[SlySherZ]

There's a common way people from scientific communities (such as HN) look at the world - there's a "real world" out there, and in order to improve our understanding of things we should approximate (discover the rules that govern) this real world and try to minimize our subjective experiences as much as possible. I fully subscribe to this view, the real world has to be same for everyone, right?

But there's another way to look at things which is prevalent in other circles, and if someday you decide to learn to meditate, I'm confident you'll get it.

How do you know the "real world" exists? Maybe you're a brain inside a jar "in the machine", and all the things you experience are being generated by the machine. In that case, how is an hallucination any different from any other experience you have? It isn't, it's exactly the same, it's just another experience. How you interpret it may be different, if you realize it's an hallucination, but the process itself is the same.

When you look at a tree, you can't just see the tree, you can only see the model that your mind creates of that tree, from the light that reaches your eyes, the sound, maybe touch etc - this is true for everything you experience.

Obviously the first perspective is very useful, it's science. But the second perspective is also very very useful, if you want to know why I can elaborate : )