Since the Cartesian revolution, we’ve been inclined to see life as a duality. There’s the inner world and the outer world. Mind and body. Thoughts and feelings versus physical matter. Conception versus creation. Philosophy versus science. For some, the inner world dominates: reflection, spirituality, and the humanities feel like home. For others, life is more external, more material. You can touch it. You can’t touch love, agreed, but without the loved one (the physical person), love wouldn’t be possible. It’s the practical over the theoretical.

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This comparison might sound vague or oversimplified. And of course it is if we fixate on the borderline cases. But broadly speaking, it holds. Now, there’s one element that neither side can ignore: doubt. Doubt is an everyday phenomenon. It flows in and out of our lives like wind—natural, spontaneous, and sometimes unnoticed. We doubt constantly, from minor choices to life-changing decisions. Over time, we become somewhat tolerant of doubt, even resistant to its effects.

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If we combine these two poles with doubt, we arrive at a shared existential question: Where does the limit lie? For those drawn to the inner world, the possibilities are unsettling: perhaps the limit lies in that we’re brains in vats being fed artificial experiences, and we cannot know anything further than that. Or maybe everything is an illusion; reality is a construct of the mind, and each step in it self-generated. Meanwhile, the outer-world clauster presents its own abyss. Nothing challenges our sense of limit like outer space.

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Philosophers distinguish between beauty that brings pleasure and beauty that overwhelms us, mixing awe with a touch of terror. This latter experience is called the sublime. And “sublime” is adequate to describe what we feel when contemplating the cosmos. We go about our lives on this little blue planet, orbiting a burning star, in a universe filled with dark matter and forces we barely understand. We are just one among those vast numbers, extraordinarily fortunate to be in the right place, under the right conditions, for life to emerge.

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Existential crises are defined as those moments when, at the root of our doubts—no matter their form—lies a deep uncertainty about our own existence. Who am I? Why am I here? What does any of this mean? These are complicated questions. And the strange part is that those who have resolved them cannot offer precise, repeatable answers. Because the issue is personal, based on individual experience. Which is ironic, isn’t it? Experience is precisely what we’re doubting.

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Yes, existence lies at the heart of the matter. But our certainty of existence comes from experience. As Descartes said, “I think, therefore I am.” In other words, it’s the experience of thinking that allows the self to affirm its being. That’s what sets us apart from artificial intelligence. An AI may process data and simulate thought, but it cannot be. We, on the other hand, can think and reflect on our thinking. That ability—whether we call it consciousness or self-aware experience—is what makes us human. And, at the same time, it is what makes us doubt.

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One can conduct a thorough self-interrogation into the limits of our experience and, by extension, our existence. But strangely enough, we always seem to arrive at the same two boundaries. The two walls that humanity hasn’t yet managed to break through. One is the “brain in a vat” scenario: what lies behind experience, and how do we know it’s not all an illusion? The other is the overwhelming vastness of the universe: what lies beyond the stars, and is there any end to what we can know? 

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These two limits—inner and outer—frame the space where our most profound questions arise. What is it, exactly, that makes experience possible? And what, if anything, contains the universe itself? If the cosmos is infinite, then so too is our pursuit of answers, meaning we may never find one. It becomes a kind of blank question with blank possibilities, a riddle with no apparent logic. 

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Sadhguru, in a recent interview with Steven Bartlett, noted that humans simply don’t tolerate limits. We always want more. He offered the example of placing someone in a 10x10 room. After a week, you move them into a 20x20 space—they feel relieved. But soon enough, they’ll want a 40x40, then a 100x100. It’s about ambition. The human mind can imagine so many possibilities that it wants to make them all real, to match its conceptions with its pleasures. I can imagine this. I believe it will bring me joy. Therefore, I pursue it.

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But here’s the more complicated question: If we did manage to find the ultimate limit, if we answered the mystery of existence itself, would that bring us pleasure? Would it satisfy us? Or would it only spark the desire to go further still?

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The “brain in a vat” is not just a thought experiment; it’s taken seriously in philosophy and neuroscience. Technically, the brain processes all input through electrical signals, meaning there’s no absolute way to distinguish between a real world and a simulated one. This is the foundational concern of Cartesian scepticism and is reflected in modern debates on virtual reality and simulation theory.

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On the other end, astrophysics offers staggering numbers and conceptual demands. According to NASA and recent data from the James Webb Space Telescope, the observable universe contains an estimated 2 trillion galaxies. Each galaxy has billions of stars and, likely, even more planets. The universe is expanding and current models suggest we may never see its outermost parts. It’s not just vast; it’s unknowably vast.

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It seems that we are trapped in something limitless, huh. That is surely counterintuitive. 

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As of now, the status of the “grand existential doubt” depends on where you stand. For the inner cluster—the ones drawn to introspection—the answer has taken the form of spirituality, religion, or ultra-meta-philosophical, psychological explorations like Panpsychism. Instead of relying solely on traditional lines of inquiry, we have begun to explore more esoteric, creative ways of asking the question itself. In the hopes that the answer might not come from the solution, but from the activity of solving, also known as the activity of being.

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Then there’s the outer cluster—those who look outward rather than inward. Here, the scientific and technological revolutions of our time have brought optimism. Two major players have entered the scene. One is Neuralink, Elon’s company, which aims to expand the brain’s capacity for processing information. After all, we use only a fraction of our cognitive potential. The second is the arrival of AGI, with its seemingly boundless reasoning power. These two tech members rely on each other, for even if AGI were to deliver the answer, we need to equip the human brain to understand it.

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And so, in the end, we reunite the duality in impossibility. Who knows, maybe in the future, we’ll see a joint force emerge. And with it, a fairer fight against the unknown.

 

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Resources for YouTube video (“links in the description”)

• Dualism. 

• Sadhguru, in a recent interview with Steven Bartlett.

• NASA and recent data from the James Webb Space Telescope

• Panpsychism.

• Neuralink, Elon’s company.

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Best book transmitting the “existentialism feeling”: Albert Camus – The Stranger