To get a good foundation, we need to talk about existence and reality.
Something that is, exists. Aristotle probably put the first stake into the ground for that. Existence exists. This principle is also called "A is A" or "The Law of Identity". Now, at inconspicuous as that sounds, it's an axiom we need later so we'll make it strong and solid.
In mathematics, one finds axioms and builds on it. In physics things have to have a connection with reality - so the axioms themselves come under scrutiny. This is a good thing: We might never know the whole truth. But that is not an excuse to stop searching and let all ideas pass. We have to go with what we know. So we have to start with what we see, with what our senses give us. We can exercise reality by experiments. As much as we cannot prove something is true, we can often prove that something is not true. So we can separate the good ideas from the bad ones. The longer an idea survives this scrutiny, the more chance we have that we found a truth. Short - our existence gives us information about our environment and we act on the best understanding of it.
A few examples of this thinking:
- The world is real. The fact that atoms have so much empty space in them is not taking anything away from that reality. So is the fact our eyes are selectively ignoring a lot of irrelevant information not making everything relative - there are facts, and we can prove them.
- You have an identity. As romantic the thought might be that all men could be equal, you actually are different from other people. All men might be created equal in many ways, and the rights question is something I'll get to, passionately. But if you're better at something it's nothing to be ashamed of.
- There are no flying saucers. The fact that there might be is not relevant as long as there's nothing solid to stand on. We don't have to take its possibility into account when we decide on our actions.
We have many more neurons than most species. So we think a lot - as we call using those neurons. It gives us a thing we can call volition. This gives us the ability to rewire stuff - not feeling pain, not seeing things which are. This is an ability, a feature, not a bug. But it can be abused in many ways - including the denial of our own existence, to take it to the extreme.
Examples of such things are:
- Beliefs. Beliefs must be founded on facts. If they are, they're not beliefs anymore, but facts. If beliefs are not founded on facts, they're worthless because they are pulled out of nowhere. Creationism vs Evolution is such a thing - Creationism is not a theory but a belief. Evolution is a theory with a lot of proof.
- Religion. I may just lose a lot of potential readers, but allow yourself to be challenged if you believe. I'll write again about religion. Most aspects of religion talk about self-evident things. Love thy neighbour is equally reached through game theory or behaviour evolution. But there most probably is no god - there is just not enough evidence. Religion is a belief - you cannot hold it up in a reasonable manner, only with belief.
- The simulation argument. Like in the Matrix or in Sophie's World, there might be a super-reality in which ours is running. But since that simulator is unreachable to us by definition, it makes no sense to imagine it and draw conclusions on how to handle it. If it doesn't interact with us it just is none of our concern. It can be misused to draw conclusions on how we should behave. In that sense, it gets close to beliefs and religion again - you might be punished for bad behaviour when exiting the simulator.
Let me get back to evolution. As beautifully explained in "The Selfish Gene" we can have the following model: The soup of random chemicals are roaming in the ocean. Accidental chemical combinations build and disappear. Most don't have any long term effect - some limescale, some bubbles, but it all stays chaotic and entropically sound. Until at some point, a few molecules find together and start building genomes, pretty much by accidental chemistry. Now those genomes have the tendency to use other bits in the ocean to replicate. And that's what they're doing - there's no competition from any other process, so they have a field day. Soon, the whole ocean is full of RNA.
Now we go one level up. The RNA has different patterns. Maybe one has viral capabilities, breaking other RNA and inserting itself into others. A million strategies for survival develop and die, some of them survive. One is the one who develops a cell membrane - protecting itself against being broken up or tampered with. And we go from there, very slowly, to the multicellular organisms and up the ladder.
Now, if any of those cells does not react to the environment, ignoring the facts, it dies. The fact a cell ignores a virus because it is using unfair tactics and shouldn't do that will not make that cell survive any better. The best idea wins.
A dog might get religious feelings howling at the moon, but it won't help survival.
If we as people lose sight of reality, we lose. It might not be instantaneous. But A is A, reality exists, and if we follow the path of finding real, solid truths, we have an advantage over those who don't. In the long run, it will be the realists who have the advantage over those who waste time and energy on unprovable beliefs and delusions. Let's get real - it's a firm point to stand on.
Exercises
To analyze your understanding of that concept, think about the following:
- Try to find a definition for yourself for both belief and knowledge. What's the difference? You can start here.
- Think about the word 'reality'. First, read the wikipedia article about Reality and debunk the sentence "You might disagree, but in my reality, everyone goes to heaven." When you feel you stand firm, head over to Anti-realism and make sure you really understand why its indefensible.
If you disagree, please comment below. I ask all readers to contribute to help those who haven't grasped the concept, I will too. Try to find knowledge. If you belief in beliefs, you're out of luck, you lock yourself out in an unbreakable argumentative loop. Open up and seek to understand.
