Difficult to evaluate, with potential yellow flags.
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On Understanding Reality
-The Question: What Am I?
"Exist," I said. "Just exist." Why are you struggling in place, failing to simply exist? The waves crash against your face, yet you refuse to accept reality. You cannot exist in the present, so the waves capsize you. As you grew, you forgot how to glide with them. Tell me, what have you achieved in this state? Isn't it truly boring to kill time without grasping who you are or your own selfishness? This is neither advice nor condescension—I’d call it growth, so I won't even explain it. Think of every second like a film, or refusing to sacrifice today's happiness for some future "what ifs." It’s not just carpe diem; it’s about acceptance. A light melancholy, perhaps, remembering the past while acknowledging the reality of the future. We are wood floating on a river. It offers choices, drifting left or right, but you act as if you were the one who decided the wood’s existence in the first place.
Fine, you said. The past is out of my control, and I don't care about the future. So, what do we do? What would you do? If you were an ant on a piece of wood drifting down that river, what would you do? Is despair good? No. But it is possible to avoid despair even without hope. Everything comes with time. Some events act as catalysts, accelerating your growth, but it is time that truly grows you. It is the only concept that cannot be contemplated in the river analogy—the one that allows everything else to grow. I have no explanation for what time is, of course. Yet, concepts do not owe us meaning. If an ant asks the river why it flows, it receives no answer. Even if it did, it should not change the river's flow. But it does, doesn't it? It’s funny. A concept with no explanation that initiates every system. Let’s not get too hung up on time; it takes up too much of our time. This is what those few Sapiens who left Africa created—something our species collectively created with its time. When I said "exist" at the beginning, this is what I meant. We are merely individuals existing within that collective. Let’s just exist; none of our ancestors did anything else, don't worry. They were born, they reproduced, and they died, just as we will. Avoiding aimlessness must become the goal, so that an enlightened, self-aware creature can build a life based on a fabric of living. Otherwise, it just thinks about the river.
Life is not a problem to be solved; time is not something to be planned with calendars and agendas; death is not a concept to be pondered every moment. I once concluded a piece by saying we must not miss life while dancing with death. Now, I say: life is not something you can escape, and death is not something you can dance with. Humans owe nothing to the life they are born into or the time they possess to live it. As I said, concepts have no goals. Just exist. That is enough. Never think about how; you already are.
Is this, what I feel and try to explain, a Nietzschean perspective that hasn't lost hope, or a form of hedonism that isn't just chasing pleasure? I believe it is neither—it isn't even in between. If you are seeking a classification, it means the need for pattern-recognition—which our brain has used for simplicity since the hunter-gatherer days—has kicked in. This way of thinking has surely been incredibly useful to us, but now, especially in these matters, it should be pushed into the background. Because I am only trying to synthesize what I feel, what I have learned, and what I have experienced. I will not categorize or classify them just to make them more didactic and universal for others. So, please, even if not in life, at least while reading this text, ignore those urges. I, you, we all spend our lives within that mechanism. Let’s not use the same system to feel that mechanism. Although our brain plays a huge role as a result of the collective heritage of our lives I mentioned earlier, we are still talking about 200,000-year-old technology. We can see how outdated it is, especially today. So, do not misunderstand this piece.
As is understood so far, this is a text that carries in its background both the honesty of humanity as a species and the individual's honesty toward themselves. But where are we going from here? This is no longer even that brutal, hard truth. It is just good, old-fashioned honesty. Being honest about the heritage of our past that controls our nature. Being honest while smoking a cigarette while shivering in the light wind after getting out of bed. As for me—the subject should have come to this eventually—am I asking questions without looking for answers just to keep my brain busy? Am I, too, drifting in time, just to exist? I know very well what I want to do with my time; don't worry about that. But I do not know the "why" or the "how." There are things you know, and things you cannot know. People love to find an answer for one of these two. I just choose to exist—not because it’s the only thing I know or the only thing that feels real. I simply realized that even finding answers is just a matter of following the questions I created myself, those initial urges. Curiosity, enlightenment, aimlessness, numbness, indifference, and finally, this. I am drifting in the river just like everyone else; it is not resignation. To be honest, I am just trying not to be bored with minimal effort. It is not good, it is not bad; life just is.
-Making Peace with Your İnner Monke
What do you see in my gaze? In the many words you have read? Sincerity, or perhaps maturity and composure? You might see selfishness or arrogance. It does not matter at all to me. Because this question is not actually for me. Any answer you provide will have already revealed you to me, not the other way around. But even that is unimportant because I have no need for you to be explained to me. I stated all these arguments to reach a single point. You do not see your own gaze. Do not explain yourself to me—not until I explain to you why you cannot understand yourself.
We romanticize the act of romanticizing if we were raised on sold-out dreams: home, car, love. We all want to be rockstars—to be seen, to be heard, to be famous. Do not misunderstand me; this is not a critique of capitalism. This is merely the reflection of Homo sapiens' social structure and behavioral psychological movements onto the present day. So, what does it mean to romanticize? For instance, the desire of men to die while protecting something they value with a group of close friends, or girls creating themselves and their partners in The Sims. While fantasies and alternative history romances may appear at first glance as an escape from reality, they are actually just games played on us by our brain—our 200,000-year-old technology. The human brain already possesses plenty of mechanisms to escape reality, within our subconscious or our dreams. But if you and ten friends form a group, create a social hierarchical order among yourselves, and set a goal, you are actually just performing the morning activity of those Sapiens who went out to hunt. What was once the social engineering of past survival has transformed into a D&D party or Roman soldiers scaling the walls of Nova Carthage. This is why the state of romanticizing even the act of romanticizing makes us feel comfortable in this aimless place. 100 billion humans and as many ideas. All built upon a primal behavior of hunting in the morning. Therefore, when you judge, accuse, or form concepts of good and evil in your own mind, please pay attention to this. This is a topic that is rarely pointed at, perhaps very rarely noticed, but it is one of the major problems of our day: Unawareness.
My aim here is not to convince anyone, to write some manifesto, or to declare "these are my thoughts." Yes, it would be logical for you to look at it from that perspective, but my thoughts and ideas are only concepts when they are not written down; they are the things that make me "me" in conversations with others, just like we all are. But writing does not just make them systematic or orderly; besides, that is not the goal anyway. Writing only ensures that the winner of the internal struggle is clearly determined. My ideas are already in a constant state of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis in my mind. When I write, it is as if the thoughts of whoever won that moment's debate are being recorded.
I am not looking for clarity in my loneliness or comfort in my writing. As I said, I just like to see who won the argument at that moment. If you also add the dates, you can see a timeline—a piece of advice for those who do not know themselves. But there is a primary purpose: to see which ideas remained dogmatic, which ones were transformed the least, and which ones vanished. Which antithesis defeated these thoughts? Also, when discussing with others, you can directly counter with the antithesis of a thesis you held in the past, accelerating your synthesis.
-Maps Are Just Madeup Lines
It is no coincidence that philosophy emerged in Ancient Greece rather than Ethiopia. You cannot inquire into existence without first meeting the basic needs required to survive. Asking "Why am I here?" while slaves feed you grapes overlooking the Aegean Sea is not the same as asking it while half-naked, hunting a lion with a spear. Yes, we know these things. Philosophy, after all, is not meant to provide us with an ideology catalog or a Hollywood tabloid to pick your favorite philosopher from. Philosophy offers the opportunity to create a system of thought. In this regard, I won't even cite direct examples like Descartes, Kant, or Hegel, because everyone is responsible for their own system. Once you grasp this, another question will come to mind: Why are we different? Why do we think differently? After all, I previously mentioned that most human behavior can be explained by the fact that we are 200,000-year-old social animals. Here, psychology should interest you. Because even though psychology or neuropsychiatry show us that we all come from the same instincts, behavioral patterns, and brain structures, these identical beings can exhibit differences in behavior due to the events they experience. I won't get into the nature vs. nurture debate here, because there are entangled effects between them that even influence one another.
So, fine. Philosophy, psychology, and your own way of thinking—where does this lead? As I always say, it follows the path I have traveled: curiosity, enlightenment, aimlessness, numbness, and where I am now. Your journey might be similar or vastly different. In the end, I do not look at where I have reached as the beginning or the end of a path. The very concept of a "path" seems absurd, given that we are drifting in the river. I do not know how logical it would be to give forward-looking advice. Let me just say this before ending: all ideologies, ideas, concepts, and romanticizations were not created for the purpose of societal control. They have always existed within humans, and humans have used them to control others—which is, in itself, a part of human nature. So, if you believe in something, remember that the person across from you—no matter how contradictory they may seem—is also just a synthesized result of their instincts, hormones, brain structure, archaic behaviors, ideas, character, lived experiences, and moral ethics. A human is just an animal on this planet of soil. An animal capable of understanding that the reflection in the mirror is us. But an animal that spends its whole life running from that reflection.
But finding answers to some questions in your head does not mean you can never be amazed again. The importance of our sense of wonder is obvious. Of course, I have moments of astonishment. For instance, when I read an old notebook of mine, I see the way I arrived at an argument—much like an archaeologist—and I don't just say, "Wow, that's weird" or "How much I have progressed." I am amused and amazed when I see those ideas transforming into other ideas in the void, thanks to time. This thought structure of mine occasionally surprises me, even though it is the most natural thing we possess.
-Being at Peace with Being Persuaded
When I discuss such things with someone, I can personalize my arguments according to the individual and build them to dismantle their dogmas. But when I tell them, "Come on, your mind is open now, let’s think," they ask for a new dogma to replace the one I tore down. I do not wish to instill my own ideas in people, and because I hesitate to do so, I leave them to nature and to their own new dogmas. Of course, you could view my offer of freedom—this way of thinking that constantly renews itself, that reflects by disproving its own theses within its own mind to prepare new ones—as yet another dogma. But for most people, what we call dogma, what we call a "comfort zone," is "a framework that carries me, that does not tire me, and that does not leave me alone." My offer is, "Let’s build the framework together. Or better yet, maybe there shouldn't be a fixed framework at all." This is not an offer of freedom. It is, in fact, carrying the burden we left at the door back inside by escaping into our comfort zone. Yes, uncertainty is a threat. Yes, a threat breeds defense, but for us humans, that defense is merely labeling, categorizing. I know that the human thought structure is based on such patterns, but this is not freedom. Calling something "dogma" does not necessarily mean it is "wrong." It is the sum of ideas people have extracted from the events they have lived through over time. But a dogma is an unquestionable starting point. It is like leaning your back against a mosque while asking for directions. Freedom cannot be a starting point; it can only be a continuous state. Do not hear "I thought freely, so you must do the same" in my words. Hear, "If you want, we can try to think together." The funny part is that we all have our own internal paradoxes; mine is the dogmatism of freeing people from dogmas.
Ultimately, we return to this: what is mere survival when there is living? To realize that one has never truly lived on one's deathbed... At the end of the day, mere survival does not feel honest to me.
-Not Returning to Our Nature, But Understanding the Causes
Fire. Let’s play a game; let’s establish a correlation between the brain, the concept of family, and human behavior. I want it to sound neither overly didactic nor fabricated because, in fact, what I want to explain is how subjective the things that seem like the most objective truths really are. Fire. The gestation period of Homo sapiens was 12 months. And like all other mammals, 12 months spent in the womb is sufficient time for maturation. Most mammals burst from the womb ready to run; their five senses, lungs, and vital organs are at a certain level of development. Fire. So, what happened? Normally, like all our other peers, we were eating meat—protein—raw. But our Homo sapiens ancestors, who discovered that using fire on food improved both the quality of its nutrients and its taste, found themselves flipping the first domino of our species. Fire is cooked meat. Cooked meat is better protein. Better protein means a healthier body, a smaller jaw, and a larger brain. Indeed, our brains grew, and because the skulls of infants had not yet hardened, the thickness of our skulls decreased; because we chewed less raw vegetation, our jaws shrank, and our overall brain volume increased. But this situation was not good in every sense, of course. It made the already difficult process of childbirth almost impossible for both mother and infant. But Homo sapiens had two solutions for this: women with wider hips and premature birth. Even today, premature birth can be fatal; the infant is born before it is developed. Back then, dropping from 12 months to 9 months was a necessity because the infants' heads were truly massive. Of course, this created another problem: 3 months in the womb is equivalent to 10 years of growth outside. And the loss of those 3 months brought Homo sapiens offspring into the world as a burden, unable to run or escape predators, their five senses underdeveloped. But this also led to a different situation: families. As child care became so critical, grandmothers, grandfathers, and other family members began to look after the children together, and the foundations of our human culture were laid.
However, "fire" would be the wrong answer to the question, "What makes a human human?"—even though its impact was astronomical. Because we have something greater than that. Wolves can teach their young how to hunt. At a young age, by watching first and then participating in hunting parties. But a mother wolf, who has suffered cruelty from humans throughout her life, cannot explain to her cub that it should fear humans. The cub must be beaten in the same way to learn. Living things cannot pass knowledge from generation to generation. Each generation learns to hunt from scratch. But we humans do not re-prove Pythagoras every generation. Each generation builds upon the previous one, developing our species' collective body of knowledge. We teach each generation the knowledge we have accumulated up to that point so that they can add even more to it. Is it writing, then, that is the answer to this question? Or is it school that makes a human human? Let’s not think so sharply. Let me explain the thing that makes us human and allows us to achieve this thing we call civilization, which other creatures have failed to do, with a single example: A caveman is cold. He enters a cave with a spear in one hand and a torch in the other. Inside, he sees paintings of animals. In one of the paintings, it is depicted how an animal is hunted. A spear driven into the animal's back does not bring it down, but a single spear taken in the belly kills it. This event is the first spark of civilization, because this man, who has never seen that animal before, is now aware of how to kill it, and this does not exist in any other creature. DNA is normally the only way to transfer information from generation to generation for every living thing. We, however, simply found another way.
Today, humans have managed to create so much free time for themselves through technology that we no longer know what to do with it. And when we spend that free time without producing anything—unfortunately, due to our brain chemistry—we become unhappy. That is why we spend our entire day with dozens of different activities to which we are addicted for dopamine. If we were to spend a week discussing these things while watching a fire in a small, quiet forest, then go for a run in the morning, eat our food and sleep when we returned, and then wake up toward evening to discuss such ideas accompanied by music, we would realize how much happier we could be.
-Not Poisoning Myself
I mentioned why I like looking at my old ideas, much like an archaeologist. It isn't to judge whether I was right or wrong with nostalgia, as that carries no meaning. It is to see that the foundation I built remains the same while the buildings upon it change, proving that my thought structure is functioning healthily. The phase of numbness in my early writings is now merely a symptom, not the philosophy itself. My mind is no longer my prison, either. I have also shed that tone of "I can see this, you cannot."
As for the issue of not contradicting myself, most people either abandon their old ideas entirely or sanctify them. I, however, change my arguments while preserving the underlying axioms (well, there’s no other term for it). What makes this difficult to achieve is our ego. We cannot easily let go of our old ideas without hating them or turning them into martyrs.
For an archaeologist, the "old" is not more "true," and the "new" is not "better." They simply examine layer by layer and ask how this was possible. Without Morin, the Aegean of today would not exist. This is not a contradiction; it is simply continuing. I am no longer just writing down my ideas. I am tracing, without fighting myself. My own track of thought.
But let’s get to the dangerous part: sometimes I cannot be sure of the future of this tracking. I am human, too; I remember my nature. I will put myself into a state of thesis-antithesis-synthesis so many times that it will become almost impossible for anyone to win an argument against me. Because I will have already thought of every antithesis thrown my way. Combined with persuasive ability, it is very easy for this to poison me.
The issue here really comes down to what I want to do with this situation, and I am not succumbing to my ego. I am not saying everyone is dumber than me or that I am right because I thought about it a lot. At least, I am not saying that yet. I am currently developing a mental immune system against this poisoning.
But we are approaching a critical point. This immunity must absolutely not backfire. There are two paths before me. I could become a god complex who says, "No argument can be won against me," if I succumb to my human emotions. In that case, the people around me will not want to think with me; they will just go silent. I would be right and lonely; I would not produce ideas; I would protect a single idea. I would harm the people I value. The second path is one where I guide people, where I open space. That requires more will—to stand against your ego—but I must be able to achieve it. Otherwise, these thoughts I created will poison me. Tracking will turn into hunting. If I succeed in this second path, people will want to produce counter-arguments against me. My power of persuasion will turn not into pressure but into a natural pull, and I will discuss not to "defeat" people, but to expand my foundation.
This path makes me not only strong but puts me in a central position.
When I said at the beginning, "I don't know what to do with all of this," I actually had an answer. At least for now; I am thinking of the people I value in this regard, but I am not closed to valuing new people. Humans need humans.
If one day I become drunk on power with thoughts like, "I know what they will say before they finish their sentence," that is the moment I must stop, because that is no longer tracking—it is hunting. That shrinks me.
Truly strong minds do not seek to win the argument; they question its form and structure. Continuing to track.
Written in Turkish originally by me translated by AI
On Understanding Reality
-The Question: What Am I?
"Exist," I said. "Just exist." Why are you struggling in place, failing to simply exist? The waves crash against your face, yet you refuse to accept reality. You cannot exist in the present, so the waves capsize you. As you grew, you forgot how to glide with them. Tell me, what have you achieved in this state? Isn't it truly boring to kill time without grasping who you are or your own selfishness? This is neither advice nor condescension—I’d call it growth, so I won't even explain it. Think of every second like a film, or refusing to sacrifice today's happiness for some future "what ifs." It’s not just carpe diem; it’s about acceptance. A light melancholy, perhaps, remembering the past while acknowledging the reality of the future. We are wood floating on a river. It offers choices, drifting left or right, but you act as if you were the one who decided the wood’s existence in the first place.
Fine, you said. The past is out of my control, and I don't care about the future. So, what do we do? What would you do? If you were an ant on a piece of wood drifting down that river, what would you do? Is despair good? No. But it is possible to avoid despair even without hope. Everything comes with time. Some events act as catalysts, accelerating your growth, but it is time that truly grows you. It is the only concept that cannot be contemplated in the river analogy—the one that allows everything else to grow. I have no explanation for what time is, of course. Yet, concepts do not owe us meaning. If an ant asks the river why it flows, it receives no answer. Even if it did, it should not change the river's flow. But it does, doesn't it? It’s funny. A concept with no explanation that initiates every system. Let’s not get too hung up on time; it takes up too much of our time. This is what those few Sapiens who left Africa created—something our species collectively created with its time. When I said "exist" at the beginning, this is what I meant. We are merely individuals existing within that collective. Let’s just exist; none of our ancestors did anything else, don't worry. They were born, they reproduced, and they died, just as we will. Avoiding aimlessness must become the goal, so that an enlightened, self-aware creature can build a life based on a fabric of living. Otherwise, it just thinks about the river.
Life is not a problem to be solved; time is not something to be planned with calendars and agendas; death is not a concept to be pondered every moment. I once concluded a piece by saying we must not miss life while dancing with death. Now, I say: life is not something you can escape, and death is not something you can dance with. Humans owe nothing to the life they are born into or the time they possess to live it. As I said, concepts have no goals. Just exist. That is enough. Never think about how; you already are.
Is this, what I feel and try to explain, a Nietzschean perspective that hasn't lost hope, or a form of hedonism that isn't just chasing pleasure? I believe it is neither—it isn't even in between. If you are seeking a classification, it means the need for pattern-recognition—which our brain has used for simplicity since the hunter-gatherer days—has kicked in. This way of thinking has surely been incredibly useful to us, but now, especially in these matters, it should be pushed into the background. Because I am only trying to synthesize what I feel, what I have learned, and what I have experienced. I will not categorize or classify them just to make them more didactic and universal for others. So, please, even if not in life, at least while reading this text, ignore those urges. I, you, we all spend our lives within that mechanism. Let’s not use the same system to feel that mechanism. Although our brain plays a huge role as a result of the collective heritage of our lives I mentioned earlier, we are still talking about 200,000-year-old technology. We can see how outdated it is, especially today. So, do not misunderstand this piece.
As is understood so far, this is a text that carries in its background both the honesty of humanity as a species and the individual's honesty toward themselves. But where are we going from here? This is no longer even that brutal, hard truth. It is just good, old-fashioned honesty. Being honest about the heritage of our past that controls our nature. Being honest while smoking a cigarette while shivering in the light wind after getting out of bed. As for me—the subject should have come to this eventually—am I asking questions without looking for answers just to keep my brain busy? Am I, too, drifting in time, just to exist? I know very well what I want to do with my time; don't worry about that. But I do not know the "why" or the "how." There are things you know, and things you cannot know. People love to find an answer for one of these two. I just choose to exist—not because it’s the only thing I know or the only thing that feels real. I simply realized that even finding answers is just a matter of following the questions I created myself, those initial urges. Curiosity, enlightenment, aimlessness, numbness, indifference, and finally, this. I am drifting in the river just like everyone else; it is not resignation. To be honest, I am just trying not to be bored with minimal effort. It is not good, it is not bad; life just is.
-Making Peace with Your İnner Monke
What do you see in my gaze? In the many words you have read? Sincerity, or perhaps maturity and composure? You might see selfishness or arrogance. It does not matter at all to me. Because this question is not actually for me. Any answer you provide will have already revealed you to me, not the other way around. But even that is unimportant because I have no need for you to be explained to me. I stated all these arguments to reach a single point. You do not see your own gaze. Do not explain yourself to me—not until I explain to you why you cannot understand yourself.
We romanticize the act of romanticizing if we were raised on sold-out dreams: home, car, love. We all want to be rockstars—to be seen, to be heard, to be famous. Do not misunderstand me; this is not a critique of capitalism. This is merely the reflection of Homo sapiens' social structure and behavioral psychological movements onto the present day. So, what does it mean to romanticize? For instance, the desire of men to die while protecting something they value with a group of close friends, or girls creating themselves and their partners in The Sims. While fantasies and alternative history romances may appear at first glance as an escape from reality, they are actually just games played on us by our brain—our 200,000-year-old technology. The human brain already possesses plenty of mechanisms to escape reality, within our subconscious or our dreams. But if you and ten friends form a group, create a social hierarchical order among yourselves, and set a goal, you are actually just performing the morning activity of those Sapiens who went out to hunt. What was once the social engineering of past survival has transformed into a D&D party or Roman soldiers scaling the walls of Nova Carthage. This is why the state of romanticizing even the act of romanticizing makes us feel comfortable in this aimless place. 100 billion humans and as many ideas. All built upon a primal behavior of hunting in the morning. Therefore, when you judge, accuse, or form concepts of good and evil in your own mind, please pay attention to this. This is a topic that is rarely pointed at, perhaps very rarely noticed, but it is one of the major problems of our day: Unawareness.
My aim here is not to convince anyone, to write some manifesto, or to declare "these are my thoughts." Yes, it would be logical for you to look at it from that perspective, but my thoughts and ideas are only concepts when they are not written down; they are the things that make me "me" in conversations with others, just like we all are. But writing does not just make them systematic or orderly; besides, that is not the goal anyway. Writing only ensures that the winner of the internal struggle is clearly determined. My ideas are already in a constant state of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis in my mind. When I write, it is as if the thoughts of whoever won that moment's debate are being recorded.
I am not looking for clarity in my loneliness or comfort in my writing. As I said, I just like to see who won the argument at that moment. If you also add the dates, you can see a timeline—a piece of advice for those who do not know themselves. But there is a primary purpose: to see which ideas remained dogmatic, which ones were transformed the least, and which ones vanished. Which antithesis defeated these thoughts? Also, when discussing with others, you can directly counter with the antithesis of a thesis you held in the past, accelerating your synthesis.
-Maps Are Just Madeup Lines
It is no coincidence that philosophy emerged in Ancient Greece rather than Ethiopia. You cannot inquire into existence without first meeting the basic needs required to survive. Asking "Why am I here?" while slaves feed you grapes overlooking the Aegean Sea is not the same as asking it while half-naked, hunting a lion with a spear. Yes, we know these things. Philosophy, after all, is not meant to provide us with an ideology catalog or a Hollywood tabloid to pick your favorite philosopher from. Philosophy offers the opportunity to create a system of thought. In this regard, I won't even cite direct examples like Descartes, Kant, or Hegel, because everyone is responsible for their own system. Once you grasp this, another question will come to mind: Why are we different? Why do we think differently? After all, I previously mentioned that most human behavior can be explained by the fact that we are 200,000-year-old social animals. Here, psychology should interest you. Because even though psychology or neuropsychiatry show us that we all come from the same instincts, behavioral patterns, and brain structures, these identical beings can exhibit differences in behavior due to the events they experience. I won't get into the nature vs. nurture debate here, because there are entangled effects between them that even influence one another.
So, fine. Philosophy, psychology, and your own way of thinking—where does this lead? As I always say, it follows the path I have traveled: curiosity, enlightenment, aimlessness, numbness, and where I am now. Your journey might be similar or vastly different. In the end, I do not look at where I have reached as the beginning or the end of a path. The very concept of a "path" seems absurd, given that we are drifting in the river. I do not know how logical it would be to give forward-looking advice. Let me just say this before ending: all ideologies, ideas, concepts, and romanticizations were not created for the purpose of societal control. They have always existed within humans, and humans have used them to control others—which is, in itself, a part of human nature. So, if you believe in something, remember that the person across from you—no matter how contradictory they may seem—is also just a synthesized result of their instincts, hormones, brain structure, archaic behaviors, ideas, character, lived experiences, and moral ethics. A human is just an animal on this planet of soil. An animal capable of understanding that the reflection in the mirror is us. But an animal that spends its whole life running from that reflection.
But finding answers to some questions in your head does not mean you can never be amazed again. The importance of our sense of wonder is obvious. Of course, I have moments of astonishment. For instance, when I read an old notebook of mine, I see the way I arrived at an argument—much like an archaeologist—and I don't just say, "Wow, that's weird" or "How much I have progressed." I am amused and amazed when I see those ideas transforming into other ideas in the void, thanks to time. This thought structure of mine occasionally surprises me, even though it is the most natural thing we possess.
-Being at Peace with Being Persuaded
When I discuss such things with someone, I can personalize my arguments according to the individual and build them to dismantle their dogmas. But when I tell them, "Come on, your mind is open now, let’s think," they ask for a new dogma to replace the one I tore down. I do not wish to instill my own ideas in people, and because I hesitate to do so, I leave them to nature and to their own new dogmas. Of course, you could view my offer of freedom—this way of thinking that constantly renews itself, that reflects by disproving its own theses within its own mind to prepare new ones—as yet another dogma. But for most people, what we call dogma, what we call a "comfort zone," is "a framework that carries me, that does not tire me, and that does not leave me alone." My offer is, "Let’s build the framework together. Or better yet, maybe there shouldn't be a fixed framework at all." This is not an offer of freedom. It is, in fact, carrying the burden we left at the door back inside by escaping into our comfort zone. Yes, uncertainty is a threat. Yes, a threat breeds defense, but for us humans, that defense is merely labeling, categorizing. I know that the human thought structure is based on such patterns, but this is not freedom. Calling something "dogma" does not necessarily mean it is "wrong." It is the sum of ideas people have extracted from the events they have lived through over time. But a dogma is an unquestionable starting point. It is like leaning your back against a mosque while asking for directions. Freedom cannot be a starting point; it can only be a continuous state. Do not hear "I thought freely, so you must do the same" in my words. Hear, "If you want, we can try to think together." The funny part is that we all have our own internal paradoxes; mine is the dogmatism of freeing people from dogmas.
Ultimately, we return to this: what is mere survival when there is living? To realize that one has never truly lived on one's deathbed... At the end of the day, mere survival does not feel honest to me.
-Not Returning to Our Nature, But Understanding the Causes
Fire. Let’s play a game; let’s establish a correlation between the brain, the concept of family, and human behavior. I want it to sound neither overly didactic nor fabricated because, in fact, what I want to explain is how subjective the things that seem like the most objective truths really are. Fire. The gestation period of Homo sapiens was 12 months. And like all other mammals, 12 months spent in the womb is sufficient time for maturation. Most mammals burst from the womb ready to run; their five senses, lungs, and vital organs are at a certain level of development. Fire. So, what happened? Normally, like all our other peers, we were eating meat—protein—raw. But our Homo sapiens ancestors, who discovered that using fire on food improved both the quality of its nutrients and its taste, found themselves flipping the first domino of our species. Fire is cooked meat. Cooked meat is better protein. Better protein means a healthier body, a smaller jaw, and a larger brain. Indeed, our brains grew, and because the skulls of infants had not yet hardened, the thickness of our skulls decreased; because we chewed less raw vegetation, our jaws shrank, and our overall brain volume increased. But this situation was not good in every sense, of course. It made the already difficult process of childbirth almost impossible for both mother and infant. But Homo sapiens had two solutions for this: women with wider hips and premature birth. Even today, premature birth can be fatal; the infant is born before it is developed. Back then, dropping from 12 months to 9 months was a necessity because the infants' heads were truly massive. Of course, this created another problem: 3 months in the womb is equivalent to 10 years of growth outside. And the loss of those 3 months brought Homo sapiens offspring into the world as a burden, unable to run or escape predators, their five senses underdeveloped. But this also led to a different situation: families. As child care became so critical, grandmothers, grandfathers, and other family members began to look after the children together, and the foundations of our human culture were laid.
However, "fire" would be the wrong answer to the question, "What makes a human human?"—even though its impact was astronomical. Because we have something greater than that. Wolves can teach their young how to hunt. At a young age, by watching first and then participating in hunting parties. But a mother wolf, who has suffered cruelty from humans throughout her life, cannot explain to her cub that it should fear humans. The cub must be beaten in the same way to learn. Living things cannot pass knowledge from generation to generation. Each generation learns to hunt from scratch. But we humans do not re-prove Pythagoras every generation. Each generation builds upon the previous one, developing our species' collective body of knowledge. We teach each generation the knowledge we have accumulated up to that point so that they can add even more to it. Is it writing, then, that is the answer to this question? Or is it school that makes a human human? Let’s not think so sharply. Let me explain the thing that makes us human and allows us to achieve this thing we call civilization, which other creatures have failed to do, with a single example: A caveman is cold. He enters a cave with a spear in one hand and a torch in the other. Inside, he sees paintings of animals. In one of the paintings, it is depicted how an animal is hunted. A spear driven into the animal's back does not bring it down, but a single spear taken in the belly kills it. This event is the first spark of civilization, because this man, who has never seen that animal before, is now aware of how to kill it, and this does not exist in any other creature. DNA is normally the only way to transfer information from generation to generation for every living thing. We, however, simply found another way.
Today, humans have managed to create so much free time for themselves through technology that we no longer know what to do with it. And when we spend that free time without producing anything—unfortunately, due to our brain chemistry—we become unhappy. That is why we spend our entire day with dozens of different activities to which we are addicted for dopamine. If we were to spend a week discussing these things while watching a fire in a small, quiet forest, then go for a run in the morning, eat our food and sleep when we returned, and then wake up toward evening to discuss such ideas accompanied by music, we would realize how much happier we could be.
-Not Poisoning Myself
I mentioned why I like looking at my old ideas, much like an archaeologist. It isn't to judge whether I was right or wrong with nostalgia, as that carries no meaning. It is to see that the foundation I built remains the same while the buildings upon it change, proving that my thought structure is functioning healthily. The phase of numbness in my early writings is now merely a symptom, not the philosophy itself. My mind is no longer my prison, either. I have also shed that tone of "I can see this, you cannot."
As for the issue of not contradicting myself, most people either abandon their old ideas entirely or sanctify them. I, however, change my arguments while preserving the underlying axioms (well, there’s no other term for it). What makes this difficult to achieve is our ego. We cannot easily let go of our old ideas without hating them or turning them into martyrs.
For an archaeologist, the "old" is not more "true," and the "new" is not "better." They simply examine layer by layer and ask how this was possible. Without Morin, the Aegean of today would not exist. This is not a contradiction; it is simply continuing. I am no longer just writing down my ideas. I am tracing, without fighting myself. My own track of thought.
But let’s get to the dangerous part: sometimes I cannot be sure of the future of this tracking. I am human, too; I remember my nature. I will put myself into a state of thesis-antithesis-synthesis so many times that it will become almost impossible for anyone to win an argument against me. Because I will have already thought of every antithesis thrown my way. Combined with persuasive ability, it is very easy for this to poison me.
The issue here really comes down to what I want to do with this situation, and I am not succumbing to my ego. I am not saying everyone is dumber than me or that I am right because I thought about it a lot. At least, I am not saying that yet. I am currently developing a mental immune system against this poisoning.
But we are approaching a critical point. This immunity must absolutely not backfire. There are two paths before me. I could become a god complex who says, "No argument can be won against me," if I succumb to my human emotions. In that case, the people around me will not want to think with me; they will just go silent. I would be right and lonely; I would not produce ideas; I would protect a single idea. I would harm the people I value. The second path is one where I guide people, where I open space. That requires more will—to stand against your ego—but I must be able to achieve it. Otherwise, these thoughts I created will poison me. Tracking will turn into hunting. If I succeed in this second path, people will want to produce counter-arguments against me. My power of persuasion will turn not into pressure but into a natural pull, and I will discuss not to "defeat" people, but to expand my foundation.
This path makes me not only strong but puts me in a central position.
When I said at the beginning, "I don't know what to do with all of this," I actually had an answer. At least for now; I am thinking of the people I value in this regard, but I am not closed to valuing new people. Humans need humans.
If one day I become drunk on power with thoughts like, "I know what they will say before they finish their sentence," that is the moment I must stop, because that is no longer tracking—it is hunting. That shrinks me.
Truly strong minds do not seek to win the argument; they question its form and structure. Continuing to track.
Written in Turkish originally by me translated by AI
I am better at writing in my own language