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I can’t claim to know much about reality. How could I? I’m human. Humans are pretty new to the reality game. Still, I have some guesses about the reality that are a little different, coming from decades studying the origins of life, the evolution of language, the history and philosophy of science, and the nature of escapism – cults and the like.
Here are some common beliefs about reality that I think don’t hold up. And for the record, I can’t claim to know that this myth-busting is realistic. It’s just an educated guess from someone who admits he doesn’t know much about reality.
- It’s best to avoid talking about reality: Reality, like wisdom, is a somewhat taboo topic and for much the same reason. Any clown can talk about having wised up to what’s really real, as though they’ve got the last word on the subject. It poisons the well and makes it difficult to talk about reality. Still, none of us avoid talking about reality in so many words, like when we overuse terms like “really,” “absolutely,” “for sure,” and “no doubt.” Taboo or not, there’s no escaping the topic. Might as well head into it headfirst.
- There is no reality: One way to try to avoid talking about reality is to claim that there’s no such thing. But notice the problem: That’s like saying “Really, there’s no reality.” It, too, is a supposedly wise last-word claim about reality.
- To talk about reality is pretentious: It’s pretentious to insist with last-word authority that you know what, in particular, is real. It’s useful to distinguish between the category “real” and what belongs in that category. The category “Reality” is real. What counts as real – what belongs in that category – is up for debate.
- Reality is undefinable: Here’s a practical simple definition for the category “reality”. Reality is the set of all the things we can and can’t change, in other words, the set of all opportunities and constraints. Picture reality as the maze we’re in. A maze has room to move and not move, freedoms and constraints, places we can and can’t go. There are limits to what we can see and what sits on the other side of a dead-end we can't reach.
- Wisdom is transcending reality to something higher and more important: No, we need wisdom to survive reality. A practical definition of wisdom is right there in the serenity prayer: Wisdom is wanting to know the difference between things we can and can’t change. In other words, freedoms and constraints.
- Reality is a human construct: Our words for reality are human but reality itself goes way back. How far? To the origins of life. Organisms are adapted to their environment. Their environment is their slice of reality. Adaptive fitness is the suite of an organism's traits and behaviors that enable them to survive by fitting within the freedoms and constraints of their mazes. Beavers can change trees into dams. That’s something they can change. They have fur to keep them warm because cold weather is something they can’t change. In this respect, the serenity prayer goes way back. Adaptations are functional habits, biological wisdom to respond to the differences that make a difference to an organism's survival, the differences between what they can and can’t change in their slice of reality’s maze.
- Things are either absolutely real or absolutely unreal: About the past, this might be so; about the future, reality is the set of all possibilities, relative likelinesses. This is a challenge for our quest to gain the wisdom to know the difference between what can and can’t change. It’s not black and white. For example, at the origin of the universe, there was a faint possibility that you would be here today. There was a path down the maze of reality that led to your existence. You weren’t a certainty at the origin of the universe, but here you are.
- Reality is unchanging, timeless, universal: Some features of reality might be unchanging, timeless and universal. Most are not. Time changes realities. Reality changes as life evolves its way through the maze. Rome couldn’t be built in a day. Our modern world was very unlikely at the origin of the universe but here it is, in reality, today.
- The supernatural is real: Miracles, God, a higher power, heaven, hell for our enemies – we have all sorts of names for things we’re tempted to assume are real for which there is no evidence one way or another. Is there no evidence? By definition, evidence is sensed physically either directly through our senses or through scientific instruments. All supposed signs of the supernatural are actually sensed, natural, physical. I could interpret a burning bush, or an Ayahuasca trip, as being about something unsensible, but I can’t sense the insensible. The supernatural is a human notion. Other organisms just deal with their slices of reality but humans can give names to any notion, real or imagined. The idea of Santa Claus is real in that it changes behavior in November. But Santa Clause isn’t real. Don’t tell the kids but do tell the adults, because we better grow up and start facing reality undistracted by unsensible imaginary things that, like Santa will bring us miraculous presents like heaven hereafter.
- Reality is whatever the powerful say it is: This is a popular idea, a central theme of post-modernism. It’s true that what the powerful say is real in that it will alter the maze of reality, but no it’s not all that reality is. The climate crisis is real even if the most powerful people say it isn’t.
- Reality is whatever you believe it is: Another popular notion that’s wrong. You have some power to influence reality but that doesn’t mean that all thinking or believing makes it so. The Secret is wishful thinking. You're not omnipotent, you're some-nipotent. You have some power to change reality.
- Different people have different realities: We each occupy different slices of the maze. Still, this claim is often just another way to sidestep the taboo topic of reality. It’s escapism, a way to avoid facing our common reality.
- In the proper frame of mind, reality is revealed to you: If this were so, as spiritualities and religions claim, why don’t all spiritualities and religions converge on the same understanding of reality? This comes back to us being humans, and we're wired to our own subjective experiences.
- If you’re honest, you’re being realistic: You can honestly, earnestly believe unreal things. When people say a liar “tells it like it is,” because he’s honest about his false beliefs, they fail to distinguish between honesty and realism.
- We should all be realistic, always: We have to get realistic about how unrealistic humans are. We all need some escapism, some flights of fancy – though for them to be safe, we need to keep a return ticket to reality in our heart pockets. To survive we should cultivate optimal illusion, kidding ourselves where it helps, not where it harms. Reality is just too much.
- You’re more realistic than most people: That’s what pretty much everyone says, so no. If we're all more realistic than the next, whose reality do we believe? Like me, you can’t claim to know much about reality. We humans are new to this reality game and easily distracted by non-optimal illusions, the equivalent of believing in Gods who will bring miraculous heavenly presents like Santa Claus.
