Rhetorical Questions Round a Rectangular Dining Table
Vol.13 Existential narcissistic solipsism and other ramblings from deep within The Matrix
Vol.13 Existential narcissistic solipsism and other ramblings from deep within The Matrix
I have long joked that I identify as a solipsistic Scientologist and in the famed words of my literary hero Hunter S Thompson
“and why not?”
Why not indeed. The world has long been open to the fluidity of identity and so today’s madness and the politics that have blatantly fuelled this identity fire, it’s to be expected. How can you know that I’m not a solipsistic Scientologist? How can you be sure? Maybe I’m one of these characteristic labels? Perhaps I’m the one of the two you’d least expect?
Perhaps the greater question is why would you care considering you only exist within the context of my own mind?
I’m sorry you don’t exist but I do thank you for reading whatever becomes of this article, as I thank you sincerely, and always, for reading my ramblings here. It means the world to me.
Even if you don’t exist.
Solipsism fascinates me and only up to the point of my own understanding and no more. The rough and ready version I apply is I’m the only living, breathing organism in this play of our lives and I, through the barrage of a Matrix program entitled “real life”, populate that life with other characters. So I’m a Scientologist in a program of my own life and of course this is faintly and absurdly ridiculous if only for the fact I wouldn’t be able to afford the fees to my chosen religion even in my own realised dream world! Come to think of it, I don’t fancy signing that billion year contract of service either and holding a couple of baked bean cans and confessing my sins every other day for the rest of my life?
What was I thinking?
I’m the master of my own destiny!
I’m the only captain steering this particular Titanic!
Solipsism falls at the first hurdle, but then again, so does nearly everything else in this absurd reality we all believe in. Quantum physics contends that everything in the universe is made of atoms but these invisible joys of nature are almost exclusively empty. So if that laptop or phone you’re reading this article on is made of atoms, how does it hang together so solidly? This dining table too, upon which I constantly put digital pen to digital parchment? This table should not exist! Cannot exist! Yet it does.
We can discuss at length the absurdities of our worldwide reality, from the little nagging doubts through to the flagrant deceit of our own lying eyes, but however much I want solipsism to exist and be a tangible thing, it isn’t. My family and friends are as real as I am and I’ve even hugged them and felt their human warmth from time to time, so they must exist. Right? You, I’m not so sure of! I mean, you too must have family and friends and you may even hug your loved ones far often than I do, so you, as well as your family and friends must exist. Right?
The obvious and honest answer to my own solipsistic question is that I use this existential conundrum as a satirical release valve from a world I’ve never agreed to or with. Who wants to play in the same sandpit as the lunatics who refuse to define what a woman is, or wage wars for their demonic masters whilst squeezing the pips, zest and goodness out of a society they are desperately and deliberately destroying? Who wants to partake in that carnival of the utterly absurd? But if I’m the only person that can truly exist, who created this fake reality and why am I investing my energy into it? Have I created this mess and the characters in it?
Where’s the delete button?
And what is “real life” anyway? The din of an annoying alarm clock through to the exhaustion under a moonlit night? Or is real life the two weeks annual holiday (if you’re lucky) to sunnier climes and a break from, well, real life? But surely the two weeks under a Floridian sun should be fifty two, and a constant real life in place of the other real life? It’s the age old question I guess of “if a tree falls in a forest and kills a recruitment consultant, do you care?” but if the very fabric of time, space and that annoying elephant in the room screaming “Quantum Physics!” is all a lie, or at best an inversion, then why not solipsism?
Here’s where things get interesting. If you wish, you are free to be whatever you wish to be within The Matrix. You can have an avatar picture of a banana, drape it in the national flag of your choice and say you identify as a chocolate biscuit if you wish, but there’s still a human being underneath the froth. Where the Metaverse will ramp up the absurdity is the complete envelopment it’s users will feel as they dive into a virtually real world and with the incredible technological advances ever quickening it won’t be long before users will be barely physically linked to this other universe at all and hence, deeper and deeper into the real Matrix that’s been planned all along. Whether you believe in solipsism or not, this incarnation of the Matrix is just its training wheels. The Metaverse will amplify all selfish/solipsistic thoughts of self to a whole, and frightening, new level. If your identity, be it that banana mentioned earlier or the fetishised version of yourself you’ve always wished to be, can be played out inside a headset or via a simple microchip perhaps, then why would you ever venture outside and into the “real world” ever again?
The very definition of a “real” life varies wildly and to individual lived experiences and perceptions of the world around us, and what’s real to you will almost certainly not be my experience. The Matrix amplifies this with the proliferation of social media with people retreating into their own echo chambers, shouting into the void of Twitter or Facebook and whether we admit it to ourselves or not, there’s a large dollop of narcissism to go around too. Is it any wonder a daydreamer such as myself believes he’s the only living human organism in this collective wonder of a maze of caves of my own creation?
Talking of caves and the absurdity of whatever we all laughingly agree upon as “real life”, I’ve recently delved into the available back catalogue of the German eccentric film director Werner Herzog and I heartily recommend the films in the collage below. A cursory glance into my archives here will hopefully demonstrate that I am somewhat of a cinephile and whilst I’d been fully aware of the documentaries of Mr Herzog I’d never seen a single one. Until the past week. And now I’m hooked! Why I’m disappearing onto this unexpected tangent is three fold (1) my fascination with the concept of a “real life” (2) the headline story is faraway from the central protagonists and (3) I’ve only seen six so far and they are all absolutely stunning in their own individual ways. So briefly working backwards, these documentaries truly are stunning and despite even the title or the central strand of the story, what fascinated me immediately with the first documentary I watched Into the Abyss, follows through in seemingly every other film. The background is key, filled with characters you’d least expect to play such prominent roles as the narrative unravels and are so typically emblematic of the film: stoic, unmoved, faithful, truthful, respectful and simply human beings going about their lives. Their real life.
Whether it’s a death row inmate pleading his innocence and the lives he may or may not have taken to a quirky young man full of his life, his experience and his 13 consecutive summers of living with wild brown bears. It’s an astonishing story wrapped in an enigma that defies the eyes. This young man’s life was dedicated to the preservation of the bears he called friends, as well as the foxes he called family. From this wilderness we venture to another in Encounters at the End of the World we now find our intrepid German eccentric showcasing my favourite of his documentaries so far. The interviews of the scientists, zoologists and volcanologists of Antarctica are dry, awkward, intensely fascinating and perfectly demonstrating these people’s lives, every day lived experiences of peering into a bubbling volcano or the reclusive and shy man devoting his life to monitoring the life habits of penguins. Of the three documentaries not yet alluded to I’d highly recommend Happy People: A year in the Taiga and a staggering portrayal of familial every day life in the wilds of Siberia.
So solipsism doesn’t exist as I’m not paying the exorbitant fees to enter my religion of choice and I’m not remotely clever enough to invent the film director above! I’ve disproved my own argument whilst tying myself in existential knots in the process. Pretty much par for my particular course. Perhaps both the theory itself and my adoption of it is the ultimate distraction trick of all?
You view the world through the prism of eyes you are constantly told are lying to you.
Up is painted in dark red colours yet the paint is dripping downward.
So how else can we explain away a distorted and upside down world?
As my dear old friend Hunter would say when needing an answer to one of his many letters to friends
“Send word”.
Selah.
Thanks for reading you non-existing heathen! Links below to various other volumes in this series:
Rhetorical Questions Round a Rectangular Dining Table
Vol.11 What’s happened to nuance? Do we just signal our virtues now? And what about whataboutery?medium.com
Rhetorical Questions Round a Rectangular Dining Table
Vol.10 “Come you masters of war” and other discussions with the ghost of Lee Harvey Oswald.medium.com
Rhetorical questions round a rectangular dining table
Vol.6 Why can’t I have a leap year this month? And why are we allowing the lunatics to dim the sun?medium.com