Objective reality: How do we know it exists ?
- Thread starter Enmos
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Enmos
Valued Senior Member
As stated in the OP, but any will work to make my point i guess.
By focusing on those truths that seem useful, and working from there.
Trying to recalibrate your whole philosophical system at once -in the way one would format a computer and upload a new OS- doesn't really work, IMO.
Enmos
Valued Senior Member
Unless I am proven wrong of course.
But as that isn't likely to happen IMO, you are suggesting to deliberately delude myself..
I can see how this might look so from your perspective. But it's not what I'm suggesting.
For example, let's say that in 6th grade, you stole something at a store. You weren't caught, but you still feel very guilty about it, and sometimes, it really brings you down. It is a truth that you stole something. But dwelling on that particular truth ("I stole something") isn't going to help you now.
You'd probably do better to focus on other truths related to that truth - like that beating yourself up doesn't help you, or that the reason you feel so bad about stealing is that your mother found that stolen thing and you lied to her about where you got it.
Focusing on those other truths isn't deluding yourself, it's looking to resolve psychological discomfort.
And similar can be done with other truths.
But I wouldn't be psychologically comfortable with the knowledge that I was denying something I believed to be true.
As for your example of the stealing incident., it seems to me that you are more concerned with making yourself comfortable by selecting what you will choose to believe. Is that not being intellectually dishonest ?
As for your example of the stealing incident., it seems to me that you are more concerned with making yourself comfortable by selecting what you will choose to believe. Is that not being intellectually dishonest ?
So, per you, if I don't focus on "Oh, I'm so bad, I stole!", I am being intellectually dishonest?
I didn't say that, but an earlier post of your suggested that one should ignore anything which was not " helpful ". Why cannot one take a balanced view and accept that we are a mixture of good and bad and accept ourselves on that basis ?
If you want a status quo, then I suppose what you are suggesting above is the thing to do.
Status quo means keeping things as they were. It is not possible to do so in the circumstances we are discussing. We have no choice but to move on, such that what we regard as a balanced view today will be modified by our future actions.
Enmos
Valued Senior Member
I see your point, but I don't suffer any ill-effects from thinking the way I do.
And, IMO, if we follow the analogy correctly I would be actively trying to deny the fact that I did steal. That's what I call deliberately deluding oneself.
Enmos
Valued Senior Member
I would also say that your analogy is loaded, because stealing is widely regarded as a bad thing. I would definitely not compare it to arguing for objective reality.
"There are 1000 people standing around a wall. The wall is made of solid reinforced concrete. It is for all intents and purposes impassable by those 1000 people"
Is the wall an objective reality?
Or more precisely is the walls ability to "obstruct" passage to everything in this material universe [ matter ] an objective reality?
No ant or fly or bird or person can pass through this wall. regardless of what is percieved or sensed the wall can not be passed through.
Does this qualify the wall to being objective if only for it's impassability?
Some thought, suggests that everything is a collective imagination that it is a universal imagination that has rules and order.
It could be said that the wall in question is also a part of that collective imagination and yes it must obey certain rules and physical laws as do the entities trying to pass through it.
Is this enough to suggest objectivity is available, even if not to the senses and perception but to the material facts?
Is the wall an objective reality?
Or more precisely is the walls ability to "obstruct" passage to everything in this material universe [ matter ] an objective reality?
No ant or fly or bird or person can pass through this wall. regardless of what is percieved or sensed the wall can not be passed through.
Does this qualify the wall to being objective if only for it's impassability?
Some thought, suggests that everything is a collective imagination that it is a universal imagination that has rules and order.
It could be said that the wall in question is also a part of that collective imagination and yes it must obey certain rules and physical laws as do the entities trying to pass through it.
Is this enough to suggest objectivity is available, even if not to the senses and perception but to the material facts?
Everything to us is subjective reality, that is the reality that is objective to us.Reality and all the objects in it exists completely independent of the mind.
I call this objective reality.
No observer can perceive objective reality directly. Perception is necessarily colored by interpretation, expectation, etc.
We make up our own version of reality in our mind which is based on (part) of objective reality, let's refer to it as subjective reality.
Some people here have argued that it is impossible to know whether objective reality exists because of it's own premises. I disagree.
We know the senses aren't perfect. For instance, the eye can only sense a small portion of the electromagnetic spectrum.
We also know that some animals can perceive more of the spectrum than we can.
The same goes for all the other senses: smell, hearing, touch and taste.
So we know, as an objective fact, that the senses can only sense a specific portion of objective reality.
When our brain is fed this data it interprets it based on:
- memory of previous experiences;
- character, which is the product of in part genetic but mostly environmental circumstances in our childhood;
- knowledge/believes;
- immediate environmental demands.
Then value is assigned to anything that is perceived according to above circumstances.
And so we end up with our own version of reality; subjective reality.
This is my view and I am convinced of it's correctness, but feel free to add or criticize.
Discuss
As far as I understand there is no reality that everyone can see that isn't subjective (seen by the observer).
The camera doesn't observe a objective reality, in order to observe a objective reality it has to have a subjective one.
Therefor everything objective is subjective for it to have any meaning (otherwise it equates to nothing at all - as in the cameras perspective).
We have a subjective reality and through that we can call what we observe "objective" because we know that others can see it as well (but it is only a definition), while we can call feelings and thoughts subjective, simply because only we can see it, and that is not a definition, that is experiance.
There is no objective experiance that I can understand (everything works from the inside).
ha...
question:
How long do 1000 people bang there heads against a concrete wall before they can be sure they are doing it?
I suppose until they knock themselves unconscious.....:bugeye:
Sorry, but I have been following these objective/ subjective threads for some time and as usuall we assusme that the mind and it's capacity to sense is all there is.
Fortunately the mind also comes attatched to a physical body and that physical body is what determines objectivity IMO.
Try and exist with out it and you will see what I mean....
Matter can not pass through matter....whilst the mind can subjectively do so the body cannot. This is the objective reality.
You will have to prove that matter is subjective to give credit to the arguement that everything is subjective....
question:
How long do 1000 people bang there heads against a concrete wall before they can be sure they are doing it?
I suppose until they knock themselves unconscious.....:bugeye:
Sorry, but I have been following these objective/ subjective threads for some time and as usuall we assusme that the mind and it's capacity to sense is all there is.
Fortunately the mind also comes attatched to a physical body and that physical body is what determines objectivity IMO.
Try and exist with out it and you will see what I mean....
Matter can not pass through matter....whilst the mind can subjectively do so the body cannot. This is the objective reality.
You will have to prove that matter is subjective to give credit to the arguement that everything is subjective....
Subjective and objective "realities" are a crock.
There's this "me" that I perceive. I can perceive that "I" can see and hear things, and touch them. So there's this thing that's "me" - my awareness of my seeing and hearing, etc, and my awareness that I have a material "self" that contains "me", and contains my "awareness".
Then there are all the other things that aren't "me". These are all the things I perceive that aren't a "part" of me and my awareness (of me and the things that aren't me).
Some idiots say I have to call the "me" thing, subjective, and the things that aren't "me", objective.
But that's because they're a bunch of idiots.
There's this "me" that I perceive. I can perceive that "I" can see and hear things, and touch them. So there's this thing that's "me" - my awareness of my seeing and hearing, etc, and my awareness that I have a material "self" that contains "me", and contains my "awareness".
Then there are all the other things that aren't "me". These are all the things I perceive that aren't a "part" of me and my awareness (of me and the things that aren't me).
Some idiots say I have to call the "me" thing, subjective, and the things that aren't "me", objective.
But that's because they're a bunch of idiots.
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Enmos
Valued Senior Member
Eh.. I think we kind of agree then :shrug:
Enmos
Valued Senior Member
Thank you for sharing that.