If consciousness is part of the physical universe, and if connected consciousness is real, to what extent is individual consciousness, our sense of self, an illusion?

The simple answer is “yes.” The complicated answer is also “yes.”

A recurring theme in human spirituality is the experience of some form of connected consciousness outside the self. Mystics speak of the self as an illusion, and the study of spirituality and consciousness often leads to a conclusion that the self is an illusory construct of the mind.[1] Meditation is said to bring an experience of “pure consciousness” different from the experience of self—an empirical cognitive awareness that need not be religious in nature. Even a committed atheist can experience a connection to pure consciousness within one’s own mind.[2]

Some scientists and philosophers also speak of consciousness as an illusion, nothing more than an incorrect perception of reality or a temporary accident of neuroscience.[3] Others believe that all intangible things that exist only in subjective perceptions are not real in the objective sense. Some argue the opposite view that objective reality is an illusion because humans cannot experience anything other than our own subjective reality.

So who is correct? Is pure consciousness the true underlying reality? Is individual consciousness a temporary accident? Is everything intangible an illusion? Or is the entire vision of objective reality an illusion?

The answer to all these questions is “yes.”

The self is an illusion because it is impermanent

Consciousness exists and is part of the physical world, but it is likely that the self is characteristic of only one phase of physical existence. To the best of our knowledge, we experience the self only while the components of consciousness that comprise our existence are part of a living individual. During our lifetimes we may glimpse pure consciousness, but our primary experience is one of individual consciousness as a distinct component of the all.

That primary experience is temporary. If death does not destroy consciousness, surely it means the loss of self and a return to pure, undifferentiated existence. The illusion ends and we lose ourselves in the lake of matter and energy and connected consciousness from which we came.

The self is an illusion because the macrocosmic universe is an illusion

All of “reality” also is in some sense an illusion. That includes both the objective reality of traditional physical scientists and the subjective perceptual reality in which we humans live.

We commonly perceive the universe as comprised of solid objects and quantifiable forces that cause interactions between objects in space and time. When we look into the sky, we see an enormous collection of stars, planets, and galaxies whirling through the vastness of empty space.

That vision of the macrocosmic universe is an illusion. Objects are not solid in the way that we perceive. They consist of tiny particles of interchangeable matter and energy orbiting other tiny particles at relative distances that are almost unimaginable on the macroscopic scale. An atom is almost entirely empty space in which particles orbit and interact across vast stretches. We perceive objects as solid because the extreme velocity of the tiny particles (in the very small atoms that comprise slightly less small molecules) creates the illusion of solid objects in space.[4]

The tiny particles themselves are not solid in any traditional sense. They may be waves or particles depending on how they are perceived. They may exist in multiple places at once and may have no definite location or velocity until we attempt to observe and measure them.

Atoms with their tiny particles or waves interact in patterns constantly, forming a vast fabric of pulsating energy that is the underlying substance of the microscopic universe. What we perceive as objects may be nothing more than concentrations of energy morphed into knots of matter that can morph back into energy again.

Time may not exist in any ordinary sense for this microcosmic quantum reality that forms the underlying fabric of the universe. There are no definite events; there is no progress of history. All possibilities exist side by side with each assigned an amplitude of something like probability. An entangled universe evolves with waves of interlocking superpositions that make all things possible and nothing definite or real as we know it. There is only a vast field of pulsating energy that forms all things and subverts all things. Nothing is permanent but that one massive field of throbbing energy, constantly changing and therefore possibly never changing.[5]

Objective reality and subjective reality are both part of the same illusion

If the microscopic quantum world reveals objective macroscopic reality as a superficial illusion, subjective reality is nothing more than our human perception of that illusion. The self and all things tangible and intangible may be little more than temporary concentrations of energy in the fabric of the universe, part of a macroscopic illusion that can change in an instant.

So yes, self is an illusion, but perhaps no more than our sun, our galaxy, or the macrocosmic universe itself.

What matters is the significance of the illusion

The interesting question is not whether self and consciousness are illusions, or even whether objective and subjective reality are illusions. The truly interesting question is not whether we live in an illusion, but why. What is the significance of this illusory reality? What does it mean that the universe is a pulsating energy field that inexplicably creates a constant stream of illusory experience? What does it mean that we are here to observe it, or at least that the illusion of observation is created inside this pulsating energy field? Why should we or any of these illusions exist at all?

These are fundamentally abstract questions. They suggest others only slightly less abstract:

• Does time exist in any form for this microcosmic quantum reality? What is time and is it real? Is time part of the illusion?
• Why does the illusion of spacetime exist? Is spacetime real? What causes macrocosmic reality to seem to exist at all?
• Why does the universe generate an illusion of consciousness and self? What purpose does it serve in the mechanics of the universe and the illusion of macrocosmic reality?
• What does it mean that the universe is expanding continually at an increasing velocity? Is some core change happening in the universe at a macro or micro level? Does the universe have a trajectory or is it never-changing and timeless? Is the seeming trajectory of the expanding universe just another illusion?

These abstract questions are precisely big and foolish enough to fit squarely within the theme of this collection of essays. In attempting to address them going forward, I will rely on scientific investigation where accessible to an amateur investigator. But if you are reading this, I hope you have a taste for logical conjecture and even imaginative philosophical speculation, because some foolish questions are not amenable to definitive empirical resolution. We will ask them anyway, of course.

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[1] For a striking comparison, see Dennett (1991), pp. 426-427. “A self, according to my theory, is … an abstraction defined by the myriads of attributions and interpretations (including self-attributions and self-interpretations) that have composed the biography of the living body whose Center of Narrative Gravity it is.”

[2] Harris (2014).

[3] Perhaps even a “controlled hallucination.” Seth (2021).

[4] “These high velocities make the atom appear as a rigid sphere, just as a fast rotating propeller appears as a disc.” Capra (1975), p. 70.

[5] And based on the little we know, even that may be impermanent.