Amanda Osborne: Reading Connections #1

This youtube clip explores the idea that there is a difference between the external world and the world of perceptions, which form in our brains.  The external world consists of objects of real matter.  It is the reality of the universe.  Many theorize that this is a world in which we never truly see or can be sure even exists.  This world is unreachable to us.  Why?  It is due to the concept that we view the world around us through perceptions formed in our brain.  Our five senses send electrical signals to our brain, which is what we interpret as the world. In reality, we are seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting, and smelling electrical copies formed in our brains rather than seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting, and smelling the original matter.  For instance, we say that we see a plane flying in the sky, but in reality we are seeing an electrical copy of our brain’s interpretation of the object provided through our sense of vision.  We are not seeing a plane, but rather we are seeing what is perceived to be a plane by our senses communicating to our brain.  This idea that we can’t truly trust our senses in perceiving what is around us was explored in Chapter Four of The Accidental Mind.  Linden explains to readers that we all assume that the information we receive through our senses is “raw data.”  He claims that, “our senses are cherry-picking and processing certain aspects of the external world for us to consider” (Linden, 83).  If this is the case, then I wonder; can we ever truly understand and evaluate the world in which we live?  And if we can't then what is to be said about science today?  How can we claim to know and discover so much about the universe if what we are "seeing" isn't the external world after all, but rather a world of our own perceptions?