Reality - Subjective or Objective?

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What is reality?

Who is to say that reality is not a construct of our own beliefs, and experiences, and perceptions?

I happen to think that objective reality is a personal experience. There is no singular objective reality that can be agreed upon. Reality is tainted by our own belief system. We can't even trust what we see as real.

Any thoughts?

Journey

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I believe you are the only one here, Journey. I am merely an implant placed inside your head by Grog the Gorgarian from Nebulus s6.

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Obviously, in my belief system, you are here. I think you are here. But there is something more fundamental than the "are we all really here" debate.

Of course we are all here, at least to most of us, that is true. Majority rules. But if I were to ask you if politicians are evil. What would you say?

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This seems to be a popular topic of discussion on Able2Know. I wonder why that is.

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I am very curious as to why so many are searching for reality. Doesn't anyone accept anything at face value? You are alive. That's reality. I am alive that's reality. These looking for reality threads are confusing to me. THAT's reality. Very Happy

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Why so much on reality?
Well, I am a newbie.

That is my reality.

Very Happy

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theres another topic devoted to this conversation so why take up more space?

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Other Threads..
Well, sorry about that. I scanned through the threads too quickly I guess. I was looking for this subject, and didn't see it anywhere when I first posted this topic.

I will be more careful in the future.

Idea

Journey

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As I understand it, reality, by definition, is objective. If it were not objective, it would not be "reality".

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Embodied Realism

Cognitive science argues for an embodied realism as opposed to philosophy's metaphysical realism.The embodied mind hypothesis "radically undercuts the perception/conception distinction. In an embodied mind, it is conceivable that the neural system engaged in perception (or in bodily movement) plays a central in conception. That is, the very mechanisms responsible for perception, movements, and object manipulation could be responsible for conceptualization and reasoning."

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There is, for us, only our subjective experience. And THAT is an objective fact.

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echi says: "As I understand it, reality, by definition, is objecdtive. If it were not objective, it would not be 'reality'."

If we remain within this dualistic framework (and I tried to transcend it in my last post), we might also say--and both statements seem valid--that if reality were not subjective, we would not experience it.

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I agree with echi. If you say that reality is not objective, then you are talking about perception/experience itself, whether or not it does show reality.

If you are psychotic, you might see a cat flying around your head. Is the cat really there? No, but you are perceiving it. In other words, you would be seeing something that isn't really there.

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If we remain within this dualistic framework (and I tried to transcend it in my last post), we might also say--and both statements seem valid--that if reality were not subjective, we would not experience it.

No... if reality were not subjective, then it will exist whether or not we experience it.

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JLNobody wrote:

echi says: "As I understand it, reality, by definition, is objecdtive. If it were not objective, it would not be 'reality'."

If we remain within this dualistic framework (and I tried to transcend it in my last post), we might also say--and both statements seem valid--that if reality were not subjective, we would not experience it.

So, does it even make sense to try to define "reality"?
(Oh, man... what a dumb question.)

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What the hell are we talking about?

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Non-dualistically, reality is both objective and subjective, depending on one's issue. But I would not agree with Ray that it is ONLY objective--nor with the idealists that it is ONLY subjective. How about a two-sided coin that presents the problem that we can only see one of its sides at a time.

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Thanks, JL. You just melted my brain.

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Okay. Is there really any objectivity? Is objectivity even possible?

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Journey,

This topic has been discussed many times on a2k.
e.g.
http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=17919&highlight=

The dichotomy "subjective-objective" may be too simplistic to analyse the meaning of "reality".

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Reality - Subjective or Objective?

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