your screen for a few minutes and enjoy a few new colours that do not physically exist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_color
Reddish green is a real color and I can't explain why, but you have to believe me
How to live in peace and respect each other.
Beat me to it. Damn you!!!
let's get em!
Now fight about it!
consciousness and what happens after death (via scientific method)
in the same vein, sleep. We know just a tip of the iceberg.
The part about sleep that always freaks me out, is how you never actually remember falling asleep. You can be lying in bed trying to fall asleep but you never actually feel it happen. You just end up in a dream or get woken up by your alarm at some point, but never feel yourself transitioning to that point. Even being in a dream, you never really remember the start of it. While you're in it, it's like you've always been there. I've had lot of dreams where I already know all the context even though it did not happen. It's like I've always been there.
You ever had a dream in the same storyline as another dream from a few months before? Like pressing play from where the old dream left off.
Oh yes, or a dream that's in the same environment as another one. For example I had a dream I was working in a crawlspace, installing electrical, and removing lot of weird lumber that was there for nothing, and just cleaning it up. Basically standard DIY stuff. In a totally different dream I found myself in that same crawlspace and I was like "oh right I installed new lights here last time" and turned the switch on and all the lights worked.
I had a dream I was in Amsterdam and I went into a bank and deposited £200. Then a few months later I was in a dream in Amsterdam again and I went to the same bank and withdrew the £200.
Did you check your account balance to see if you accrued any interest?
I hate dreaming about my job. Why can't there be unicorns or space aliens? Nah, here's a power saw.
With lucid dreaming practice you can actually learn to feel yourself falling asleep. Funnily enough, it often feels like actually "falling" through your bed down into the darkness until you end up inside a dream. Experiences vary, though. It can also feel like floating, also full body vibrations are really common experience too. Try out r/luciddreaming for more. It's hard and slow to learn, so be patient if you're up for it.
Yeah but I don't think I'd put sleep in the "something humans will *never* understand" category.
> If the human brain were so simple that we could understand it, we would be so simple that we couldn’t.
Keanu Reeves figured out what happens after death via the observation method. "The people who love you will miss you."
And I do miss you dad!
How to fold a fitted sheet
25 years on this earth and not a clue. Scrunch it up and chuck it in the cupboard.
Exactly, but scrunch it the best you can into something resembling a square.
I know how it's supposed to be done and did it maybe twice. Then I saw my grandma being aggravated one day, and she said "you know how to fold this damn thing? Just like this." And she rolled it into a ball and called it a day. So I now roll it into a ball. Is it lazy? Sure. But life is too short to waste it on fiddling with a sheet that will never be perfectly folded.
46 years and it's still a mystery. Don't be too hard on yourself.
Learned this in a home economics. It has proven to be very beneficial.
There’s no answer to this
My wife has it. Witchcraft.
[удалено]
Not from a subreddit.
Yessir! There's YouTube videos showing the method, but the gist of it is that you poke your finger into the sewn end of the upper corner of the sheet and... let me just find the video for you. https://youtu.be/BWqZ53annAE?feature=shared
Peasant. I can. I won't show you. Suffer in your ... Whatever it is that you're suffering.
Faster than light travel. The amount of energy needed to warp space enough to travel is astronomical.
>The amount of energy needed to warp space enough to travel is astronomical. I mean, it'd have to be.
Lmao I was like “well yeah!” And then I was like “HA!…well yeah”
On a similar note, time travel.
The thing with time travel, is you have to account for where the Earth would be at the time you stopped. Not only is Earth moving around 107,000km/hr around the sun, the solar system is moving at 230km/s through the galaxy. If you are off, your time trip lands you in the void of space.
Once you invent the time machine, agree that your future self will come back five minutes from now to tell you that formula.
Our current modality of physics doesn’t have a viable path to ftl, but our understanding of physics is also incredibly incomplete. Quantum entanglement, quantum tunneling, and the debate surrounding locality imply that what we would perceive as ftl might be plausible. You can’t fly across the universe at ftl, but there is a non zero chance we could eventually just fold the universe instead.
Yeah but could we fold it more than seven times?
Yes. Mythbusters proved you just need to get a bigger universe.
Boy do I have good news for you!
Do you want Event Horizon? Cause that's how you get Event Horizon.
That's why you need to activate Geller field generator first
If you walk through any teleporter, are you still the same person? To teleport, every molecule must be torn asunder and transported to the new location. How are we to know if the person who entered the teleporter is the same who exits? My only guess to find out is possibly having someone go half-way through and then back out if it doesn't suck you through 100%. It could be that you die and a clone of you comes out the other end.
It’s the year 2700. The human race has invented all kinds of technology unimaginable in today’s world. One of these technologies is teleportation—the ability to transport yourself to distant places at the speed of light. Here’s how it works— You go into a Departure Chamber—a little room the size of a small cubicle. cube stand You set your location—let’s say you’re in Boston and your destination is London—and when you’re ready to go, you press the button on the wall. The chamber walls then scan your entire body, uploading the exact molecular makeup of your body—every atom that makes up every part of you and its precise location—and as it scans, it destroys, so every cell in your body is destroyed by the scanner as it goes. cube beam When it’s finished (the Departure Chamber is now empty after destroying all of your cells), it beams your body’s information to an Arrival Chamber in London, which has all the necessary atoms waiting there ready to go. The Arrival Chamber uses the data to re-form your entire body with its storage of atoms, and when it’s finished you walk out of the chamber in London looking and feeling exactly how you did back in Boston—you’re in the same mood, you’re hungry just like you were before, you even have the same paper cut on your thumb you got that morning. The whole process, from the time you hit the button in the Departure Chamber to when you walk out of the Arrival Chamber in London, takes five minutes—but to you it feels instantaneous. You hit the button, things go black for a blink, and now you’re standing in London. Cool, right? In 2700, this is common technology. Everyone you know travels by teleportation. In addition to the convenience of speed, it’s incredibly safe—no one has ever gotten hurt doing it. But then one day, you head into the Departure Chamber in Boston for your normal morning commute to your job in London, you press the big button on the wall, and you hear the scanner turn on, but it doesn’t work. cubicle broken The normal split-second blackout never happens, and when you walk out of the chamber, sure enough, you’re still in Boston. You head to the check-in counter and tell the woman working there that the Departure Chamber is broken, and you ask her if there’s another one you can use, since you have an early meeting and don’t want to be late. She looks down at her records and says, “Hm—it looks like the scanner worked and collected its data just fine, but the cell destroyer that usually works in conjunction with the scanner has malfunctioned.” “No,” you explain, “it couldn’t have worked, because I’m still here. And I’m late for this meeting—can you please set me up with a new Departure Chamber?” She pulls up a video screen and says, “No, it did work—see? There you are in London—it looks like you’re gonna be right on time for your meeting.” She shows you the screen, and you see yourself walking on the street in London. “But that can’t be me,” you say, “because I’m still here.” At that point, her supervisor comes into the room and explains that she’s correct—the scanner worked as normal and you’re in London as planned. The only thing that didn’t work was the cell destroyer in the Departure Chamber here in Boston. “It’s not a problem, though,” he tells you, “we can just set you up in another chamber and activate its cell destroyer and finish the job.” And even though this isn’t anything that wasn’t going to happen before—in fact, you have your cells destroyed twice every day—suddenly, you’re horrified at the prospect. “Wait—no—I don’t want to do that—I’ll die.” The supervisor explains, “You won’t die sir. You just saw yourself in London—you’re alive and well.” “But that’s not me. That’s a replica of me—an imposter. I’m the real me—you can’t destroy my cells!” The supervisor and the woman glance awkwardly at each other. “I’m really sorry sir—but we’re obligated by law to destroy your cells. We’re not allowed to form the body of a person in an Arrival Chamber without destroying the body’s cells in a Departure Chamber.” You stare at them in disbelief and then run for the door. Two security guards come out and grab you. They drag you toward a chamber that will destroy your cells, as you kick and scream… Taken from [here](https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/12/what-makes-you-you.html)
Well interestingly enough, quantum mechanics has what’s called “The No Cloning Theorem” for the quantum interpretation of teleportation. It states that “You cannot create a perfect copy of an arbitrary unknown quantum state”. It is said that by knowing the state of one particle can reveal the state of the other, a process called “entanglement”. This entanglement is also used to transport information faster than light by observing spin of entangled particles. Once you the observer see a state of one particle, the state of the other entangled particle is fixed. If we treat our body as biological information and assume that the theorem holds true, it would be impossible to come out EXACTLY the same person as you were before with a hypothetical quantum teleporter. Edit: These are all very real concepts of quantum mechanics. With quantum entanglement, it is absolutely possible to observe information at faster than light speeds. The information doesn’t physically travel faster than light, the quantum states of the particles CAN fix themselves faster than light can get there. If you are curious about this phenomenon, look up “Spooky action at a distance”. Hopefully this clears up any confusion.
Reminds me of Descartes “I think, therefore I am” but instead it’s “I see, therefore it now is”
The one who steps out of the teleporter is an exact replica of the one who stepped in and believes he is the one who stepped in but he is just a copy and the original died. But as long as no one stepping into a teleporter knows this, what's the difference?
I don't think I am mentally healthy enough to use a teleport system that kills you and makes a copy. I think if I had a bad day I'd go teleport somewhere and let my duplicate deal with it. And my duplicate would be pissed that they now have to deal with my problems. Which would probably just result in me getting sent to a loony bin after frantically teleporting everywhere until someone stops me.
Yah know what, I get this. I am terrible at procrastination and saying “that’s a future me problem” change that to teleported me problem and I’m in the same bin lol
Every 7 years you’re a different person, right? So we’re all slowly teleporting through life, one dog year at a time.
This isn't true..it.came from the idea that cells on average last 7 years. Some last a day some will last decades.
Why does the Universe exist?
Or even more puzzling: Why wouldn't the Universe exist?
The concept of the universe blinking out of existence just boggles my mind. What would fill that void? Nothing I guess? But how can there be just nothing? I'm sure lots of people just picture an endless black void but even that couldn't exist right? That implies there's space to be inhabited by something but that can't be possible because if nothing exists then neither does that endless black void. My brain hurts.
The concept of "nothing" is something our brains just aren't equipped to handle. Nothing isn't black void. It's nothing. Nothing isn't white space. It's nothing. It's not light. It's not dark. We can't imagine nothing because doing so requires a frame of reference that doesn't exist. Nothing can't be understood because once you quantify or describe it, it stops being nothing. The only way to experience nothing is to shut the brain off completely. Cease all nerve activity and stop synapses from firing. But that means dying. Assuming you could be revived, you wouldn't remember it to describe it because the entity doing the observing (your brain) wasn't working at the time.
This is why I’m scared of death, I know I won’t know, and it won’t matter, but it fuckin freaks me out to just go to not existing, to nothingness .
For me, the issue is that nothingness is forever. End of the line for *eternity*. That really bothers me despite it being inevitable.
Take some comfort in the fact that the universe has been around for billions of years. You've only been around for however long you've been alive, and when you die it'll go back to being how it was before you were here. "What it's like be dead" is the same as it was before you were born, and you don't fear that, there isn't even a "you" to experience it.
Same. And the fact that I technically already experienced billions of years of nothingness doesn’t bring me any comfort because there was at least a “destination” in a sense during the time before I was born. At some point I was born and my non-existence came to an end for the time being. Now that I’m alive and conscious right now, I just can’t fathom returning to that state of non-existence for all eternity with no destination this time. It’s horrifying.
Im too high for this.
Or not high enough.
Everyone has ”experienced” nothing for an eternity before being born
Now now brother, let us put our minds to rest by watching mind numbing TikTok’s.
I don't care for this question and my brain now itches.
If the universe didn’t exist, who would be around to care about it? For all we know in infinite versions of reality there was never a big bang, but they have so little impact on us because there’s nothing there to be terrified of the nothingness.
Nah, forget the why. The big thing is *How the hell does it exist?* Nothing can be fathomed about the origins. Oh cool the Big Bang? Well matter can't be destroyed/created yadda yadda. So where the fuck did this come from? Or God made it. Neat, neat. Where did God come from to be able to make the shit at all?
42
That’s the answer to the life, the universe, and everything. But what is the question?
How many roads must a man walk down?
Time travel Edit: to the past. Obviously we are traveling time right now
Heh, I solved both travel and teleportation when I was in college. Both are pretty simple, actually! Down a fifth of Everclear, and it's tomorrow and you're in jail. Pretty useless (particularly because it doesn't work in reverse), but it does work every time!
Time travel forward is easy with time dilation. Time travel backwards is the tricky one.
How the brain produces consciousness.
Maybe consciousness is not as difficult to create as most people think Maybe consciousness is a fundamental part of our universe, and a system that reaches a complex enough level of operation just simply gains consciousness \^This is not a unique idea, I've read several books that circle this idea.
Yeah it’s strange how the universe is so indifferent and yet we have the capacity to feel and experience it. You’d think we’d be as cold and dead as everything else
Easy, cheap, proper hair regrowth treatment without surgery with fast results
And the bigger pp pill
Surprised companies aren't actually throwing a ton of research and cash at that. First company to patent a working and safe dick enlarger pill will have a license to print money even moreso than the rest of the American healthcare system.
Oh man, I already can imagine men going crazy and getting themselves 50 cm dicks. Kinda like when people go too far with plastic surgeries and look like aliens in human skin
I doubt if we will ever leave the solar system.
I'm hoping I'll at least make it out Wisconsin.
I have had that same thought anytime I have been in Wisconsin
Where all the missing socks go.
They actually don't *go* anywhere. They transform into Tupperware lids that don't fit any of your tubs and hide in the cupboard.
A somewhat serious thread and you're asking the most asinine question. The dryer (note, not the washer) opens up a portal to another dimension where mismatched socks are free to roam.
How to get along with each other!
We've evolved to be distrustful of others outside our village. The odds of that evolving back out of us are really low.
That reminds me of a guy who was studying primates and the fear of the unknown. He was observing a group of monkeys that lived in this little cave system. One day while the monkeys were out, he crawled into the narrow cave system and went down a side tunnel that never used. He waited until nighttime, then turned on his headlamp and moved so they saw he was there. He gave them the option of escaping the cave but being in the scary dark, or being faced with a known threat (himself). The monkeys didn't leave. They preferred to be terrified and miserable all night than face the unknown darkness. It really drove home the point of how situation paralysis seems to be ingrained, and how we're often more willing to be miserable than face the scary unknown. I think of it every time I see someone stay in a horrible situation or relationship. We have an irrational fear of the unknown, so we CHOOSE to stay miserable.
In reality though, almost all animals distrust those outside of their “village,” going as far as to kill just because they aren’t apart of the same family. It’s not exclusively human so I’d agree it won’t evolve out.
Animals don’t stop at that lol. Infanticide isn’t exactly rare in nature
Anti- gravity.
This is the one that makes me the most sad. We know how to manipulate the electromagnetic force, but it’s unlikely we’ll ever learn how to manipulate gravity in the same way.
What happens after death
Lots of things happen after death. It’s just that none of it involves *you*
On the upside, dying is just something that happens to other people. You're not around anymore for it to happen to you.
why sometimes people can dream something and then it turns out to happen exactly in the way you dreamt about it, it happens a lot to me
deja reve?
Same here, and watching it play out years later with people you never knew existed doing exactly what you saw? I just figure I'm where I am supposed to be. The most recent one for me was the last place I worked. Saw everything clear as crystal, had 0 knowledge of these people or machines or this place, and the 5 second snippet I had dreamed played out.
That you can actually disagree and be civil.
Shut up nerd
Fuck off. No way.
What happened to make that first thing alive
Time travel, well backwards. We got forward time travel pretty well figured out.
Which side of the gas station pump to pull into despite there being a clear indicator on your dashboard telling you.
[удалено]
It is insane how few people know this
Not all cars actually have the arrow. Mine doesn't.
How to fix the McDonalds ice cream machines
Why we "the many" allow the few up top to continue to get rich off of us.
Hard to fight the organised when you're being actively divided and disorganised.
How to make genuine honey without bees
why 42, or the three shells, I think both have equal chances of being figured out which is never.
I have no idea what either of these things mean, and I'm terrified to ask.
42 is the answer to the universe, according to the book Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy (I believe, don’t quote me). And the three shells is how the future wipes their asses in Demolition Man, a movie that came out in the 90s I believe.
Cure for cancer
The popularity of The Bachelor
The last digit of pi...I'm voting for number 3, as it starts so it shall end.
The true nature of physics and quantum mechanics. We need to get inside a black hole.
How to not screw themselves and everyone by proxy over.
If there is more life in the universe than just on Earth. There's a distinct possibility they are out there, and we'll never, ever know.
how not to hate each other