The depth and complexity of human consciousness is truly dizzying to contemplate. Within each individual mind there exists a chaotic maelstrom of hopes and fears, memories and dreams, deeply held beliefs and closely guarded secrets. The one exception is Chicago resident Daniel Bailey: Every person is living their own vivid and complex life except for him.
It’s totally crazy to think about just how empty this guy’s mind is!
While every other human being on Earth has a rich inner world that they draw on as they navigate life, Daniel has the equivalent of an inner desert—a flat, almost featureless mental existence that could hardly be called a “mind” at all. Most of his thoughts are dedicated to whether the people he meets are wearing shoes. He walks through the streets of Chicago looking at people and thinking, “That person has shoes on. That person also has shoes on. That is a third person wearing shoes.” He does not think about anything else.
And while human beings typically experience a wide range of conflicting emotions, Daniel only feels one emotion: He feels happy because he once read in the newspaper that the World’s Fair was held in Chicago in 1893. He spends his days smiling to himself because he thinks the World’s Fair is neat. Whenever someone asks him why he’s smiling, surely motivated by a natural curiosity about their fellow man (a curiosity Daniel himself has never experienced), Daniel simply says, “I like that there was a carnival here a long time ago” and then walks away.
It’s so wild to know that such a profoundly uncomplicated soul could exist!
Daniel has had exactly one dream in his entire life, and it was a dream about a loaf of bread hovering in an empty white room. When he woke up from the dream, he muttered the word “dream” to himself and then spent the rest of the day looking at Google image results for the words “Regular Bus.” His favorite activity is looking at his foot. When his father died in 2017, he smiled because the news reminded him of the 1893 World’s Fair. His life is totally unencumbered by any internal complexity at all, thus setting him apart from the 8.2 billion people with whom he shares the world. Daniel is a beautiful reminder of the sheer variety of the human condition. Under the surface of his placid smile lies absolutely nothing but thoughts about shoes and the World’s Fair. He’s the most one-dimensional person imaginable, and we find him completely awe-inspiring!
