Philosophy: Reality? Perception and Perspective

This was really my first serious reasoning problem that I saw as philosophical and extremely important to understand. At the time of writing this I didn't exactly know what I was finding out or what the arguement was. But after reading several different philosophers I found that I am not the first one to think these things or question them... This is probably one of my favorite subjects in philosophy; which sort of mixes Existentialism and Descartes.

Descartes: "Cogito Ergo Sum" or "I think, therefore I am"
Literally this means that we can never doubt out own existenence or how things seem to us. However, we can doubt own senses (because we could be dreaming) and we can doubt our extended reasoning (because we could be tricked or flawed in a previous step). So all that is certain in life is self existence and perception.

Who am I truly? What makes me, me? How do I know that what I percieve is true? So many questions and no answers... because they can't be answered, only thought about.

Late one night I began thinking about what makes me, me. I certainly know who I am. But that isn't at all the way anyone else sees me. They don't know what I think or how I feel, what I have been through. So who I am to the world must be based on the way others perceive me. Which is strange because that is something I have no control over, even though it defines 'me'.

Here is a quick example of what I mean. Say there are two people that often do random acts of kindness. Things that help those around them; people they may or may not know. The difference is that one guy doesn't think of the affect on his own life, doesn't imagine how this may or may not benefit himself. The second guy always does these acts because of a future benefit to himself. Here is the interesting part. Guy one, is genuine and sincer but to those around him he is no different than the second person. Guy two is self-serving and doesn't really care that he is helping someone else; even though both are doing a good deed only one of these people is a moral person and doing things selflessly. It's interesting that even though guy two is selfish he will probably enjoy a better perception than guy one.

Take this for example. If I fall into depression or anxiety, then there is medication I can take. The medication can change my thought process, my feelings, and even how I see things... this is good for the general sense of well-being, but think about it. Aren't alot of the things that make me who I am changing? So if a drug (alcohol or pot say) or medication can change how I act and feel, then what certainty do I have about who I am. Is who I am and how I think just defined by chemical levels and interactions in my brain?

I also began to realize what this means for accomplishment. If I draw something, write something, or do something, then when is it accomplished. When I do it, or when I show someone? If one accomplishes something and never shares it with anyone that cares, then it never happend. No one will remember. So it's so very important to share experiances and actions with someone that cares to listen. It's both important to share and to listen.

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Have you ever noticed how isolated we are? My 'reality' is not the same as anyones around me. It is like the Self-Isolation of Perception. When I say something, words are symbolic. I gather my past experiances and feelings and encode a message using an understood language, the person I am talking to decodes that message with their own thoughts, feelings and experiances. So when I express something, have I ever been truly understood. An example I use all the time: if I say the word 'blue' I may think of the sky or my bed-sheets and the feeling those images convey, while you may be thinking of the first time you felt ice or sailed in the ocean and the feelings those convey. This example is simplistic, but now imagine a life time of these piling up... there is no way for me to understand what you are saying without first knowing about you and even deeper having experianced everything you have.

Reality is also completely ego-centric. I view life from only my own perspective. It is hard to imagine all the people in the world doing something right now. Every person with their own objective for the day, feelings, problems, achievements. I don't think we are aware of anyone else but ourselves (Some argue we can never be). People forget this and just think of the world of people as characters in a play; a play about ourselves and staring myself. That somehow all existence is me. The truth is that we are all characters in each other's plays, and we need to relize this. "Selfawareness is realizing that you are apart of someone elses dream", Dikstra?

To expand on this. People are not only ego-centric but also self-serving. Caring only about themselves and how things make them feel. This is an extreme example but it shows my point. When someone does something nice for someone else usually they say "It makes me feel good..."? that's not the point. Who cares how it made 'you' feel... if you do something for someone else, you should only care how it makes them feel. If this self serving nature extends to even when people are helping others, that just shows how horrible it must be when they aren't thinking of others; and most of the time they aren't. People do and don't do things for all the wrong reasons. Don't not do something because it is against the law, and don't do something because the Bible says so... do it because you want to, and because you want to be a better person. Sacratise said, "Can you define your morality through external authority?" That pretty much sums it up. And the answer is No.

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How about Perception. How do I know that what I see and preceive is what is truly happening? Maybe something simple like colors. My favorite color is blue, maybe your's is green... who's to say that we don't actually see the same color. Your green being my blue. There's no way to prove it either way. If all my blues and greens got switched I'd probably think someone slipped something into my drink... but to the person that it has always been like that, it would seem completely natural.

What if I am enteracting a certain way, but to everyone else it's different. I often thought that perhaps I am handycapped. What if to everyone else I am in a wheel-chair, can barely speak and they think I am retarded. But to me I see everything normally. To me I am having meaningful conversations with people, however to them I am just mumbling nonsense. Maybe I think that someone is my friend and says nice things to me, when actually they are not and are making fun of me. It's alot to digest, but it's important to think about nonetheless.