(July 21, 2013 at 9:02 am)wandering soul Wrote: ok in this ongoing debate there is no resolution when the terms are not defined. Even then there will be no resolution because it is being driven by emotion and survival instincts rather than informed comprehension.
Are you more interested in defining the terms or redefining them to suit your argument? If your aim is informed comprehension of the concepts then then you need to start with opening a dictionary and understanding what they mean.
(July 21, 2013 at 9:02 am)wandering soul Wrote: First the problem must be addressed from the point of divergence which is not at the point of either reason or faith but of reality. Reality is not, as we always assume, some objective verifiable entity. It is an abstract concept created by the human mind.
Wrong. Reality is an objectively verifiable entity.
Reality
1. The quality or state of being actual or true.
2. One, such as a person, an entity, or an event, that is actual
3. The totality of all things possessing actuality, existence, or essence.
4. That which exists objectively and in fact
It is not a concept created by human mind.
(July 21, 2013 at 9:02 am)wandering soul Wrote: Plants, rocks, water, air, and animals do not have Reality, they have merely existence. Even animals with mind and consciousness do not experience reality but only existence. Reality did not exist until the human mind worked itself up from manipulation of mental objects (as all sentient creatures do) to construction of mental ideas and thoughts (also common in sentient creatures) and then from thoughts and ideas constructed abstractions leading to abstractions as fully formed mental objects themselves to be manipulated to construct whole worlds and universes of philosophy, science, and yes, religions.
The totality of all things having existence is called reality. So plants, rocks water air etc do not have Reality - but Reality has plants, rocks, air, water etc. It existed not only before humans were capable of forming thoughts and abstractions, but before there were any humans at all.
The cause of your error is the misuse of the word reality. Reality exists objectively and independently of human mind - but the mind is capable of forming concepts, abstractions and other ideas about it and based on it through perception and experience. This mental model of reality that we have (the correct word for which would be worldview) is often conflated with reality because we fail to recognize any errors or bias in it due to erroneous perception and subjectivity. So while you may refer to your worldview as "my reality", do not make the mistake of confusing it with the actual reality.
(July 21, 2013 at 9:02 am)wandering soul Wrote: Both faith and reason are just mental tools we have constructed to manipulate and create our mental worlds and our realities - yes plural - one size does not fit all. We are all constructing and experiencing different realities based on different data sets, using different mental tools and different methods of construction of reality.
The only correct statement here is that faith and reason are both mental tools. We are all living in the same reality and we are all experiencing the same reality - but we are using different tools to create our mental models of reality. So while we may be working with different data sets, these data sets are subsets of the same reality and because we use different tools, our mental models of reality - our worldviews - turn out to be different. That does not mean that there actually are different realities.
(July 21, 2013 at 9:02 am)wandering soul Wrote: The thing is, you can't say one reality is more "real" than the other. Reality is an abstraction which we create, which corresponds to our subjective lived experience. We only trade in one reality for another when our current constructed reality starts to break down in the face of that business of raw existence itself - which can totally disrupt our mental abstract constructs at times.
Actually, I can say that - and I do say that. The actual reality - the one that has an objective existence - forms the standard to see which worldview is more real. "My reality", i.e. my worldview based on reality constructed from my subjective experience and mental tools like reason or faith, is "real" only so far as it matches the actual reality. The more it deviates, the more unreal it is. And as we've found, reason provides much more "realistic" models of reality than faith.
