What is Reality?

[Sunny Ghost]

Studying Rene Descartes?

Well... if you think about when you are in your dream world, it's often hard to distinguish whether you're dreaming or experiencing reality. Our senses can often be deceiving. I know that, I myself, have experienced dreams where I felt real physical pain or heat from fire, etc. Our brains believe these things to actually occur, and so we feel or sense them to occur.

A lot of people also like to say that what we believe to be reality, isn't truly reality, and that what we experience as a 3d world can be altered if we truly put mind over matter. One could walk on water... I don't know about all that. But this is something a lot of Buddhist monks play around with.

 

[Sunny Ghost]

btw... we live in the matrix, you know, right?

but more seriously, the Matrix is one of my favorite movies for that very reason. It questions reality.

My understanding of karma, is that the more karma you experience (which, if you didn't know--karma, good or bad is something you should avoid.) Basically, you need to avoid the swings of life in either direction. One needs to avoid karma and remain neutral to the world. It is this supposed neutral state that is nirvana. It is in this state, one can alter the reality around oneself and become a Buddha himself, or what I like to equate as the Christian version of Buddha, Jesus. It is in this state of being, in this state of being unaffected by outside influences, that one has full awareness of not only self, but of the world around them, capable of looking beyond "reality."

But I'm a little intoxicated right now, and it's sort of an inappropriate moment to be having a philosophical discussion... so I hope that made some sense.

 

[figsfiggyfigs]

I've thought about this for fun multiple times... so many theories, too crazy to share.

 

[Mephistopheles]

Then what is the point of it all?

Imho, there is none. If you want a point, you have to make you one yourself. In fact, I don't even see how the lack of a reason of our live is connected to the subject of reality. Would our live be less pointless if we would surely know that this ... environment is completely what you call "real" ?

 

[A window to the soul]

Thought experiment: suppose that you wake up from a dream, which initially you thought was a reality; how could you be certain that the now current "reality" that you are perceiving is really a reality, or just another dream?

How can we ever be truly certain that what we are perceiving right now is reality? Or perhaps, is reality itself what we perceive to be?

Reality is not always what it's perceived to be because sometimes perception is false. Reality is what exists, regardless of human awareness. It's what 'is'. We may not have all of the answers to the questions of the universe, but that doesn't change that reality exists. If you want to find it, dig deeper. In some cases we must resort to logical reasoning in order to deduce what is 'probable'.

 

[guesswho]

We'd be fucked without logic.
But this is only what I've deduced from my subjective reality, where logic is sexy

 

[Kenn Salvatore]

Reality can only be what one perceives it to be.

 

[Poki]

Reality can only be what one perceives it to be.

Unless you think the world is reality and realize its not what you percieve it to be.

 

[Kenn Salvatore]

Unless you think the world is reality and realize its not what you percieve it to be.

this can be said about many things, and I believe reality to be one of them.

 

[Santosha]

I used to discuss this topic frequently with an old INTJ boyfriend. I would always say "perception is reality" meaning the way I perceived a situation was obviously what was truest to me. But he insisted that perception is NOT reality, because reality binds you to the laws of the world. Laws that no perception can escape. I might perceive that I could jump off a building and fly, but the reality is that gravity will pull me down.
Someone earlier mentioned dreams, and it brought to mind Near Death Research that I've read quite a bit on. Youtube "medical proof of consciousness that exists outside the brain" and you will come up with some really fascinating experiences that fairly accredited nuerosurgeons are looking into. It is common for people that claim NDE's to say that their experience was once they left the body, they seemed to feel as though the life they had just lived had a hazy dreamlike quality, and that being outside the body gave them much greater awareness or consciousness. Just a thought.

 

[EcK]

a kind of dumb essentialist concept for people who need to grow up a bit

 

[Gish]

a kind of dumb essentialist concept for people who need to grow up a bit

And that's the way the cookie crumbles, folks.

 

[HotpinkHeatwave]

Reality is not what we dream, or what we imagine, unless me make it so. Reality is everything that is possible.

 

[ThatGirl]

Reality is the collective of....

Physics
Time
Space
Action
Reaction
Thought
Perception
Comparison
Judgment
Value
Understanding
Action
Physics
Time
Space......

You get the idea.