思考1

真实与虚假的世界

首先定义一下真实与虚假。中国有本名著《红楼梦》里面围绕着一句话展开“假作真时真亦假”。真实中有虚假，虚假中有真实。这两个概念是非常模糊的。举个内在的小例子，比如我很生气骂一个人。我骂的内容是夸张化的，也就是传统意义上的虚假；但是我愤怒的情绪是真实的。再举一个比较外在的例子：我们所说的通过客观感受体验的客观事实也是有虚假的成分的。比如这个裙子，有些人觉得它是左下图的颜色，有些人觉得是右下图的颜色。

其实，传统意义上的真实是虚假的，因为它是人为定义的。这个裙子客观来讲是什么颜色根本就不重要，它会随着光线的亮度和颜色改变自己的颜色，即使我们认为它有一个客观颜色，也是裙子在我们设想的白色光线底下的颜色。为什么default颜色一定要是白色啊？再者说，我们的体验限制在了视觉、触觉、听觉、味觉、闻觉这五种体验方式里。我们并不能超越这些体验方式去体验任何东西，所以我们无法获得全方位”真理“。假设你是一个聋子，你周围的人都是聋子。你就不会知道声音的存在。所以世界上有很多我们不知道存在的感触和东西。这个裙子的颜色也就不是定义它存在的真理中最重要的描述方式。

但是我逼逼了这么多其实一条裙子的颜色还是蛮重要的。因为它可以团结大部分人类的意识。它在大部分人的感受中是一种相似的颜色，因为我们对于一种颜色的容忍度很大（比如大部分人都会描述蓝紫色是蓝色，蓝绿色也是蓝色），而且我们都拥有视觉，而且大部分光线都是白色或者暖一点的白色。所以这条裙子的颜色的真实——我定义一下——就是大部分人类能够通过个体感知，不接受情绪洗礼下认同的颜色。我觉得这个定义不错。

所以“真实”就是大部分人类能够通过个体感知，不接受情绪洗礼下认同的东西。

"虚假"就是大部分人类能够通过个体感知，不接受情绪洗礼下不认同的东西。

那我们成功定义了物体的真实和虚假，社会中的真实和虚假却难得太多了。比如，我永远不会知道你真的在想啥。我可以通过我的智力预测你大概的动机和目的，但是我无法完美感受你在感受的事情。那你会问了，”我思考的东西都是文字“，如果你把我的思考transcript打印下来，你不就能完全的、客观的理解我了吗？啊那不是这样子的。因为你的思考一部分是由人为文字，另一部分是由文字带给你的情绪构成的。你有点像人工智能，你的文字经过你的千万经验对你有特定的情绪影响。现在读一首诗：

你来人间一趟，你要看看太阳， 和你的心上人，一起走在街上。

我无法用文字描述这首诗对我带来的梦幻般的体验，因为文字是后天人为创造的，而情绪是与生俱来的。文字可以但无法完全规训我的感受和思考；它的combination/permutation给我带来一种特殊的、由上万种感受集合起来的一种感受。最接近我的感受的文字是hope & happiness，可能这两个字也是你的感受，但是像我之前说的一样，大部分人都会描述蓝紫色为蓝色，蓝绿色也为蓝色。所以我可能是蓝紫色，你是蓝绿色，我们的感受其实挺不同的，我们无法给诗歌里一种”至上真理“的解释。

实事比一首诗带给你的感触要复杂多了，它会卷入上万不同人的动机与行为，所以即使诗歌至少能有个大概相同的意思（蓝色），实事是难以，乃至永远无法接近大部分人同意的”至上真理“。所以我们来分析一下特朗普的TRUTH social。他们团队所谓的truth（真实）不可能是客观的真实，并且演变成了一种标签或者宗教。什么是truth？特朗普说的所有话便是truth，什么是fake？所有反对特朗普的媒体便是fake news。最接近特朗普的角色是耶稣先生，耶先生的真实来源于他的神圣，但特朗普的真实来源于他营销的共同仇恨和以他个人特点为主的一种产品（白人、精英、鄙视女性、阿尔法男性），然后他还不得了得trademark一下”真理“这个词语。其实我觉得特朗普这么扯淡，还能够团结这么多人还挺牛逼的。如果我们社会可以团结所有人，那这个社会挺好的。但是特朗普的问题在于他的团结建立在对少数民族和性少数群体的仇恨。所以这个不是很好。

因此我越来越觉得我们生活的世界的秩序全是人为的，美国梦已死。对我来说，现实里唯一能够喘息的行为是画画。因为我画的过程是我唯一能真实拥有的东西。我对笔刷的选择，我对颜色的选择，这些不像我对工作的选择一样是被他人利益影响的。我无法看破所有社会当中的假象，我也不需要看破社会当中的所有假像。内心踏实、做出让自己开心的选择才是最重要的。

真实和虚假其实并不重要，他们最终也只是词汇而已，你可以像玩泥巴一样塑造他们对你的意思。

那我说了这么多你就要问了，既然”真实“属于个人的，那你凭什么在这里总结我们所有人的经验，给出你认为的客观解释？回到裙子的颜色。我认为团结大部分人类的感知还是蛮重要的。我利用这些你我都有的感知（视觉、听觉之类的），再利用我被社会规训、塑造的，大部分人都有的思考方式，来结合一些特定的文字放放屁。这些文字是能被你共鸣的，而且这个共鸣对我来说非常重要。我不满足于我们都认为这个裙子是蓝色的，我渴望更需要投入不同感触方式以及思考的共鸣。因为我是一个想要在我的物种当中建立复杂的相同价值和友谊的小动物。

喵喵。

The Real and the Fake World

First, let’s define what “real” and “fake” mean. In the Chinese classic Dream of the Red Chamber, everything revolves around one line: “When the false is taken as real, the real becomes false.” There is falsehood within reality, and reality within falsehood. These two concepts are incredibly blurry.

Take a small internal example: imagine I’m furious and yelling at someone. What I say is exaggerated—“fake” in the traditional sense. But my anger is real. Or take an external example: even the so-called objective facts we experience through our senses contain elements of falsehood. Think about this dress—some people see it as the color in the bottom-left image, while others see it as the color in the bottom-right.

Actually, what we traditionally call “reality” is itself fake, because it’s a human-made definition. The “true” color of the dress doesn’t matter at all; it changes depending on the brightness and color of the light. Even if we insist it has an “objective color,” that color only exists under white light which we assume by default. But why should white be the default light color?

Moreover, our experience is limited to five senses: sight, touch, hearing, taste, smell. We can’t go beyond them to experience anything else, so we’ll never gain access to total “truth.” Imagine you’re deaf, and everyone around you is also deaf—you would never know sound exists. There are surely countless sensations and things in this world we simply don’t know. So the color of the dress isn’t really the most important descriptor of its existence in some ultimate truth.

But after all this rambling, the color of the dress does matter a bit. Because it unifies the consciousness of most humans. Most people will perceive roughly the same color, because our tolerance for variation within a color category is pretty broad (blue-purple is “blue,” blue-green is also “blue”), and most of us have functional vision, and most lighting is white or slightly warm. So the dress’s “real” color—according to my definition—is: the color that most humans, through individual perception and without emotional interference, agree upon. I think that’s a decent definition.

So “reality” is whatever most humans, through their individual senses and free from emotional distortion, can agree on.

“Falsehood” is whatever most humans, through their individual senses and free from emotional distortion, cannot agree on.

Now we’ve managed to define the real and the fake for objects, but doing so for society is much harder. For example, I’ll never truly know what you’re thinking. I can use my intellect to guess your motives or intentions, but I can never perfectly feel what you’re feeling.

You might ask: “Well, my thoughts are all words. If you printed a transcript of my thoughts, wouldn’t you understand me completely and objectively?” Ah, but no. Because your thoughts are partly made of words, and partly made of emotions that the words evoke in you. You’re a bit like an AI model: your words trigger emotional responses shaped by thousands of your past experiences.

Now read this poem:

You’ve come to this world once,You should look at the sun, And walk down the street With the one you love.

I cannot describe the dreamlike feeling this poem gives me. Words are artificial, man-made; emotions are innate. Words can shape my feelings, but cannot fully control them. Their combinations/permutations produce a special sensation that is actually made up of thousands of smaller sensations. The closest words for my feeling might be “hope” and “happiness.” Maybe those words are what you feel too—but like I said earlier, most people will call blue-purple “blue,” and blue-green also “blue.” So maybe I’m blue-purple, and you’re blue-green. Our feelings are actually quite different. We cannot give the poem one single, ultimate “truth.”

Reality is far more complex than a poem. It involves the motives and actions of tens of thousands of people. So even though poems can at least be understood in roughly similar ways (“blue”), real-world events are difficult—if not impossible—to interpret in a way that most people agree is the “ultimate truth.”

Which brings us to Trump’s TRUTH Social. Trump team's so-called “truth” can never be an objective truth; it has turned into a label, even a religion. So what is “truth”? Whatever Trump says is truth. What is fake? Whatever media outlet opposes him is fake news. The closest analogue to Trump’s role is Mr. Jesus: Jesus’s truth came from his holiness, whereas Mr. T's “truth” comes from a marketed collective hatred and a product built around his personal traits (white, elite, puts woman in their place, “alpha male”). And then he goes as far as to trademark the word “truth” itself! Honestly, the fact that he’s this absurd yet can rally so many people is kind of impressive. If all members of society could unite like that, it would be wonderful. But the problem is that his unity is built on hatred toward minorities and LGBTQ groups. That’s not great at all.

Which is why I increasingly feel that the order of the world we live in is entirely man-made. The American Dream is dead. For me, the only thing that still lets me breathe is making art. Because the process of drawing is the one thing I own. My choice of brush, my choice of colors—unlike my choices in jobs—aren’t influenced by other people’s interests. I can’t see through every falsehood in society, and I don’t need to. What matters is feeling grounded inside, making choices that make you happy.

In the end, “real” and “fake” don’t matter. They are just words, and you can mold their meaning however you like—like playing with play dough.

After all this, you might ask: “If ‘reality’ is personal, then who are you to summarize everyone’s experience and give what you think is an objective explanation?” Let’s go back to the dress. I think uniting the perception of most humans is still valuable. I use the senses you and I both share (sight, hearing, etc.) and the socially shaped ways of thinking that most of us hold, combine them with certain words, and say some stuff. These words resonate with you—and that resonance is very important to me. I am not satisfied with us merely agreeing that the dress is blue; I long for resonance that requires slightly more complicated feelings and thought. I am just a little animal who is trying to build complex shared values and friendships within my species.

Purrrr.