The Case Against Reality

Why Evolution Hid the Truth from Our Eyes

By: Donald Hoffman

Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon

Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's summary

Can we trust our senses to tell us the truth?

Challenging leading scientific theories that claim that our senses report back objective reality, cognitive scientist Donald Hoffman argues that while we should take our perceptions seriously, we should not take them literally. How can it be possible that the world we see is not objective reality? And how can our senses be useful if they are not communicating the truth? Hoffman grapples with these questions and more over the course of this eye-opening work.

Ever since Homo sapiens has walked the earth, natural selection has favored perception that hides the truth and guides us toward useful action, shaping our senses to keep us alive and reproducing. We observe a speeding car and do not walk in front of it; we see mold growing on bread and do not eat it. These impressions, though, are not objective reality. Just like a file icon on a desktop screen is a useful symbol rather than a genuine representation of what a computer file looks like, the objects we see every day are merely icons, allowing us to navigate the world safely and with ease.

The real-world implications for this discovery are huge. From examining why fashion designers create clothes that give the illusion of a more “attractive” body shape to studying how companies use color to elicit specific emotions in consumers, and even dismantling the very notion that spacetime is objective reality, The Case Against Reality dares us to question everything we thought we knew about the world we see.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2019 by Donald Hoffman. (P)2019 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

not an audiobook

there are so many visual components that you lose a huge, HUGE portion of the book by listening rather than reading. very disappointed.

Intriguing Ideas, Yet Repetitive Execution—Perhaps Better Read than Listened To

“The Case Against Reality” presents a compelling argument that challenges our basic assumptions about the world. However, the audiobook format leaves something to be desired. Repetition is a notable issue; phrases like “which you can see in the accompanying PDF” are overused to the point of distraction. Some of the repetitiveness seems like an oversight in editing rather than a deliberate choice.

Given these drawbacks, potential listeners might find greater value in reading the text version of this book. Alternatively, I recommend listening to the Lex Fridman interview with the author as a primer before diving into the audiobook. While the delivery may have its shortcomings, the thought-provoking content still makes “The Case Against Reality” worth your time.

Very good book

The narration is well done.
The math is above my knowledge level and I disagree with his basic premise, but I would definitely have him over for dinner as a friend. Worth your time

Blue email icon

Hoffman's analogy of the "blue email icon" changed my perspective when I first heard him talk about it on the You Are Not So Smart podcast. This book fleshes out that model, and it helps inch closer to an understanding of humanity's conception of the world. He brings in Chalmers, Dennett, Kahneman, and others, who have made huge strides in advancing our understanding of consciousness. But I was a bit surprised that he never mentioned a couple scientists who I think have ideas very similar to his...Lanza and Hofstadter. It seems as if humanity is reaching a precipice...an understanding that the world we see isn't really there. This book is for anyone who's intrigued by what that could mean.

extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence

Despite being a fan of Hoffman and his thesis, I was expecting more evidence. A book-length treatment on a radical idea needs more than a handful of examples.

Be careful - a truly astonishing hypothesis, a modern classic

A great book like The Case Against Reality makes one sad to complete it for they will never have the chance to experience again for the first time. This magical book is replete with wonderful ideas yet free of all woo that normally bedevils books like this.

Savor it like wine or fine chocolate as a sublime experience if such things can be said to exist after this mind blowing book.

Fantastic content, but get it somewhere else!

After listening to Dawkins’ “The Selfish Gene” this will really enlighten you. There are numerous allusions to “The accompanying PDF”, which Audible apparently didn’t buy the right to. Too bad, because Hoffman makes a compelling case for the fact that we assume our perceptions and conceptions are “reality”. Love the book, disappointed in Audible!

Wow

With it's proofs, we as a species may be beginning to truly open our eyes. Perhaps the most difficult of the big questions, and we'll done.

Mind-bending but also lacking

Hoffman creates a compelling argument as to why he believes the world we perceive is almost certainly nothing like "objective reality" at all. Buckle your seatbelts because Kansas, as well as space and time itself, is going bye-bye.

His "fitness beats truth" theorem is interesting and seems to me to be almost certainly true. The first six chapters lay the groundwork for his ideas and can be sort of repetitive – you can get a basic understanding of these chapters from his appearance on the After On Podcast, also titled The Case Against Reality. His repetition of the "Desktop" metaphor to describe Interface Theory of Perception or ITP gets pretty old fast – we get it, you think our perception is like a desktop and what we see are like icons – but that's my biggest gripe.

Even if you're not convinced by his arguments, it's worth reading just to imagine the implications such an understanding of consciousness could have on the future of science, religion and the way we understand what it means to be human. An easy and fascinating afternoon read!

The performance of the book is lacking, however, AND THERE'S NO "accompanying PDF" which is mentioned many times in later chapters!

Missing promissed PDF

The audio repeatedly refers to accompanied PDF but audible does not provide it and its needed to follow the book closely. I am also afraid the author blames the lack of current full understanding of brain consciousness connections as support for his speculations while doing the same error of logic...not this/yet therefore that......