Thread: What happens if you woke up and knew everything?

what would you do?

Enjoy the flashback

And what would you believe your life be like if something like this happened to you?

Do you mean if this was a constant state? Then I don't think
it would be possible to function, let alone survive for very long.
If I would go back to "normal", I don't think it would change
really all that much, since it would not be possible to still know
everything once back into everyday consciousness.

I'd say I would start seeking inside myself and getting into meditation
and all sorts of things, but I already do that anyway, so yea, no big changes.

Trippy thought!

Originally Posted by AccountableMasses

What would happen to you if one morning, you woke up and knew everything? And I do mean every thought, idea, memory, language, person, dream, ability everything you could think about. Just everything about everything and everyone in existence, what would you do?

And what would you believe your life be like if something like this happened to you?

I'd be pre-determined to be mad that the world is pre-determined.

I think only the person who knew everything would be able to answer this.

Go to the nearest store and play the lottery.

I would go insane. Absolutely stark-raving mad. Stone cold fuck nuts. Lunacy cubed. The sheer intake of that kind of knowledge would probably annihilate any sense of reason, and my perception of reality would fall to shambles.

If I managed to retain any strand of rational thought whatsoever, I would probably end up spending the rest of my life in therapy, trying to forget about all the evil and hatred out there.

pat myself on the back for being such a good student

Pretty normal day for me.

Well I reckon you wouldn't be human anymore. How can you say there would be "no big changes"? That's a bit silly.

I would build a ship to fly to outerspace with infinite amounts of fuel because I can turn anything into energy for whatever I needed and EXPLORE! Like Dora.

But isn't the fun of exploration going to new places and seeing new things? What meaning would "explore" or "new" have to someone who knows everywhere and everything?

I would no longer be myself.
I cannot answer a question for someone else.

Originally Posted by AccountableMasses

What would happen to you if one morning, you woke up and knew everything? And I do mean every thought, idea, memory, language, person, dream, ability everything you could think about. Just everything about everything and everyone in existence, what would you do?

And what would you believe your life be like if something like this happened to you?

I have no idea. I don't even know what "knowing everything" would usefully even mean. And neither does anyone else.

I would start writing.

^^^

The above comments made me realize I knew what I wanted to know! lol

It's a strange thinking process when you don't actually know everything. However, no-Name's input is something I realize I would want to do. I would be the next jesus! lol Share the good news!

Originally Posted by Mark75

Well I reckon you wouldn't be human anymore. How can you say there would be "no big changes"? That's a bit silly.

Well, you didn't read right. My point was that you could only momentarily
even know 'everything', whatever that means, because you could not
survive for very long. So basically you would be back to normal later
and would just have the memory of knowing everything, and no more
even the capacity to even comprehend what that meant at that time.

It would change the life in subtle ways, but you would just not be able
to recall, comprehend or even tell someone about what you have experienced.
So basically, I don't think it would change even that much - in the sense
of 'less than you'd think'. I don't think it's silly, but just an assumption.

I've had this argument before and no one seems to get my answer...

it isn't possible for all information to exist in a single point.

let's say for the sake of argument, you woke up tomorrow and knew absolutely everything. the way I see it, you would (hypothetically, since this is completely impossible) essentially become something like a black hole, suck all of the universe into you, and then nothing would exist.

do you get it or would you like me to elaborate?

Your brain isn't a 'single point'. :l

We know a finite number of things. Presumably there are only a finite number of other things to know, so it's just an extension of the same situation.

Although my assertion there are only a finite number of facts is patently untrue. There are an uncountably infinite number of facts. Knowing all of the prime numbers is an infinite subset of this infinite set.

However, such a thing seems trivial. Can we restrict 'facts' to interesting facts which are actually about understanding; for example, understanding what a prime number is, why there are infinitely many, how to find them, how they are distributed, etcetera. A better question would be 'what happens if you wake up and understand everything'.

An interesting question though: is it actually possible for a conscious system to know everything? I tried reducing the problem down to an extremely simple universe where there simply exists only an algorithm capable of thinking. Can this algorithm understand itself, including how it thinks?

I'll have to mull that potent question over. Perhaps Godel has something to do with it.

I guess I would stop learning and start doing, unless all the knowledge in the universe revealed to me that I don't need to do anything or even live at all.

Originally Posted by AccountableMasses

What would happen to you if one morning, you woke up and knew everything? And I do mean every thought, idea, memory, language, person, dream, ability everything you could think about. Just everything about everything and everyone in existence, what would you do?

And what would you believe your life be like if something like this happened to you?

pretty sure i would first solve world hunger then initainate socialism in every country becuase with knowledge is power and with power is responzabiity so you gotta take on the responsebablity of this gift you have obatained in order do so in a direct manner one must be a polotician because they rule the country hopefully with mass amounts of knowlege and power you can rule all counties and have a 1 world gov where you can help everyone and everyone can be happy doing things they lvoe becuase its a socialist world and everything gets recycled nothing is wasted

Originally Posted by SupremeUltimateSuperMega

pretty sure i would first solve world hunger then initainate socialism in every country becuase with knowledge is power and with power is responzabiity so you gotta take on the responsebablity of this gift you have obatained in order do so in a direct manner one must be a polotician because they rule the country hopefully with mass amounts of knowlege and power you can rule all counties and have a 1 world gov where you can help everyone and everyone can be happy doing things they lvoe becuase its a socialist world and everything gets recycled nothing is wasted

Holy Christ. What kind of post is this? Punctuation is your friend, mate.

Well, given the fact that you know/understand everything, would it not be possible that there is an even more effective means of governing than socialism? If you're talking about bettering the world, I would use the bit of info that tells me how to singlehandedly stop global climate change and develop green technologies.

But, I'm completely insane, so there goes my idea...

Probably commit suicide.

What would I do if I woke up with the knowledge of an omniscient god?

I imagine I would be a lot like Dr. Manhattan from Watchmen. Gradually, I would start losing my touch with humanity whilst trying to use my knowledge to save it.

If I woke up one morning knowing everything? I think in order to know everything, I would have to be everything; therefore, "existing" everywhere and everywhen simultaneously. I'd probably be stretched so thin as to be undetectable by anything in this dimension.