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Memories and dreams

philosophy

Did you enjoy a good dream if you don’t remember it? Should we focus on creating or remembering memories? I will try to find an answer these in this post.

{2024-09-21}

General Ideas

Discussion

I’d argue that it is true that we only experience the past, however, in practical terms that is not entirely the case as we feel something as the present. I say that it is technicaly the truth because just by the delay in the transmission of information from our senses to our brain that makes everything that we experience past tense, and if we take into account the time that it takes the brain to process it, then even more time will have passed. Now, this can vary in lenght and it is very subjective depending on the activity that you are doing. This is a widely discussed topic in meta-physics and doing some research coud help with this issue, however, for the purposes of this mini-essay I won’t check any external sources. This is solely my own experience, but I woud say that by nature we classify the near past as the present. Also, in this essay I plan on talking about remembering the past and we don’t have any issues remembering the present so I think that it makes for a convenient distinction.

For the purposes of this essay the present is classified as that past that you can vividly remember with almost all detail, and the past is everything else.

Then, I think that answering the question of:

“Did you enjoy a good dream if you can’t remember it?” - OC (I think)

Depending on how you answer it you will position yourself in either side of the debate: Either you think that if you can’t remember the past then it’s equivalent to you not experiencing it, or, even if you can’t remember the past you still experienced it sometime and that matters.

I haven’t given each side a name (even though they probably have) but I’ll name the former “GA”, and the latter “GB”. I also acknowledge that dividing this complex question into just binary sides is a bit of a generalization, but for the purposes of this essay it will remain as it is for now.

If you are from group GA then you will probably think that it is of outmost importance to preserve the memories, store them and revisit them frequently so that you can rejoice in what good experiences you had in the past. On the other hand, if you feel more afine with group GB then, it doesn’t necessarily have to matter to you so much the past, because you know that even if you can’t remember it right now, you don’t need to because you experienced it sometime. Both arguments have its strenghts and weakneses however I will try my best to be opinionated on the matter and since I don’t have any sides yet, I will reason until I come up with my preferred colored glasses, because after all that’s all opinions are.

The main issue that I have with the argument of GB is that: what matters to us humans is now. If we are in pain it doesn’t matter so much to us if in the past we where happy compared to the emotions of the present. I thought I could say the same for when we are dead, and to some extend I think we can. Beware, that I’m assuming that when we die, we cease to exist and therefore can’t remember anything. In that case we wouldn’t care if we were happy because we simply cannot remember. This, unexpectedly but conveniently leads us to a much bigger and existential threat inducing question:

“If in the end we won’t remember anything, then what is the point of living?”

What is our happiness and sorrow if not a flower that dies instantly when pulled from the ground. Always knowing that it eventually will be cut, and it lose all its beauty but also all it’s pests. What will be left of the flower, if not just sorrow for the other plants. And getting reminded, that, they in turn, wil get picked up next by the hand of Death. Acting like a 3 year old with no sense of morality, because he doesn’t know that flowers are alive.

Then it doesnt’t matter how beautiful of a flower it is, or how many pests it has, or how many other plants are giving it shade, it won’t matter, because in Death’s backgarden, all flowers are sooner or later needed as floral decoration.

{2024-09-22} This existential crisis can be answered differently by the two groups that we talked about earlier. “GB” will reckon that even if you die, it won’t matter because you had fun in the first place so you can rest in peace. The actions that you took mattered to you even if you are now gone. However, “GA” might not think the same way. For them, it truly doesn’t matter at all, at least for you, what you experienced in life. If you ever felt joy or sadness it doesn’t matter. Because you cannot experinece that good dream now. You are dead. But this can lead to some other even more dangerous questions, like:

What if the good dream wasn’t worth it in the first place because you are bound to forget it?

I will take the opportunity here to introduce another of my thoughts that is: what defines a reality. The reality feels real for two main reasons: Firstly, it has a logic that we can warp our heads around somewhat and secondly, and much more importantly: continuity. We think that reality is real because even when we wake up from that dream, get away from that fabulous adventure book, it is still there. It hasn’t abandoned you when you moved out to other worlds. I think that this is the only thing that marks what is a reality. But, as everything, it isn’t eternal. And when we die, that continuity fades away, and at that point, was reality ever more different than the plot of a movie? Why are we so invested in it if we know that it will discontinue at some point?

One of the main reasons I think is because we don’t want to pay attention to it. I have talked about this in some physical reflections in my notes that I’ll have to archive digitaly some day but people are not willing to think about their deaths. They do anything in their power to not think about it. This why hobbies exist, why some people are so addicted to work, because if they don’t then they get bored. And boredom leads to questions, and questions need answers and the biggest question of them all is the one proposed by Camus in the Myth of Sisyphus: “Wheter life is or not worth living”.

I reckon that this can be answered in two ways, the same way that we answered whether we only live in the past. There is the TTT(Technically The Truth) and the practical answer, the one that we must live by. If we answer it with the first guidelines then I’d argue that no. All is meaningless, all happiness ethereal, all sense of importance so naked that there is nothing left behind, all adventures, forgotten. But we cannot live like that. After all, if you are reading this you are alive. Take a moment to savor that. Isn’t it sweet? That’s why I’d agree with Camus and all other people alive, that life is absolutely worth living. And even if life is a good dream that we will be forever forgotten at some point, why not live it regardless. What’s the harm?

This is why, in conclusion I consider myself to be a “GA”, however, I do acknowledge that technically, the truth bearears are “GB”s. But we have to act uppon the world from what we can experience, because in a sense that is what really the world is to us and that is what it will be for us forever, so why bother living a life through some guidelines that aren’t even meant for us to be looked at? Answering the initial question, we should focus on creating new memories even if we won’t be able to look back at them. We can’t live just recording preserving and consuming memories, we don’t have enough time for that. Because remember: YOLO!