The Agony of Intelligence

The question why are we here has probably been asked by man countless times in his time line of existence. Despite being an organic aggregation of biochemical components, the breadth of man’s intuition and intelligence defies the paradox of the intricate simplicity in its construction. Our bodies have billions of cells each of which is made up of billions of even smaller structures in the form of amino acids and other building blocks for life. In turn, these are made up of even smaller particles called atoms. No one will ever see an atom with the naked eye and this literal introspection of sorts regarding the stuff that make up every concrete thing can be intellectually overwhelming - assuming of course that a person dares to foray into cerebral realms.

Most people have the penchant for romanticizing things. Not wanting to be in the dark, some would try to explore his world and his universe to study the forces that move it. The information that he gets from these experiments enable him to be more secure in his future. This distracts him from wandering to the unmapped regions of the intellectual landscape and saves him from confronting questions that have no answers. When science falls short, those who can’t take the agony of uncertainty make things up and try to pass it off as the truth. This masquerades in the form of realism wherein one tries to find purpose and meaning through symbols and events in one’s life. Once the symbolism and events crossover and are interpreted in the context of belief systems and esoteric creeds, it stops being real.

This is of course the realm of religion and theology.

As proven by its staying power and across-the-board popularity, it’s fair to say that most people would need some sort of crutch to live through one’s life. Uncertainty just exposes one to an immense amount of anguish, anxiety and depression. Not knowing what lies ahead can turn people into nervous wrecks who would be paranoid and uneasy about everything they experience in life. Their incessant worries and fears are tamed and controlled by their belief. All people are ignorant one way or another because of the things that we will never know for ourselves in our lifetime, but to suppress this, most would choose to surrender this ignorance to something that claims to be genuine, accurate and real. His critical side has little say in this aspect of his life - despite skepticism, the possibility of being left in the dark is more daunting and unacceptable to those already weary of life. This is why that school of thought sells - not everyone can step out and say that there is none.

As a young girl - about six or seven years of age — I would often have a hard time sleeping because of these nagging questions in my head. As I try to bury my face in my pillow to lull me to sleep, I often asked myself not why am I here but how did ‘here’ happen.

You see, the universe is a vast collection of everything that we know and even more things that we have yet to know and a plethora of entities that we will never know. The universe as a confluence happened as an event and as an entity. It is governed by various forces and man-perceived laws that were arbitrarily put into a form that we could understand. The things that we see now is just one permutation and one combination of what the universe could have been. This thought would could also be moot because the possibility of the universe never happening as an event. The universe was literally something that didn’t necessarily need to happen. Life happened.

And yet, it happened. They all happened.

There is greatness in that occurrence but to those who have the intellectual depth to explore this dark and mentally-draining realm. Though one could suggest research and further experiments, human intelligence would only reach to a particular amount that there will always be room for anxiety to breed and propagate. The word choice gets thrown around a lot, but I personally don’t think that I had a choice.

My brain doesn’t come with an off switch. I will explore those deep trenches in my idle time whether or not I consciously choose to do so. Most people would just look at me and dismiss me as someone who is simply odd or disturbed when I wax nonstop about this topic. Unsurprisingly, few will have the intellectual mettle to even grasp what was actually bothering me. Clearly, an overly inquisitive mind can prove to be burden especially when make-believe fairy tales don’t work to pacify the neuronal rancor and chaos that comes secondary to the helpless feeling of knowing what lies ahead.

To combat the helplessness and desperation, man romanticizes his persona into a duality. He constructs the idea of the body and the soul. The flesh is something that is easily corrupted by the elements. It can be mangled, burned and butchered in such a way that it would no longer resemble the original form once the transformational processes are done. The soul of course is the ultimate manifestation of man’s arrogance and denial. Through the soul, man consoles himself that his essence transcends that of his mortal manifestation and has the ability to defy time. Time corrupts flesh. The soul is virtually invincible to the threats that make continued mortal existence precarious.

Despite my atheism, I too struggle with the idea that my consciousness was a mere result of the firing of neurons and the release of neurotransmitters. There is an innate need to rebut the statement. We were conditioned to see ourselves as the best life form there is - at least on earth. Despite this denial of sorts that I am a mere aggregation of flesh and bone, I do not see this as a reason to subscribe to made-up beliefs that other troubled individuals concocted to either put themselves at ease of create a hoax that would eventually win the hearts and minds of millions. The thought of being no greater than your mortal self is saddening, but it is no reason to romanticize and fabricate an overly complicated lie.

And here it stands. I live a life that would likely be plagued by the hyperactive and unstoppable machinations of my brain. I am predisposed to explore those areas of permanent misery. Sometimes, I feel like this type of thinking is quite ironic for the pathetic pile of connective tissue that we are.

Existence was never a choice - yet we did. Having me exist as the person as I am now required the union of two cells that correspond to a one-in-a-billion event. Another combination would’ve yielded a totally different person - and my consciousness and the very essence of who I am would’ve never existed.

And yet I did. It is a statistical probability, but the funny thing is, we only see the anomalies that managed to actually break through the plane of statistical probability and permutation into the realm of actual, palpable and concrete entities. This is quite similar to the universe - it could’ve totally been something else, but this is what we have now. We are left to be alone in a rocky ball hurtling across space wondering for eighty years or so before our entire beings are swallowed up by oblivion.

I apologize if this just sailed over your head, I would be the first one to admit these types of thought experiments are not for everyone. Only those who continue to dare to really think and suspend their fairy tale beliefs could ever tap into the vast chasms and trenches that are often times unexplored.

I also apologize for the limitation of language. Language is but an arbitrary system that was used by man to make sense of the randomness interaction. The words by themselves may not really be an accurate depiction of how puzzled, mesmerized and disturbed I am with this entire phenomenon which I still do not have a name for.

_{Image Credits: [1] Alpha Coders [2] DJ [3] Power to Change [4] Fikriniz Olsun}