David’s Journal

THE GAME YOU’RE PLAYING

The year is 2267. This is not for pretend. Consider, for a moment, that I might be telling the truth.

You think you’re in the early 21^st century. Very quaint back then. The early 21^st century was the beginning of the Game Age, when what you call ‘video games’ became the meaning of life. By 2030, games had advanced to the point where you could enter into a perfectly realistic world, via a direct feed to your Consciousness, and live out your entire life in any of the various worlds you chose to participate in. Now, in the 2200’s, we’ve advanced far beyond this. Our entire culture and lives are ‘virtual’.

In the same way that someone from 2006 might have been interested in the Renaissance or Medieval times, you are interested in the early 21^st century. Very exciting time, full of wars and big technological breakthroughs. So you decided to play a game called The Age of Change.

You paid 410 credits to enter the game. You started playing last week. We plugged into your Consciousness, and entered in an entire set of memories so that you ‘remember’ everything that happened prior to last week. But of course, nothing did. It’s all just memory implants.

We also did a character change for you, so that you think you’re another person (you’re actually a 19 year old girl). Then, as you requested, we temporarily wiped out all memories that tell you you’re actually a 19 year old girl in the year 2267. This is a full immersion game. The game will last for two hours, but for you it will seem like 28 years.

Nothing around you is real. The computer you’re reading this on. The clothes you’re wearing. The people you think you know. Even your own body. It’s all just sensory feed from the game The Age of Change. Pretty cool, huh?

You did request that we leave you this one clue as to the true nature of the game. This is it, and you will receive no other. You thought it might be fun if you had a chance to ‘wake up’ in the game — realize you were just playing, so you wouldn’t take it all so seriously. Oh yes – Bianca tells you that she says ‘hi’, and she can’t wait to take you for a ride in her new Tricat Moonjumper, as soon as you unplug. She’s getting lunch with Cassie down at that nice little café next to the space elevator, and she’ll meet you there.

Finally, here’s the message you left for yourself –

How do you know this isn’t true?

.

(Source: kentonwhitman.com)

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It makes you pause and wonder for a moment.  I know this is somewhat Matrix-esque, but believe it or not, it’s not a new idea.  Before The Matrix even came out in theaters, I remember us discussing a possibility like this in our philosophy class.

In some religions, they even teach that “reality is an illusion.”  Well, that’s not entirely a pure translation.  Really they’re saying that “permanence” is an illusion; nothing stays the same.  Everything is moving and changing.  This is life.  This is natural law.

Obviously “reality” is real.  But … in danger of giving us all a headache before our morning coffee, what is reality?  I used to always say that perception is reality.  It doesn’t really matter what’s really “out there,” but what we perceive and believe is out there.  We don’t act on reality.  We act on our perceptions of reality.

And let’s not forget Einstein’s famous quote: “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”

With all this … just pause for a moment … and wonder …

could these be clues, little reminders, that maybe reality isn’t so “fixed” or as “real” as we imagine?

What if we really are inside some big virtual reality game?  What if we’re in some kind of dream?  What if everything only feels and seems real, but really, is some sophisticated illusion?

I do believe that everything we see, hear, touch, smell, taste, and feel is real.  But … could it be “less” real than something else?  Could it actually be a sub-set of a higher, greater reality?  “Less” real isn’t the right word.  Hmm.  Maybe, “limited” real.  It is real.  Just not all real.  Not the complete and whole and total real.

Maybe we’re only aware of a tiny piece, a mere fraction, of what’s really real.

How would we find out?  How could we know?

If there is More, can we even comprehend what’s Beyond?  Can we experience it?  Can we transcend this “viritual” real and expand and live in the higher, broader real?

Could our very concepts, our unquestioned beliefs, about God, heaven, hell, the afterlife, souls, time, space, the universe — everything — could we be like children, assuming we know, when in truth, we barely grasp one tenth of the reality and understanding of it all?

Is there something beyond heaven?

Are there many souls, or really, only One Soul?

Or perhaps both?

What is God?  Where is God?  How is God?

Can “God” even be defined?

Maybe God just is.

We don’t know what we don’t know.

And we don’t know, for sure, if what we do know is entirely correct or comprehensive.

For all we know, we are plugged into The Age of Change.  Maybe I really am a 19 year old girl, and a couple hours from now, I’ll join Bianca for a ride in her new Moonjumper.

What if we’re not really who and what we think believe we are?

This could all simply be an exercise in philosophy and imagination, and nothing more, or it could be a hint and reminder we needed that there really is something more.

The question is: how can we know, or even, can we know?

If it’s true, and there’s something more or different, I’d want to know.

I’d want to know.

But that’s a choice each of us must make for ourselves.

~ David

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