is our reality simply based on our perception through our senses that is not always accurate? If our senses can deceive us, does that mean that reality can deceive us as well?
2006-08-29 15:11:19 · 11 answers · asked by Anonymous in Arts & Humanities ➔ Philosophy
Ok..for those of you who STILL aren't getting it, I used the seeds as an example of sensory perception. It is said that what we perceive through our senses: sight, touch, hearing, taste and smell, is what defines our perception and our perception is what defines OUR reality. Well, if our senses deceive us, then are we decieving ourselves with our own concept of reality?
2006-08-29 17:20:25 · update #1
Whether reality has a consciousness is debatable.
I tent to believe that reality is complex enough to be self-conscious -- emerging out of the chaotic lower functional living activities. It is a direct analogy to a person having a large number of individual living cells all working closely within the body to form our consciousness.
In that sense, it is not entirely impossible for us to say reality is dependent of our working, that however does not stop it from interfering with our reality by whatever means it has that we are not aware of. Whether it has evolved enough to have an ability to deceive us could not be answered. It might require conscious communications between people and the consciousness of reality to determine its level of development.
Yet, it remains a possibility for reality to deceive us.
2006-08-29 17:21:55 · answer #1 · answered by : ) 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Whoa dude. How do you get from the first half of your question to the second half? The philosophical term, I'm afraid to say, is "non sequitor."
You don't hear a single millet seed because the sound it makes is not loud enough for a human to hear. What does this have to do with "reality deceiving us"?
Our experience of reality is based on our perceptions, which have limits to them, and other peculiarities (such as a small section of the electromagnetic continuum being perceptible as visible light, and the tiny subsections of that being experienced by us as different colors, for one example).
Understanding how perception and our brain's processing of our perceptions works is a useful thing. Gives perspective (and is hecka interesting). We don't have a direct pipeline, as it were.
I have a problem with the phrase "reality deceives us" -- reality just is, it doesn't sit around thinking "I'll trick those fools." Are our perceptions sometimes mis-leading? Well, there's the old chestnut involving a straight stick partly submerged looking bent.
That doesn't mean that all of our perceptions are inaccurate -- we wouldn't be able to function at all if that were the case.
2006-08-29 22:28:51 · answer #2 · answered by tehabwa 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Of course, reality deceives us continually. However, consider, how do we define "reality"? Can the same circumstance be a different reality for different people? When it's cold the reality is that it is pleasant for some, uncomfortable for others. Some jokes are funny to some, offensive to others. Reality is closer to being the same as perception rather than deception. Our reality is what we perceive.
2006-08-29 23:12:27 · answer #3 · answered by kingtut 1 · 1⤊ 1⤋
perception and reality are synonymous and so if one deceives it follows that the other does too.
Are their realities outside our perception? Inaccurate and self-limiting as it is, perception does not capture every perceptible realities. If it does, it becomes our reality. Often we call this non-perceived realities as 'unknown' but not necessarily unreal.
Continue learning your 'unknown' and expand your perception. Don't get disappointed if at the end you realized it can never end. That's the essence of knowing.
2006-08-30 00:04:18 · answer #4 · answered by Henr 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋
reality is created by our mind, so no, "reality" can't decieve us because there is no actual truth or "reality" other than the one we live in which is not the same as anyone elses reality.
(and as far as the millet seed thing, one seed does make a sound, just not a very loud sound and we don't hear it)
2006-08-30 00:25:57 · answer #5 · answered by phalsephasod 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Not being able to hear an unmagnified sound has nothing to do with perception. It's like saying not being able to see a germ without the help of a microscope somehow changes how we perceive the structure of living things.
It only means the human ear can't hear all sounds.
2006-08-29 22:41:35 · answer #6 · answered by Doc Watson 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
I'll give you a quote that sums up my theory on "reality", it's from George Orwell's, 1984:
"The so-called laws of nature were nonsense. The law of gravity was nonsense. 'If I wished,' O'Brien had said, 'I could float off this floor like a soap bubble.' Winston worked it out. 'If he thinks he floats off the floor, and if I simultaneously think I see him do it, then the thing happens.'" There is no reality which is not created in our own heads. It makes no difference what 'really' goes on, only what our own minds choose to believe.
2006-08-30 00:55:26 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
Yes, we always want quick answers. Rather know the truth in tough way, we deceive our self quickly.
2006-08-30 08:29:53 · answer #8 · answered by menova 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
More than one millet seed dropping.
2006-08-29 22:24:27 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
What then is reality?
2006-08-29 23:09:17 · answer #10 · answered by NANCY K 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋