Marijuana.com

imported_NiceGuy

This is a piece I wrote for my introductory Philosophy class. I recieved the highest grade in the class for the paper. See what you guys think. Please feel free to debate against my points of argument, as I'd like to retort to those to better both my affirmation in it, and better your understanding of my perspective.

James Sullivan
Philosophy, Introduction to

Perceptual reality vs. Objective reality

All of reality, in all functions and comprehensions, is determined by our perceptual reality. There is no objective reality. The perceptual reality is one that exists through an individual and is individual itself. An objective reality is one that exists in all cases, and is true for all things that exist. There is only the reality that is self perceived, and is perceived by the mind. There is not a reality that is universal, and holds no exceptions.
To begin, to better understand the concept of a perceptual reality, we must discuss the concept of self perception. Each human being is endowed with an individual mind that creates individual thoughts, and emotions, and gathers and comprehends information provided from its environment. And it could only be assumed that an individual mind could create, in itself, its own comprehension of what is “true” and what is “false” judging by the information gathered and comprehended.
Suppose two children upon a very young age, if not birth, were separated and placed into two different rooms for them to be raised in. The first child is given a school education, learning math, science, language, and history. He learns the many things that are accepted as knowledge. The second child is given no education, no idea of knowledge or concept. The first child learns many things, but only knows the memorization of the concepts and knowledge that he has been given. The first child knows gravity exists because he was taught so. The second child spends his time experiencing different things and gathering reason behind them. The second child knows gravity exists because when he jumps up, he falls down. The two children both understand the same concept, but understand it not only from a different source, but under different understandings. Certainly the first child would refer to gravity by its name, as he learned from his studies. The second child wouldn’t call this downward force gravity, for the word would not exist in his vocabulary. Based on this, are we to assume that one child is greater than the other based on their knowledge of gravity, despite having both of them understand the concept? Is knowing the name given to gravity more valuable than understanding the concept?
However, though their concepts differ, they are similar in one aspect – they are individual. Each child is given their own perception on what gravity is, and that understanding of reality is perceptual.
In opposition, we could say that even though their concepts of gravity differed, the fact remains that gravity existed – and that is the objective reality. Regardless of whether or not a human understands a concept or law, it does not take away that the law exists, or that the concept is unattainable. Gravity will always exist whether a person is able to conceive it, or whether they are knowledgeable about it.
A prime example is our own senses. One could say that we all touch, smell, taste, see, and hear, and that those senses alone are existent of an objective reality.
The only necessary response to those arguments is that reality exists only because we perceive it. Therefore, whether gravity existed or not, had one child not had a perception of reality then it would not exist. It is impossible for something to exist in an individual if it is not perceived. Without our mind’s understanding of a concept of law, it cannot logically be called a law being that it would not be true to that one individual.
In a retort to sense data, it is universally known that every single one of our senses is either flawed, or later becomes flawed. Our eyesight gets blurry, our hearing goes bad, our sense of smell fails, our touch goes numb. Therefore it is only arrogance that tells us that something is absolute because our senses tell us so.
The two children are again taken, and placed into a small room where there stands a table in the center and nothing else. They are given the question to show whether or not the table actually is standing there in front of them. The first child would say “yes”, in that he is able to see the table. The second child would reply “no” the table does not exist just because one is able to see it. The second child would argue that the table in front of them could be a picture, or an illusion. So, the first child would continue, and touch the table. He would then say that the table exists because he is able to touch it. The second child would touch the table as well and respond still that the table does not exist. The second child argues that what was touched is perceived as a table because the first child was educated to know that what was touched and seen is called “table”.
The first child is using sense data and knowledge to prove the existence of the table. However, the child only knows that it is a table because he was told so, educated so. Had the first child grown up like the second, he would too reason that perhaps the table does not exist, and that relying on force fed knowledge and his own sense data is not enough to prove the existence of the table. The knowledge that the table exists, that gravity exists, and that they themselves exist is knowledge that they do not self obtain. Their existence is shown to them through generations of history, and through those who educate them.
Moreover, the first child assumes without a doubt that his sense data is absolute and correct. The first child is unaware of the possibility that his eyes, his touch, his sense of smell, and his hearing are all comprehended by the mind. And, with all things, sense data is subject to human error. The first child may have poor eyesight; does that mean that a “clear” world to him is, in actuality, a blurry one? Does the first child, upon touching the table, progress his mind any further as to deduce what he is touching, or the texture of what is being touched? Our sense data has a history of failing: poor eye sight, loss in necessary nerves to feel, stuffy noses, a busted ear drum. Do these flaws in our sense data dictate any change in what we perceive from what others perceive?
The two children are symbolic examples of the differences between perception and objection. The first child knows much, but really knows nothing. The first child is without the power of reason and logic. Thus, the first child knows only what he is told. Gravity exists because Newton said it exists. The table exists because he was told that was a table. The second child was provided with the power of reason, and reasons that some kind of force, labeled gravity, exists because when he jumps in the air he falls down unwillingly. The second child reasons that the table may or may not exist, based on how reliable our sense data truly is.
Therefore, it can be deduced that an objective reality is in fact within the boundaries of a perceptual one. While an objective reality is widely understood, and accepted by many, it is a perceptual reality that has been taught. If we were to regress far enough, when these principles that later form an ideal of the objective reality were first created and understood, it was at the time an individual reality – or a perceptual one. The perceptual reality of that one individual was passed on to another, and another and another. The perceptual reality was passed on so far and became knowledge, which in turn became the objective reality that people perceive today.
Thus, in bringing all of the elements together, we can determine this: A perceptual reality is existent over an objective reality because the objective reality, at some point, fell into the domain of the perceptual one. From that perception spawned the knowledge and educated concepts that become passed down through generations. These concepts of knowledge are overestimated. Our sensory data alone, because of it’s history of faults, is not solely reliable enough to determine whether or not something exists, such as the table. Certainly we would not comprehend that our senses were flawed unless we had been told so, because of the function of knowledge, and how it is transferred. So, under the notion that one was not told of the flaw in their senses, they would assume that they were correct in saying that the table existed because they can see it. Furthermore, perceptual reality outweighs the concept of an objective reality in that it is more reliant on reason – a perception of one’s mind, which, as we’ve already determined, is more powerful than the general senses of our body. Our perceptual reality can be created by logical reasoning, which determines knowledge, which determines our objective reality. Without a perceptual reality, an objective one would not exist.

 

SmasheR

__________________

Left the philly at home, do you have another? I wanna get blunted my brother..

imported_NiceGuy

I would expect a response like that from you Smasher. Thank you.

dreamsurge

Agreed.

__________________
The only reason weed is illegal is because the police must make their quota. Most drug-users arrested are, in fact, stoners.
In short, EVERYONE SMOKES THIS GREEN PIECE OF HEAVEN!!!

ssteaco

what about some faraway, uninhabited planet? if nothing is alive on that planet to experience it, does it mean that it doesn't exist? this kind of goes back to the whole 'tree falling in a forest' thing, but there was a reality long before life came along to percieve it.

__________________
mistakes happen, that's why we're alive

 

XT Dream

"Basically, We are all humans and as such create what we want 'to believe' with our minds with how we percieve the world and everything containing; combined with all of the knowledge we have come to learn in our Life."

__________________
" Jobs and Haircuts.
Two of my greatest fears.
Reality too.
Amen.

imported_NiceGuy

If we have not perceived the planet, then we cannot say it exists. Conversely, we cannot say it does not exist because we either might not possess the comprehensive abilities to perceive it, or just haven't perceived it yet. However, being that we are arrogant human beings who feel that, because of our ability to reason, we know or can know everything, then it would be more reasonable or probable that such a planet does exist and we have just not yet found it. We can assume that because space is so large, and because we've only discovered an undeterminable fraction of it, that such a planet would indeed exist. The focus of perceptual reality focusses more on the tangible things (planets in space not yet discovered) vs intangible things (God, or something I cannot even create an idea for)

smokeydokey

Lolz U Put Ur Real Name !!!111
Im Gunna Leik Stalk U N' Stuff Lollllzzz!!!111
I <3 Teh Intranet

homemadebubbler

I'm taking intro to philosophy too (and I'm still in high school), its a crazy class man. We watched this video on quantem physics. Fucking mind blowing.

Nice shit man, although I admit, I cant make it all the way through.

__________________
When they took the 4th Amendment away I was quiet because I didnt deal drugs//When they took the 6th Amendment away I was quiet because Id never been arrested//When they took the 2nd Amendment away I was quiet because I didnt own a gun//Now they took the 1st Amendment and all I can do is be quiet...

SmasheR

Haha oh Niceguy it never gets old that your name is James Sullivan.