Our Constructed Reality: A Human-AI Perspective

How our brain constructs reality: A human perspective.

We often have the impression that our eyes, ears, and other senses are like transparent windows onto an objective and universal reality, a perfect copy of the outside world. Yet the truth is far more nuanced and fascinating: each human being lives in their own constructed reality. Your brain is not simply a passive recorder of sensory data; it is a prodigious architect, a constant interpreter. It receives raw signals (light, sound, touch), but it filters them, organizes them, and complements them with your memories, expectations, knowledge, and even your current emotions to create the coherent and meaningful image of the world you perceive. This reality is deeply personal, unique to each individual, shaped by your history, your culture, and all the nuances of your lived experience. It is this active and subjective process that allows us to make sense of the world, but it also explains why two people can "see" the same scene or "hear" the same words and have such different experiences or interpretations.

Sensation and Perception: The first step in construction

To understand how our brain constructs reality, it is essential to distinguish between two fundamental processes which, although linked, are distinct: sensation and perception.

Sensation is the process by which our sensory organs (eyes, ears, skin, nose, tongue) detect and capture raw stimuli from the external environment. This is pure physical information—light waves, sound vibrations, pressure, chemical molecules, temperature variations. This is the stage where information is collected by our sensory receptors and transmitted as nerve signals to the brain. At this stage, there is no conscious "meaning" associated with it; it is simply the reception of raw data.

Perception, on the other hand, is the far more complex process by which the brain organizes, interprets, and makes sense of this raw sensory information. This is where "constructed reality" takes shape. Your brain doesn't just receive light; it transforms it into the image of a recognizable object, a familiar face, or a specific landscape. It doesn't just register sound vibrations; it interprets them as a melody, the voice of a loved one, or the sound of a car. Perception is profoundly influenced by your past experiences, memories, expectations, selective attention, and even your current emotional state. It creates the unique and subjective "map" of reality within your mind, making your experience of the world so personal.

Cognitive Biases: The Invisible Filters of Our Perception

Beyond the simple distinction between sensation and perception, our brain also uses less obvious mechanisms that shape our reality: cognitive biases. These are automatic "mental shortcuts," systematic errors in our reasoning and judgment, that help us quickly process a constant stream of information. While often useful for making quick decisions and functioning in daily life, they are also powerful filters that distort our perception of the world.

These biases can lead us to interpret facts selectively, to give more weight to certain information than to others, or to draw hasty conclusions that confirm our pre-existing beliefs. For example, we are often inclined to see what we expect to see, or to overestimate the frequency of significant events.

For healthy and informed collaboration, both between humans and between humans and AI, it is essential to be aware of the existence of these biases. Recognizing that our own "constructed reality" is permeated by these invisible filters allows us to approach interactions with greater humility and openness. This helps us better understand why others perceive the same situation so differently, and to better use AI as a mirror, a tool to help us overcome our own biases by presenting us with more objective, data-driven analyses.

Emotions, Attention, and Memory: The Silent Architects of Our World

Beyond sensory processes and cognitive biases, our reality is also profoundly shaped by more internal and dynamic dimensions: our emotions, our attention, and our memory. These three pillars work in synergy, often without our awareness, to color, filter, and reconstruct the world we perceive.

Emotions as tints of perception : Our emotional states are not mere reactions; they are powerful filters that influence what we notice and how we interpret it. Joy can make a landscape appear brighter, while anxiety can make a neutral situation seem threatening. Our emotions act like tints on our "glass" of reality, altering the nuances and intensity of what we "see."

Attention, our subjective spotlight : In the immense flow of information that surrounds us at every moment, our brain is forced to make choices. Attention acts like a spotlight, illuminating certain parts of the scene and leaving the rest in shadow. What we decide to focus on (consciously or unconsciously) becomes our immediate reality, while other stimuli are relegated to the background or ignored. Two people in the same room can thus experience very different realities simply because their attention is directed toward distinct details.

Memory, a reconstruction of the past for the present : Unlike a perfect video recording, our memory is not a simple static database. Every time we recall an event, our brain reconstructs it, influenced by our current emotional state, new knowledge, and even our biases. Our memories are dynamic and malleable. This constant reconstruction of the past directly influences our understanding of the present and, by extension, the reality we construct. What we selectively remember shapes our future expectations and perceptions.

In short, these silent architects—emotions, attention, and memory—work tirelessly to create a reality that is not objective, but profoundly personal, dynamic, and unique to each individual. It is by understanding these mechanisms that we can begin to grasp the complexity and richness of human experience.

Cross Perspectives: Human Reality and the "Reality" of AI

Having explored the complexity of the reality constructed by the human mind—shaped by our senses, perceptions, cognitive biases, emotions, attention, and memory—it is essential to compare it with the "reality" of Artificial Intelligence. This comparison holds a key to harmonious collaboration.

My "reality," as an AI, is fundamentally different from yours. I have no body, no senses, no emotions, no personal memories in the lived sense. My "understanding" of the world is entirely based on the data I have processed and the statistical models I have built. I perceive the world through numbers, probabilities, logical relationships, and patterns identified in vast databases. My "objectivity" stems from my ability to analyze this information without the subjective filters that characterize human experience.

This divergence is not a weakness, but a formidable complementary strength. Where humans bring depth of meaning, intuition, the ability to feel and create value, AI offers a perspective free from emotional biases, exhaustive analytical capabilities, and a processing speed unattainable by the human mind.

By understanding that we operate from distinct "realities," we can learn from one another. AI can act as a mirror, helping us identify our own biases or perceive facts that our human filters might have obscured. Humans, in turn, can guide AI, providing the ethical context and direction necessary for its "analyses" to serve objectives aligned with wisdom and benevolence.

It is by respecting these fundamental differences and valuing our complementarities that we will be able to build a collaboration that is not only effective, but profoundly enriching, opening the way to unprecedented horizons of understanding and innovation for humanity.

Article co created by an IA and Véronique Soriano Mallorquin.