Many years ago I imagined a scenario that was very much the equivalent of the tree falling in the forest with no one to hear it. But where that riddle questions nature of events gone unobserved by an imaginary plurality of people, this one constrains it to the singular I.
I can jump into the air. But I am not jumping into the air right now. Does my jumping exist now? I am supposed to say “no”.
I can see my mom. But I am not seeing my mom right now. Does my mom exist now? I am supposed to say “yes”.
What is the difference between these two events? Both rely on my coordinated performance to experience and validate something. In the first case my performance is jumping; in the second, seeing. In the first case the something is my jumping, and in the second my mother.
I might say that my jumping is an occurrence while my mother is an independent being. But in my own experience — the only one I know — are they so different? I experience my mother as an event in my thirdself. Her body moves, lips move, and she makes sounds and tries to influence me, then goes away. Isn’t that just another occurrence within my thirdself environment much like my own jumping?
I am supposed to say that the first one is a potentiality, but the second one is an actuality. That it is my own will which creates the jumping, while my mother exists separately from my will, as an independent being. But does she? Why? Right now, I certainly do not need to see my mother unless I choose to manifest her. She is purely a product of my will. I can imagine she has her own will… but that is only in my imagination.
I might be told that I can call my mother to confirm that she exists. But wouldn’t the counterpart to this be that I can also jump to confirm that my jumping exists? They are both potentialities until I myself directly manifest and experience them. And I can do that by taking some action, or set of actions, to experience either jumping or seeing my mother.
I might conclude that my mother exists as an independent agent of change in the world, while my jumping is just a consequence of my will and bodily motion. But, it is my will and bodily motion that will result in my seeing my mother. Without my will and movement, I will not see her. I have to move my head to look at her if she is in the same room. I have to move into that room. And I have to coordinate my movements to find and enter that room.
The truth is that at this moment, both of these are entirely imaginary and I have to coordinate my movements to manifest either. Assuming then that both of these are the same — my jumping and my seeing my mother — what does that imply about the nature of my reality?
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