Our brains are big, I mean, really big. So big, in fact, that when we go to sleep at night they’re capable of creating virtual worlds for us to inhabit. A lot of animals have brains, but only those that have big brains, I mean huge brains, in comparison to the parts of their brains that are needed for keeping the lights on, dream. And typically this is exclusive to predators, animals who engage in daily problem solving in order to earn their daily bread.
It reminds me of old computers, you know, the kinds that filled up entire warehouses, or more close to our times, the first computers to sit on our desks. These machines were amazing, especially for their time, but they didn’t dream. They couldn’t. They simply didn’t have the processing power to do anything more than keep the lights on, or more specifically, engage in only a single task or program at any given time.
Today’s computers are a little more powerful. Trillions of times more powerful, in fact. This allows them to do something sort of amazing: run virtual machines. For those who haven’t (knowingly) worked with a virtual machine, it’s basically a computer running within a computer. For example, on the computer I’m writing this blog entry on I can run a program call a virtualizer that will allow me to run another machine, say a “copy” (or “instance”) of an Apple II computer from the 1980’s, where I can (virtually) load up any disk (image) that I’d used back in the good old days. It’s like my computer is dreaming of days past. Not really. But kind of. The point here being, it wouldn’t be possible if modern computers, like the currently evolved mammalian brain, didn’t have the horsepower we’ve bestowed them with.
One of the results of having all this processing power, for humans at least, is that we’re highly intelligent. We’re able to create virtual situations in worlds in our heads enabling us to solve problems. These imaginations don’t necessarily have to have any basis in fact. They’re pondering, mental models of how things might possibly be, that we can compare to actual reality, in order to solve real world problems—or simply to create art. Each time we boot up one of these mental virtual machines we’re playing in a complete sandbox universe. It’s allowed us to create language, mathematics, better understand the nature of the universe, land on the moon, and invent better ways of getting ourselves drunk on Friday nights. And it’s given us the creativity to ask and, for some at least, answer the age old question: what happens when we die?
I’m not sure about you, but on some deeply emotional level I don’t think my dad is dead. I know he’s not living with my mom anymore, otherwise she wouldn’t be so lonely and he’d answer the phone at least half of the time I call, but he’s somewhere else and might decide to show up at any time. He’ll still be blind and walking with a cane, he’ll still have a short temper and won’t exactly be a good listener, but he’s out there, ready to show up again without warning. I don’t believe he’s in hell or heaven because these are mystical places I was taught about be people who wanted to pressure me into believing non-sense they couldn’t in any reasonable way demonstrate, and I did see his dead body laying there empty, lifeless, for an hour while everyone began their morning (and I downed a half a pint of Jack Daniels because mornings just aren’t the same without whiskey), but I do believe he’s somewhere out there, ready to pick up a phone or walk in the door and call me “pal” again. And you know what? I’m okay with that fantasy. It helps me sleep at night. And frankly, it’s no more ludicrous than what most superstitious human beings believe despite all evidence to the contrary. Sure, I could buck up Buttercup and force my deep down emotions to accept that he’s gone for the rest of eternity, but I don’t want to. And holding this virtual reality in my so called heart doesn’t negatively impact me (or those around me—I’m not going to force anyone to jump in and dream my dreams). But I sure do miss the hell out of him.
Aslynn