Individual Images

Every critter forms an image in its brain of the world around it. The image is not the actual world, of course—it’s a collection of electrical brain signals that gives us information about how to interact with that world. It's a mental representation... a perception that we create in our head, and hope that it's realistic enough that we will get along quite decently. Again, it's not the world itself... it's a cognitive construct.

So I go through life and I will do decently well—if the sum of all those electrical signals about the world out there creates a mental image that works for me. Indeed, I come to feel that the world is those signals. So how about another person? What confidence can I have that their images are quite the same as mine? We'll never know. It's similar to the mystery of how our consciousness is formed: neuroscientists have yet to explain how our perceptions stem from electrical impulses in the brain. So we really don’t know what the other person’s electrical signals mean to them.

The problem is far more challenging when we consider non-human images. I can at least be confident that another human's sensory capabilities are very similar to mine, and we can discuss our individual images and compare them. But how about a dog—whose hearing and sense of smell are far superior to mine? How about a bat—who relies on ultrasonic echoes to “see” its environment? How about a sightless underground animal—who is unable to create a visual image at all? None of them possess my language and thus is able to describe to me those images.

Of course, each of these other creatures does not need—even cannot use—the images I create; even if its mental prowess happened to be equal to mine. I see a tree as a thing of beauty, or as a source of heat in my wood stove. A termite sees it as a source of food and a dog sees it as something to pee on and leave a personal message to other dogs. I see a dog as a potential companion, while my dog may see another dog as either a competitor (who left a message on his tree) or a chance to mate.

We tend to go through life mindlessly and self-centeredly unaware that other people and critters hold very different images in their heads. We believe that our view is best, that the world revolves around us... our individual images are all that matters. The ancient Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi was able to step back and realize there are countless perspectives of countless critters. A famous story he told was, upon awakening from a dream one day, that he was unsure whether he was Zhuangzi who was just dreaming he was a butterfly, or a butterfly just dreaming that he was Zhuangzi. Can we tell what's real, when it’s all just electrical patterns in our brains?

More importantly, Zhuangzi took away as a message from that dream, that it can be useful to try to put ourselves inside the head (if not the shoes) of another... to try to perceive the world as they do. It can break us out of our shell and expand our being. It helps generate understanding and compassion. It helps me to understand their behavior and develop tolerance and appreciation for all beings.