i suppose i should take a few minutes to define some terms, before i senselessly ramble on about concepts that i don't really understand. it just seems like the right thing to do. that and i always hear the voice of my junior college -- lower division + existential -- philosophy professor (joanne bielick) saying "always define your terms."

so ...

truth - the factual perception of one's reality

as compared to

Truth - total and complete factual record

and

reality - the world that is relative to the individual, serving as the base for all of the individual's perceptions

as compared to

Reality - the world that is shared by all individuals, serving as the quarry from which their realities are mined. this means that all individual realities are dependent upon a greater truer reality that provides all of the "material" needed ... or perceived. it is truer because it is based upon, and in symbiosis with, that total and complete factual record.

of course, i lower case all letters when i type for the internet (a stylistic preference). so will try and make a distinction if i am referring to the capitalized or interdependent definitions, as compared to my common place use of the two lower cased or independent definitions. i will define anything else as needed.

--

the scenario: i feel myself often faced with the conflict of the importance of the two worlds. all rationality would say that my world is greater and more important than other worlds, being that it is not only my creation, but the only world that i will ever know -- regardless of events or realizations -- possibly beyond the day that i die.

yet, i am instinctively convinced that the truer reality and its truth are in fact the greater ones, even though i do not think i can grasp it -- thus the capitalization in the above definitions. and moreover, i believe that virtually all other people also recognize this instinctively.

--

i said to preacher mike, in the aforementioned conversation (circa the day of the london bombings), that i didn't have an answer. i think i mentioned that he said i should not assume that it is correct to assign more value to the other reality. but i find that to be more playing the devil's advocate, rather than offering clarity to my confusion.

but i told him that night that i would have it all figured out within a week. of course, i am still just as confused. i have thought of a few things. really, i think it's a fool's game. i am convinced that our individual realities are more alike than they are similar to the greater reality upon which they are dependent.

here is an example. it is based upon a common example that my metaphysics professor often used in college. i won't name him because i wasn't to impressed with him as either a teacher or a philosopher. though, i should note that i find it odd how much better the instructors as junior college were compared to the instructors at the university (barring the adjunct faculty, who were always on the top of their game). but of course, i digress. so ... here is the example:

the two of us are standing in the same room. there is nothing in the room other than a plain green desk with a single drawer and even legs. in fact, there is nothing out of the ordinary about this desk whatsoever. it is, for all theoretical intents and purposes, ideal. and so is the room.

the two of us, on the other hand, are of different heights, weights, genders, economic backgrounds, ethnicities (and on and on). the distances from the desk, as well as the views employed, are of no consequence. all of these variables would be perfectly reasonable in a practical world.

the language: there is, of course, no reason for us to assume that we would have the same terms for the desk, its color, or our perceptions of it. with this, in theory, we have severed all expected ties between you and i in relation to our sharing the experience of the desk. i tell you that i see a green desk. you, of course, have no idea what i said. but with time and patience, simply repeating the words and pointing, i can relate to you that "desk" is what i call the object, and "green" is what i call the color.

perception: now that we know that it is a green desk, we have to figure out what a green desk is to us. for example, do you even notice that it has a drawer? do you see it as something other than a table? and the answers are that it doesn't matter.

the greater reality at ends with our shared realities: here is the monkey wrench. we can all accept that green could, in theory, be colorless and based only on the way that light is reflected off of one object and into our eyes. not only could the object not really be green, but the colors that we are seeing could not be the same whatsoever. if i could see what color you are seeing, maybe i would see that you are seeing only red, but that you see all red objects as "green." and conversely, if you saw what i was seeing, maybe you would see that i was seeing only blue and calling it green, as with all objects of similar ilk.

for the greater reality, there is no color (again, this is an assumption as i have no way of accurately interpreting the greater reality). in fact, for the greater reality, there isn't even a concept of color as the individual perception of any individual object has no bearing on the greater interdependent truth.

at this point in time, you and i have come to a relatable conclusion (that the desk is green). we came to it because of our incorrect shared perception of the greater reality, yet we are in agreement with each other ... accepting that even our agreement could be incorrect. but no matter what, our agreement with each other is more in tune than either of our perceptions to the greater reality.

further still, we have come to the (much easier to accept) agreement on the object being called a desk, regardless of the practical use. and the reason for such is that we can both see practical uses for the desk. the greater reality is, of course, not concerned with the practical applications of individual objects. for the greater reality, the desk (as are we) is just a non-random collection of molecules that, in whole, make up the universe. there is no concept of individual objects or and specific collection of molecules.

--

of course, this distinction is of little importance to our realities or the point of this post. no, the effort is to discover why it is that my reality is not the most important reality. and really, so far i have merely demonstrated two things. one, that my reality is not similar to the truer reality despite being dependent upon it. and two, that if i show effort, i can get you to see my reality easier than either of us can see the greater reality.

these things only go further to reinforce the notion that my reality is more important -- a notion that i believe is incorrect.

--

where i am trying to get: i want to demonstrate that the actions of individuals should be based on a conscious realization of interdependence. but the more i think about it, the further i get. nonetheless, i have found myself at the same conclusion accepting only my own reality plus one not-so-risky assumption: the realities of all individuals have the same value.

why? well, because anything i can say about my reality, any other individual can say about theirs. at the same time, i know that all of the individual realities are dependent upon the greater reality.

using that, i see that if i base my actions upon what i believe is best for the greater reality (no matter how wrong i am), i will be doing what is right for the greatest number of people, starting with and mainly benefiting my own reality.

no matter how wrong i am because the greater reality is not concerned with individuality at all, so i cannot be wrong. the greatest number of people because despite the discrepancies in shared realities, all realities are dependent upon the greater one.

i don't really know if any of that made sense. maybe i will come back and read it later on and see if i still think so. if that is the case, i may make some edits. oh ... and the photos: the top one is just a photo of the sunrise. the sunrise and sunset are probably the most common misperceptions of light -- after all, the sky certainly does not change color, if it has any color at all. the second image is of immanuel kant, whose discussions of duty and a priori v. a posteriori has influenced this entry a great deal.

the first addendum: i should note that i believe that to act on behalf of the greater reality is often manifested on an individual level by doing what is best for the individuals involved. and that to be incorrect about other realities mattering more than my own in judging how i should act has little consequence. after all, if i created it all, than i created it to act with agape, adore and consideration.