Concepts

Reality

Studying Rosicrucianism introduced me to the concept of actuality vs reality. The problem in using the concept of reality as a measure of truth, they say, is that none of us can experience the reality of another person or being. The reason for this, of course, is that each of us can only interpret the environment around us with the help of sense organs integrated into our physical bodies.

I use my eyes to identify a color or shape, for example. You use your eyes to do the same. We can communicate and agree that what we see is a given shape or color. However, we cannot literally see through another set of eyes. We cannot interpret that visual stimuli in the way another does. In short, we have no way to know if the way we interpret the world around us is the same way another does.

Of course, there are methods of dealing with this, if there weren’t, we’d have a much harder time creating stuff like language and society. In fact, we have all agreed (by way of early childhood socialization) on foundational Truths, such as the real-ness of the physical, and the un-real-ness of the non-physical.

Despite these large-scale shared Truths, they are still, at the end of the day, a part of our own, unique, personal reality.

Actuality

So, if we all experience our own unique reality that no other living being can experience, what, if anything, exists outside of that? What holds our shared realities?

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