People also report seeing aliens while dreaming, meditating and under the influence of hallucinogens.
So there are aliens, just maybe not in the direction that is popularly assumed.
People also report seeing aliens while dreaming, meditating and under the influence of hallucinogens.
So there are aliens, just maybe not in the direction that is popularly assumed.
There are subjective experiences that people characterize as “aliens”. And the more people talk about aliens, the more exposure there is to the idea of aliens, which leads to more people describing a certain kind of subjective experience as “aliens”.
Subjective experience of something some people characterize as aliens is real (as in: people genuinely have an experience). Does not mean aliens exist in consensus reality.
In your opinion, for it to exist in consensus reality, how much of the population needs to see it?
1%? 10? 80?
I’d say we’d need to be able to consistently capture it in some way other than the human mind:
any type of a recording. From basic audio/photo/video to fancy science gadgets.
Else, it’s just a blip in the brain. A very real blip for those who experience it but again, not consensus reality. Of course if there was some kind of an universalish experience of aliens comparable to an emotional state like love, then we’d probably have to revise.
Ok, so how universalish? Gimme a percentage.
99% or so. Leaving just a tiny bit of room for outliers which always seem to exist.
Is agreeing with the 99% important to you? Do you feel anxious when strange ideas crop up in your mind?
I meant that to have the subjective experience of aliens to be considered to have the same level of reality as emotions, 99% of people would have to experience it.
I know I already experience things that vast majority of people don’t. It doesn’t bother me because there are people who experience things I don’t. Consensus reality is fine for general use but the range of human experience is incredibly diverse.
You seem to bring up consensus as if it bears upon my post and then argue that it doesn’t really bear. Maybe I’m not getting your point.
Just gave my view on the matter with precise language.
I made a distinction between a description of a subjective experience, and a claim about consensus reality.
People experience something and then use the best language available to talk about it. These experiences are viscerally real to the experiencer.
Vast majority of people will reasonably make a claim about consensus reality if they experience something that feels very real. Because vast majority of people don’t know or understand that you CAN have a very visceral subjective experience that only happens in the brain. Or to put it another way: the brain behaves in a way that gives one every reason to think the experience happened in consensus reality.
It doesn’t make them “crazy” or “stupid”. But again, because most people don’t understand the distinction between a subjective experience and consensus reality, it’s easy to be dismissive of people who talk about outlandish experiences.
It would be more rational and kind to meet in the middle: “I believe you had an experience, but I don’t believe it means Aliens exist in consensus reality.”