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The word 'illusion' should be removed from every dictionary. It's one completely unspecific, indeterminate and misleading word and most subjects or patterns of

The word 'illusion' should be removed from every dictionary. It's one completely unspecific, indeterminate and misleading word and most subjects or patterns of discourse in which it appears have the same properties. The title of this post also reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime Just searching for "* is an illusion" returns - consciousness - choice - spacetime - the world - physical reality - certainty - memories It makes me feel disgusted.

RugnirViking 8y ago
The word is used to describe large and unknowable concepts as well as optical tricks? Its possible for a word to have more than one meaning.
fouronnes3 8y ago
illusion - noun, an instance of a wrong or misinterpreted perception of a sensory experience.
- 7373737373 8y ago
  A misinterpretation always requires a context, or direction. Its use implies the existence of a 'true interpretation'. The word illusion doesn't give either, it just signifies that there is one. But then I have to ask, how can a subjective experience be something truly or falsely interpreted?
  - goatlover 8y ago
    There's all sorts of optical illusions. If you're seeing a color that isn't in the image, then your subjective experience is that of an illusion. Perceptual illusions are where the term originates.
n4r9 8y ago
> The title of this post also reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime I don't understand what the title has to do with avoiding forms of "to be"? It contains the word "is".
- 7373737373 8y ago
  "Is" is (heh) one of the forms of "to be" and can signify many different things: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime#Different_functions_of_%22to_be%22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime#Different_functions_of...
lisper 8y ago
"Illusion" is perfectly well defined: it is a perception that does not correspond to any objective reality outside your brain.
- simonh 8y ago
  The problem is, that just punts the issue down to what is considered objective reality. If that's in contention, as in this specific case, then referring to things as illusory can be ambiguous. I happen to disagree with the comment you are responding to, but I do accept that the term illusion is often used ambiguously, especially in relation to notions of objective and subjective reality.
  - lisper 8y ago
    Yes, that's true, but it's not because "illusion" is not well-defined. It is, and claiming that time is an illusion is a perfectly coherent claim. It might be a controversial claim, and its truth might be difficult to resolve. But it's not ill-posed.
  - goatlover 8y ago
    Yeah, but illusion was one of the foundations upon which philosophy got started. People noticed that things were not always as they seemed, and this started a lot of questioning about the nature of things, perception and the mind.
- Falling3 8y ago
  No, that's the definition of a hallucination. Illusions are misinterpretation's of objective reality by the brain (and I agree that's not a well-defined thing).
simonh 8y ago
On it's own in a sentence perhaps yes, but in the context of an in-depth interview in which the author explains exactly what they mean by it I think it's ok. We just need to be aware that many of the words we use can have a variety of meanings, but once that meaning is clear it's useful to be able to continue using the words on their own.
empath75 8y ago
An illusion is simply a state where the model of the world created by the mind differs from the world as it exists. In a pedantic sense, it’s all an illusion, but there are particular illusions where the difference is readily demonstrable — when the magician shows what was hidden in his sleeves, as it were. In some sense, most of science is exposing the method of various tricks our own consciousness plays on us. We want to know, for example, why metal appears to be shiny— when the phenomenon we’re studying ‘shininess’ only exists in our own minds. There’s no innate ‘shiny’ property in nature. Time is one of those things where there is a persistent feeling that it must be illusory (which is to say, something created by our minds), but we’re not quite sure exactly in what way or how to prove it.
vinceguidry 8y ago
Illusion can be tricky to understand, but not impossible. It means that the referent is not the same as the representation. When something isn't an illusion, it means the referent is the same as the representation. We have different words for different kinds of illusion. I can show you an actual, physical chair, or a picture of a chair. The first is not an illusion, while the second is. You watch a real television show on a real television. The television is designed to create visual illusions of real things. But the television is itself real. The show is a dramatic rendering, an illusion, of real-life situations. So there's three elements needed to make illusion. A referent, a representation, and a type. Consciousness is real, but its contents are illusory, thought represents things that are not those things.
- davebryand 8y ago
  An enlightened yogi, Hindi, or Buddhist would say that the physical chair is also an illusion.
  - 7373737373 8y ago
    Why, do you think? Because they reasoned that in the mind, everything can refer to anything else?
    - vinceguidry 8y ago
      Enlightenment is the destruction of the perception that there is a separate watcher apart from the watched. Non-duality. Not-two. Just one. Since illusion requires three elements, the non-dual is just one element, there is no illusion. Any time you step 'outside', like if you look at a chair, you're dwelling in illusion. Mind generated a 'tag' for the thing you're seeing. It's not really a chair, it's a bundle of atoms. But there's no bundle of atoms, that's also a tag generated by mind. The mind itself isn't what you think it is. Everything is an illusion. Tricky to understand until you realize there's no such thing as enlightenment, it's just a religious dogma. Enlightened yogis are no different than the rest of us. One can train the mind to perceive fewer distinctions, this is yogic practice. You can even arrive at a state of mind that you can call enlightenment. But the lie is revealed any time you open your mouth. The state of mind that is being trained is an illusion like everything else. Real yogis understand this and do it anyway. Fake yogis try to fool you into believing that you can truly get rid of everything and 'merely exist'. It's not an illusion at this point, it's a lie.
barking 8y ago
What would magicians do without illusions, mere tricks, that's what. Shame on you.
- 7373737373 8y ago
  The association of the word with mystery in particular doesn't help to bring clarity in discussions with a scientific context. If I said "semiconductors are an illusion", "programming is an illusion" etc. it doesn't contribute any information. It just confuses.
  - goatlover 8y ago
    But if one said magicians use sleight of hand to fool the brains of audience members into the illusion that magic has been performed, then why doesn't that bring clarity? Illusions are perceptual errors the brain creates when misinterpreting data from the senses, often because of some unusual condition in the environment. This idea has been extended to say things like reality could be an illusion (Matrix scenarios), or something we take to be fundamental to reality such as the flow of time could be an illusion, in that our mental experience of it is misleading us into thinking it's fundamental. That we can be fooled by our experience of the world is not controversial. People thought the world was flat and that the moon and sun rose around a still Earth, which was the center of the cosmos. Because that's how it appeared to them.
EGreg 8y ago
The map is not the territory. To say something is an illusion means that something is a map that doesn’t match the territory. But it assumes there IS a territory to map! While often simultaneously denying its existence. That’s the contradiction.
criddell 8y ago
Words aren't used because they are in the dictionary, they are in the dictionary because they are used.

RugnirViking 8y ago

The word is used to describe large and unknowable concepts as well as optical tricks? Its possible for a word to have more than one meaning.

fouronnes3 8y ago

illusion - noun, an instance of a wrong or misinterpreted perception of a sensory experience.

7373737373 8y ago
A misinterpretation always requires a context, or direction. Its use implies the existence of a 'true interpretation'. The word illusion doesn't give either, it just signifies that there is one. But then I have to ask, how can a subjective experience be something truly or falsely interpreted?
- goatlover 8y ago
  There's all sorts of optical illusions. If you're seeing a color that isn't in the image, then your subjective experience is that of an illusion. Perceptual illusions are where the term originates.

n4r9 8y ago

> The title of this post also reminds me of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime I don't understand what the title has to do with avoiding forms of "to be"? It contains the word "is".

7373737373 8y ago
"Is" is (heh) one of the forms of "to be" and can signify many different things: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime#Different_functions_of_%22to_be%22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime#Different_functions_of...

lisper 8y ago

"Illusion" is perfectly well defined: it is a perception that does not correspond to any objective reality outside your brain.

simonh 8y ago
The problem is, that just punts the issue down to what is considered objective reality. If that's in contention, as in this specific case, then referring to things as illusory can be ambiguous. I happen to disagree with the comment you are responding to, but I do accept that the term illusion is often used ambiguously, especially in relation to notions of objective and subjective reality.
- lisper 8y ago
  Yes, that's true, but it's not because "illusion" is not well-defined. It is, and claiming that time is an illusion is a perfectly coherent claim. It might be a controversial claim, and its truth might be difficult to resolve. But it's not ill-posed.
- goatlover 8y ago
  Yeah, but illusion was one of the foundations upon which philosophy got started. People noticed that things were not always as they seemed, and this started a lot of questioning about the nature of things, perception and the mind.
Falling3 8y ago
No, that's the definition of a hallucination. Illusions are misinterpretation's of objective reality by the brain (and I agree that's not a well-defined thing).

simonh 8y ago

On it's own in a sentence perhaps yes, but in the context of an in-depth interview in which the author explains exactly what they mean by it I think it's ok. We just need to be aware that many of the words we use can have a variety of meanings, but once that meaning is clear it's useful to be able to continue using the words on their own.

empath75 8y ago

An illusion is simply a state where the model of the world created by the mind differs from the world as it exists. In a pedantic sense, it’s all an illusion, but there are particular illusions where the difference is readily demonstrable — when the magician shows what was hidden in his sleeves, as it were. In some sense, most of science is exposing the method of various tricks our own consciousness plays on us. We want to know, for example, why metal appears to be shiny— when the phenomenon we’re studying ‘shininess’ only exists in our own minds. There’s no innate ‘shiny’ property in nature. Time is one of those things where there is a persistent feeling that it must be illusory (which is to say, something created by our minds), but we’re not quite sure exactly in what way or how to prove it.

vinceguidry 8y ago

Illusion can be tricky to understand, but not impossible. It means that the referent is not the same as the representation. When something isn't an illusion, it means the referent is the same as the representation. We have different words for different kinds of illusion. I can show you an actual, physical chair, or a picture of a chair. The first is not an illusion, while the second is. You watch a real television show on a real television. The television is designed to create visual illusions of real things. But the television is itself real. The show is a dramatic rendering, an illusion, of real-life situations. So there's three elements needed to make illusion. A referent, a representation, and a type. Consciousness is real, but its contents are illusory, thought represents things that are not those things.

davebryand 8y ago
An enlightened yogi, Hindi, or Buddhist would say that the physical chair is also an illusion.
- 7373737373 8y ago
  Why, do you think? Because they reasoned that in the mind, everything can refer to anything else?
  - vinceguidry 8y ago
    Enlightenment is the destruction of the perception that there is a separate watcher apart from the watched. Non-duality. Not-two. Just one. Since illusion requires three elements, the non-dual is just one element, there is no illusion. Any time you step 'outside', like if you look at a chair, you're dwelling in illusion. Mind generated a 'tag' for the thing you're seeing. It's not really a chair, it's a bundle of atoms. But there's no bundle of atoms, that's also a tag generated by mind. The mind itself isn't what you think it is. Everything is an illusion. Tricky to understand until you realize there's no such thing as enlightenment, it's just a religious dogma. Enlightened yogis are no different than the rest of us. One can train the mind to perceive fewer distinctions, this is yogic practice. You can even arrive at a state of mind that you can call enlightenment. But the lie is revealed any time you open your mouth. The state of mind that is being trained is an illusion like everything else. Real yogis understand this and do it anyway. Fake yogis try to fool you into believing that you can truly get rid of everything and 'merely exist'. It's not an illusion at this point, it's a lie.

barking 8y ago

What would magicians do without illusions, mere tricks, that's what. Shame on you.

7373737373 8y ago
The association of the word with mystery in particular doesn't help to bring clarity in discussions with a scientific context. If I said "semiconductors are an illusion", "programming is an illusion" etc. it doesn't contribute any information. It just confuses.
- goatlover 8y ago
  But if one said magicians use sleight of hand to fool the brains of audience members into the illusion that magic has been performed, then why doesn't that bring clarity? Illusions are perceptual errors the brain creates when misinterpreting data from the senses, often because of some unusual condition in the environment. This idea has been extended to say things like reality could be an illusion (Matrix scenarios), or something we take to be fundamental to reality such as the flow of time could be an illusion, in that our mental experience of it is misleading us into thinking it's fundamental. That we can be fooled by our experience of the world is not controversial. People thought the world was flat and that the moon and sun rose around a still Earth, which was the center of the cosmos. Because that's how it appeared to them.

EGreg 8y ago

The map is not the territory. To say something is an illusion means that something is a map that doesn’t match the territory. But it assumes there IS a territory to map! While often simultaneously denying its existence. That’s the contradiction.

criddell 8y ago

Words aren't used because they are in the dictionary, they are in the dictionary because they are used.