How humans create reality through language and beliefs

So humans are particularly distinctive,

right? We have these giant brains that

develop mostly after we're born that

allows us to do some stuff that I think

is not seen in other animals. And one of

those is this incredible human capacity

for belief. That is this ability for

humans to take our experiences, our

imaginations and put them together into

ideas or ideologies or perceptions and

commit to them so fully that it becomes

our reality.

One of the problems that's beset

philosophers and cognitive scientists

for the last 30 40 years is how on earth

the brain represents information. An

eternally appealing idea is something

like a language of thought. The brain

writes sentences and medalleys that

store the beliefs. We have a big library

of sentences. Those are our beliefs. A

belief has got to be secured to a lot of

other beliefs. You can't have an

isolated belief. They don't parcel

themselves out the way sentences do.

They come in systems. This is sometimes

called holism. A particulate

non-holistic theory of belief is a

non-starter.

I think chatter is one of the big

problems we face as a species.

We spend between 1/3 and 1/2 of our

waking hours not living in the present.

And what do we do during that time?

We're talking to ourselves. Our inner

voice is part of what we call our verbal

working memory system. It's a basic

feature of the human mind that helps us

keep verbal information active in our

heads. But at other times, it can really

sink us. We can compensate for this

feeling out of control by creating order

around us. Rituals are one way to do

that. That's giving you a sense of order

and control that can feel really good

when you're mired in chatter.

You know, one might wonder when thinking

about human evolution, why are humans so

complicated? So, it turns out that

unlike almost all other mammals, our

brain when we're born, it's only about

40% of its adult size. This really long

childhood means that our brains are

always in this dynamic with other

humans, with other animals and the

environment. Those inputs shape who we

are and how we see the world. We are so

complex that things like culture and

history and belief systems. They enable

us to create cultural complexity,

ideologies, traditions and rituals and

make them real for us. That environment

becomes part of who we are.