It seems; realism, as the subjective self accepts is – brain’s choice (mostly randomized) of elements from the ambient milieu. Therefore, both ‘Fact & Fiction’ are equally entitled to being Realism. There are both tangible and intangible elements in any milieu. Consciousness (subjective self) as the navigation mapping mechanism, facilitated by the brain, accepts both elements with equal ease.
Interestingly, all tangibles acquire form and content from the intangibles of life and all intangibles attain utility and suitability from tangibles. Therefore, it seems, realism is an eclectic mix of Fact & Fiction. However, it depends on early childhood milieu and initial experiences of a person, whether this mix has more fact or more fiction. It seems, in contemporary milieu of most popular cultures, both men and women are growingly having a subjective consciousness with more fiction and less fact inclinations.
I present below, a discourse, which I came through in public domain. The entire idea may seem hugely confusing but believe me, it is a huge benefit to challenge our subjective perceptions about realism. There is always a benefit in extending the limits of our consciousness self. The preface above is just an introduction to what always is probability at any stage of our living experience. We remain caught between our perceptions of fact and fiction. It seems, this conundrum is our mechanism. However, understanding this mechanism can surely help in deciphering some bare-basics of life-living experiences. It goes like –
“If there is anything about which we feel sure, it is that the world we experience is real. We can see, touch and hear it. We can lift heavy and solid objects; hurt ourselves, if we're not careful, against their unyielding immobility. It seems undeniable that out there, around us, independent and apart from us, stands a physical world, utterly real, solid and tangible. But all is not what it seems.
“First, the apparently solid table in front me is, it turns out, far from solid. And second, we assume that we are directly experiencing the world around; that the colors we see and the sounds we hear are there, around us, just as we experience them. But even an elementary study of the processes of perception show that in this, too, we are much mistaken.
“All that I see, hear, taste, touch, smell and feel has been created from the data fed to me by my sensory organs. All I ever know of the world around are the images produced in the mind. I think I am seeing the tree "out there", in the world around me. But all that I am actually experiencing is the image created in the mind.
“This simple fact is very hard to grasp. It runs totally counter to all our experience. There seems nothing more certain than the fact that I am seeing the world as it is, around me. But however nonsensical it may sound, this is the conclusion we are forced to make.
“The world we experience around us is no more "out there" than are our dreams. However real it may seem, it is, in the final analysis, all in the mind. We never experience the physical world directly; all we ever know is the image of the world generated in our awareness. And that image is no more “out there” than are the images of our dreams. We may find it hard to come to terms with the fact that our normal waking experience of reality is a manifestation within the mind, but in many other instances we readily accept that we create our experiences.
“The entire concept of virtual reality is founded on the understanding that the brain is a reality generator as much as an information processor. In all these instances of illusory or artificial realities, we readily accept that the confusing or abnormal perception stems from the way the brain creates our experience of reality. Yet when it comes to our normal waking experience, the base state in which these so-called "illusions" occur, we adopt the opposite position. We feel that we are experiencing the world as it is, "out there" in front of us. But how could the illusory perception be an image in our mind, yet the world in which the illusion occurs be the physical world around us?
“Many other creations of the mind we dismiss as hallucinations. These are typical experiences, which occur under the influence of drugs, and during illness, extreme fatigue or stress. For one reason or another the electro-chemical processes are modified in some way, leading the brain to generate a different image of reality. One may perceive unusual colors or patterns, perceive time and space differently, or experience some other non-ordinary manifestation in consciousness.
“We call such images hallucinations because they do not concur with our normal experience of reality, or with the reality that other people experience. We say we are seeing things that are not really there. But, surprising as it may at first seem, this is what we are doing all the time. Even in normal, everyday perception, the kind we all agree upon, we are seeing things that are not really there. Color, sound, smell, and all the other qualities of experience are not qualities of the physical world; they exist only in the mind.
“The fact that we create our experience of reality does not imply that there is no underlying reality. When a tree falls in the forest, there is a specific event that is happening in the physical world. There is something that gives rise to my perception, and to your perception -- and to the perception of a bird sitting on one of its branches. But we know nothing of that event directly. All we know are the experiences created in our minds.
“As a contemporary analogy, we might liken the situation to the image created on a computer screen. Within the central processor of the computer are numerous bits of information, encoded as electronic states in the circuitry of the chips. Software in the computer processes this data, putting it into a form that when sent to the monitor causes it to light the screen in particular ways. The image that is created may be derived from the data in the central processor, but it is not the same as the data. The computer is not producing some faithful imitation of an image held in memory. All there is, is code; microscopic electronic switches that are either “on'; or “off”. There is no color or light in the computer code, and the spatial layout of the data on the chip bears very little resemblance to the layout of the final image.
“It is important to distinguish between two ways in which we use the word "reality". There is the reality we experience, our image of reality; and there is the underlying reality that we never know directly, but which is the source of our experience. In Indian philosophy these two realities are sometimes referred to as the Absolute and the Relative. The Absolute is the underlying reality. It does not change according to who is experiencing it. It is, as it is, an independent reality. The Relative is the reality we observe, the reality generated in our minds. There is just one Absolute; but there are numerous relative realities, each relative to a particular experiencer at a particular point in space and time.
“How we construct our image of the world is determined by our sensory organs and nervous system. Most human beings have very similar sensory organs -- my eye, for example, is virtually identical to yours -- and the neural processing of the sensory data follows very similar pathways. We receive the same data, analyze it in the same way, and so create very similar pictures of reality -- unless, that is, a person is color-blind, near-sighted, or tone deaf, in which case we make allowances for our different perceptions
“The fact that we seldom disagree on our experience of reality reinforces our assumption that we are seeing reality as it is. But if we could communicate with other creatures we would find our naive assumption severely shaken. Dogs, for example, hear higher frequencies of sound than we do, and their noses detect a far wider range of molecules. If we could put ourselves in a dog's mind we would find a somewhat different perception of reality.”
Our tacit assumption that we perceive the world as it is, has become so deeply ingrained that it is very hard indeed to appreciate that our image of reality is a construction within our own mind. Even when we intellectually accept the fact, as eventually we must, it is still extremely difficult not to see the image we have created as "out there".
In fact, we will probably always see it this way. But that is not to say it is not possible to see it otherwise. It may be that spiritual adepts who have made a deep personal investigation into the nature of the mind, explored the workings of their own consciousness, and witnessed the arising of experience, have come to see it that way. Throughout the mystical and spiritual literature of the world are examples of individuals who have claimed that the whole world is within them rather than around them, as most of us experience. Thousands of years back, rational humans warned us all that what we all accept as real is ‘maya’… science is not new to us….
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