Chapter V

Draft. Modern creationism:

Since ancient times humanity has been trying tirelessly to make sense of its own existence. It’s not something unexpected, I would say that our human experience really seems to be very suggestive by itself. It may have seemed obvious in the past that a kind of intelligent force or entity created everything we experience, but our modern knowledge can give us some important keys to formulating a new model about the nature of the human experience per se.

Above all, our world simulation exhibits intelligence by itself; the brain uses a great amount of dynamics and “tricks” in order to create a coherent conscious model which depicts what's happening “out there”. It is not a coincidence that in the past there was a lot of speculation about it; I think that humanity has been “feeling” it since a long time ago, it has been like some kind of implicit hint that we were able to discern since we started to be rational beings.

Bear in mind that we’re inhabiting a model which entails a wide sum of operations to function properly, in order to maintain the moments that integrate the experience in a state of coherence. Without all of these parameters working correctly, this model would be chaotic, unviable, and useless from an evolutionary standpoint.

As I’ve mentioned before, the model we inhabit is intelligent by itself, in a literal sense, the world around us is constantly morphing, and re-adjusting itself to maintain a stable appearance all the time. The consistent structure of our experience isn’t a coincidence, as I’ve mentioned on previous occasions, there are a lot of processes and stuff going on implicitly that give rise to the steady objects and features we experience, the trees, the sky, the clouds, the sound of the rain, the textures, the scents, even the sensation of walking; everything is constructed due to this “intelligence”.

All of these parameters and dynamics that render our experience of the world receive the name of “organizing principles”, and they are all over the place once you start “exploring” the way in which your world simulation works, through practices such as meditation or other kinds of techniques: Lucid dreaming, sensory deprivation, or the controlled use of psychoactive drugs. The brain possesses a huge array of these modes of organization, in order to make the right atmospheric changes in our world simulation, based on the unceasing flux of sensorial brought from the senses.

So, reality is in essence a system, there’s no doubt that there’s an intelligent design in it. We could say that there’s a lot of stuff going on to sustain our existence because we’re a central part of this sophisticated model in the end.

Returning to the main topic. Taking into account all that I have been saying throughout this document, we can argue that we’re in essence creations of our own brains, in a completely literal sense, “we’re controlled hallucinations with useful properties”. We’re little simulated “creatures” incorporated into a systematic volumetric model, which can be thought of as a basic function of a huge biological super-advanced computer (the brain).

So, under this premise, I would conclude that creationism is true. There’s actually an intelligent impersonal force that acts as the main administrator of the world, we’re its creations, and we’re at the mercy of it; I’m referring to the brain, of course. If you’re reading this, it means you’re currently within a complete and sophisticated model of the world, just like everyone else. Every time we look up to the sky, what we’re actually seeing is the “inner ceiling” of our brains...The fact that all of us count on our own brains running an “online” conscious representation of the external-world, simultaneously, gives rise to the convincing illusion that we are sharing and inhabiting the same “reality” with others —direct realism—.

The reality we experience is a private virtual-model taking place within the limits of our brain. This is what causes all the confusion that I have already mentioned in previous notes. Which also can contaminate some beliefs such as creationism.

“My conscious brain”. Artistic representation that depicts the concept of “world simulation”.
Author: Aarón T. M.

It is not by any chance that the people from the past thought that we were creatures at the mercy of a higher kind of force that had control over us…It is worth mentioning that in the past people thought that things such as diseases and mental disorders were a sign of divine punishment, supernatural influence, or curse. In those times it was quite disconcerting to watch, because one could only rely on empirical observations. They weren’t aware of the inner mechanisms of the human body, as we are today. But, we shouldn’t disregard such empirical observations that people have been describing throughout history until our modern days.

I would argue that these are actually valuable from the standpoint of this model of the mind, I mean, they have an explanatory power. In other words, what is it like being a human from the human experience itself? Bear in mind that we actually exist as well-defined creatures that are rendered by the brain, as well as the environment we experience. Which corresponds directly with our phenomenological appearance.

When there’s an alteration in brain activity, then as a consequence modifies the features and parameters of our world simulation, which feel —from a naive perspective— as if they were changes in reality, performed by some kind of external influence. And that’s exactly what our ancestors naively concluded.

Another example that illustrates it well is the phenomenon known as “asomatognosia”. It is a rare neurological condition that gives rise to perceptual alterations, in this case, attributed to the body schema. People who cope with asomatognosia usually report not feeling some parts of their own bodies, as if these were not there. In other cases of body schema disorders, intense bodily hallucinations can be experienced, such as feeling that one has multiple arms, rather than just two.

There’s a wide catalog of phenomena regarding those conditions, but just the main ones are enough to give us an idea about the premise of this chapter.