The Universe's Biggest Paradoxes

Has anyone ever accused you of acting like you're the center of the universe? Maybe you were 10 years old, upset that your mom wouldn't take you to buy candy, or you were so focused on an upcoming project that you totally forgot to wish your coworker congratulations on their promotion. It happens to the best of us. Most of us are wired to be a little selfish; we evolved to survive, after all. Airlines even tell us to secure our oxygen masks before our children's.

But being reprimanded by our parents or a friend for being a little self-obsessed is different from feeling like we are truly the only person who exists. What would that be like? Everyone and everything else being a figment of our imagination, actually being the center of the universe? It seems like a fun what-if game to play, but if you think about it long enough, could it make sense? Are you sure the phone you're holding in your hands is even real? Could you be certain that the woman you just bought a coffee from was indeed there?

The only thing we can be certain of is our own mind; at least that's what the philosophy of solipsism tells us. Solipsism is an extreme type of skepticism that anything external from our minds does not exist. The outside world, other people, their thoughts, and emotions simply don't exist outside of our perception of them. Solipsism is presented as an explanation for what the external world actually is. It basically says it isn't anything; it's make-believe, imaginary, literally in our heads.

The house we live in, the people we love, the car we drive, and the food we eat—they are our perception. The sky, the moon, the whole solar system are merely figments of our own minds. Solipsism equates the existence of anything with one's personal experiences, thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. They are the only things we can be certain of as individuals. It tells us that we are indeed the center of the universe.

Many philosophers have argued similar ideas to solipsism, trying to solve the gap between our perception of things and their actual existence. For example, George Berkeley similarly wanted to know if things we did not see actually existed. He asked the classic question: if a tree falls in the woods and there's no one around to hear it, does it make a noise? He answered no, that something like the noise the tree makes only exists if someone can perceive it.

But he didn't go as far as solipsism takes us. He felt that solipsists were actually absurd. He reasoned that if a solipsist thinks their mind is the only thing in existence, then it can't be perceived by anything or anyone else. If it can't be perceived, then it cannot exist. If the only thing that existed was the mind and its perception, then the actual world wouldn't be there, and then we'd be… what? Nothing?

Maybe we would live in The Matrix, living in an illusion, a figment of someone else's perception that only some know isn't real. But the thing about the idea of The Matrix, or for that matter, solipsism in general, is that it doesn't really appeal to common sense. We know that our dog exists because we just do. Solipsism is more about logic.

We can think to ourselves: I only have direct access to the contents of my own mind—sensory experiences, thoughts, and memories. These contents are completely private. I might share them, but no one really knows them besides me. At the same time, I'm unable to access anyone else's mind, so I can only infer their existence indirectly. Therefore, the only thing of certainty is that my mind exists.

We can't logically assert anything else, so we end up sealed in this prison cell of our perception of the world around us. We experience our own mind in every single moment of our lives but simply assume that other people are having the same lived experience. We will never be sure that they actually possess thoughts and emotions like we do.

The universe is filled with mystery. The only way we know how to explain this mystery is through science and technology. If you want to understand more about what goes on in our universe, then I recommend you check out brilliant.org, the best place online to learn science, computer science, and math.