Reality

[andrewducker]

Trying again, because the previous wording was causing problems.

[Poll #157777]

Edit: I'd be interested in justifications for (3) from anyone that voted that way.

Comments

[cleodhna.livejournal.com]

Oops. Ticked the wrong radio button. Meant to tick number two and then add the qualifier: There is an objective reality and our perceptions reflect it somewhat, coloured by our experiences and their imperfections, and our physical and biological limitations.

[wolflady26.livejournal.com]

That wording is more clear. Because before I thought:

Of course there is some kind of reality, but from our subjective perspective, we have no way of really understanding it, and another person's subjective idea of reality might be so completely different from mine that it makes the whole concept of reality subjective. So I picked three, then changed to two, then thought of changing it back to three.

This wording makes it very clear that my answer should be two, because to pick three would basically mean that nothing exists outside ourselves, and I can't see that as being viable. That would mean that Andrew doesn't exist, and I just created the illusion of someone else posting this poll so that it appeared on my computer, when actually it doesn't exist at all, I just imagined it. And I think Andrew could effectively debate that he exists, and could make the exact same argument that I don't, and he just imagined this response to his poll.

[autodidactic.livejournal.com]

Because reality is holographic, things are shaped by the observer and the time/angle/etc. And also because the answer is cooler and makes me feel more like I could influence things. And because my previous answer was not a mistake.

A.

[drainboy.livejournal.com]

TWO THE ANSWER IS TWO!!!!

Do I get "the prize"?

However, my qualification of what constitutes "objective reality" is "nothing people outside theoretical physics below the quantum level ever talk about".

[yonmei.livejournal.com]

I didn't vote for (3), but it can be justified perfectly easily - you can't prove that the world is anything but our perceptions.

[andrewducker]

If there's an "us" to be perceiving, then that implies that the 'us' actually exists, and isn't just figment.

Figments have to be imagined in something, after all.

[spaj.livejournal.com]

it implies it, but does it prove it?

;)

Adam

[onceupon.livejournal.com]

Did you read that Sandman story arc, Dream of a Thousand Cats? It might just have been one issue, I only got it in trade.... Anyway. I think that pretty much sums things up for me.

Reality is what we make it. That's why voodoo is effective, and our observations of quarks change the very nature of the quarks. That's why monks can sit on mountain tops in the middle of a snow storm and not be cold.

I could go on, but I'm hungry. Perhaps I'll get lunch and then continue this.

Re: Reality

[wolfieboy.livejournal.com]

I answered #2 because it makes more intuitive sense and I like my intuition. But then, considering that Bohr's model of the atom makes more intuitive sense than the quantum model, it's an iffy thing.

Then again, I suspect that I also flow between 2 and 3 as necessary depending on conceptual models I'm trying to manipulate.

[heron61.livejournal.com]

I picked 3, but in actuality, my answer probably lies around 2.5. I believe that there is some sort of underlying consistency, but that it is easily overlaid and to an extent reshaped by our perceptions. Given that I firmly believe that my rituals to bring money and similar good things actually work, this is the only reasonable view for me.

[rainstorm.livejournal.com]

i don't think an objective reality actually -matters- that much. seems strange to say so, but really what matters is what we perceive, because that's what we act on. i perceive i can't walk on air, so i can't and i don't.

if our perceptions are our senses and thought combined so what we feel, see, smell etc is all combined and then out brains say "that is so, so this must be!", then surely it doesn't matter if it's real or not.

i mean.. erm, geeky example. the holodeck in NextGen Star Trek - say you were on that, and you heard birds singing and wind blowing, you felt the breeze on your face and so on, to make you think you wer ein the countryside, would it actually -matter- that you weren't? that instead you were on a spaceship in the middle of nothing? that what you were touching was just gubbins made by the computer system on board?

have i strayed too much from the point?

[andrewducker]

Oh goodness yes, you're right. It's the perceptions that matter.

But I still believe there is an objective reality underlying things, otherwise my subjkective reality would look nothing like yours...

[rainstorm.livejournal.com]

i suppose. but then, you could be part of my subjective brain thoguths. you might not exist. i might be imagining all of this. i might not exist. you might be imagining all this.

and how do you know what i see as yellow you see as yellow (for example)? maybe what i see as yellow you see as blue or some other colour i have no word for because it doesn't exist. maybe how i see is how you smell. myabe what i think of as three dimensional you see s two dimensional?

[andrewducker]

Yup, but even if you are imagining all of this, there's still something which is 'you' and that exists. It's just that your perceptions are subjective and easily subverted.

"Subverted" - I love that word.

[derumi.livejournal.com]

Reality has to be observed to exist, hence it is all about the perception.

[andrewducker]

Reality has to be observed to exist

It does?

[kpollock.livejournal.com]

And if so, by what exactly?

(and what do you mean by 'observed'?)

[derumi.livejournal.com]

Well, what can you say is real, unless there's something or someone around to experience it? In current quantum theory, things must be observed in order to exist.

[andrewducker]

A quick browse of google groups determines that this view isn't actually held by many physicists. It's one of those "pop-sci" things which has spread too far.

The waveform collapses under certain conditions, including interaction with events above a certain size level. People happen to be one of them. But you can capture quantum events on photographic film just as well.

[derumi.livejournal.com]

Yes, but considering how many scientific and historical "truths" are disproven later, perception still has a lot to do with reality. As far as we are concerned.

Re:

[kpollock.livejournal.com]

Not as far as I understand quantum theory. IIRC, you are on about the Copenhagen Interpretation? It's only one of the options, which wax and wane in popularity. There are other explanations of quantum phenonema and even those that require a collapse of the wave function don't always require an 'observer'. Of course one could argue about what counts as an 'observer'.

[neferet.livejournal.com]

I went for (2), because (3) didn't fit, but then, neither does (2), mostly because I _think_ there is an objective reality, but I'm not totally convinced. Mainly, because they way we interact with the world is based through our perception of it, and I'm not certain how much of the 'objective reality' is exactly that, and how much is an ingrained, from birth, set of perceptions that are essentially necessary to survival... um, a mutually agreed perception, if you will.