What is "real"?

A real discussion of what the word means really does need a context. And it immediately gets into complexity and ambiguity. Like (3), which looks good except that unfortunately this definition is flawed because it leaves out the entire world of inner experience that exists but is not a "thing" of objective reality, as in emotional states.

"real" as an adjective:

1. True; not merely ostensible, nominal, or apparent: the real reason for an act.

or

2. Existing or occurring as fact; actual rather than imaginary, ideal, or fictitious: a story taken from real life.

or

3. Being an actual thing; having objective existence; not imaginary: The events you will see in the film are real and not just made up.

or

4. Being actually such; not merely so-called: a real victory.

or

5. Genuine; not counterfeit, artificial, or imitation; authentic: a real antique; a real diamond; real silk.

or

6. Unfeigned or sincere: real sympathy; a real friend.

or

7. Informal. absolute; complete; utter: She's a real brain.

or

adverb:

Informal. very or extremely: You did a real nice job painting the house.

or

noun:

Real number

The real. Something that actually exists, as a particular quantity. Reality in general.
 
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A real discussion of what the word means really does need a context. And it immediately gets into complexity and ambiguity. Like (3), which looks good except that unfortunately this definition is flawed because it leaves out the entire world of inner experience that is "real" but is not objective reality, as in emotional states.

3. Being an actual thing; having objective existence; not imaginary: The events you will see in the film are real and not just made up.
But inner experience has objective existence, and more so as we get cleverer poking around in the brain. If it had no objective existence, I could not distinguish you from a rock in terms of mental abilities.

But, you're right, definition 3 lacks something: The requirement that real thing have effects on other things.

~~ Paul
 
But inner experience has objective existence, and more so as we get cleverer poking around in the brain.


Please explain how a person (presumably through a laboratory instrument) can observe the objective existence in the brain of the actual experience of the color yellow or the emotion love, as opposed to some sort of neural correlate to it. All you can observe is effects in the excitation of neurons or in behavior, not the essence of what it is to be aware and experience. Try to measure this in units of length, width and depth, or mass and energy. Of course this goes back to the old argument over Chalmers' "hard problem".
 
If it exists independently and has no effect on anything else, then how do we know it exists?

If the existence of a thing is indistinguishable from its nonexistence, we say that thing does not exist. ---Yahzi

By sourcing reality in epistemics rather than ontics, we would have to say that "other worlds" (e.g. the worlds of Multiple Universe Theory) *could not* be real. I think that's too strong...though I doubt that they are real. If those worlds do actually independently exist, then they are real, regardless of whether or not we know about them.

I also don't think that ontic reality depends at all on the "meaning" that we give to it, or what sentence it is constructed in.
 
Please explain how a person (presumably through a laboratory instrument) can observe the objective existence in the brain of the actual experience of the color yellow or the emotion love, as opposed to some sort of neural correlate to it. All you can observe is effects in the excitation of neurons or in behavior, not the essence of what it is to be aware and experience. Try to measure this in units of length, width and depth, or mass and energy. Of course this goes back to the old argument over Chalmers' "hard problem".
Why do I have to have your experience in order to claim that it has objective existence? Evidence for objective existence doesn't require being or experiencing the thing under study. It just requires reasonably replicable observation of correlates of the thing. I can't see gravity or mass, but they have objective existence.

And even if you do require that I experience your mind, do you want to claim that I will never be able to do so?

~~ Paul
 
By sourcing reality in epistemics rather than ontics, we would have to say that "other worlds" (e.g. the worlds of Multiple Universe Theory) *could not* be real. I think that's too strong...though I doubt that they are real. If those worlds do actually independently exist, then they are real, regardless of whether or not we know about them.
But since we don't know if they actually exist, we cannot say whether they are real. There is no point in talking about things that are real even though they have no effect on us. In that case, the invisible pink hamster orbiting Neptune exists, along with every god ever invented.

I agree that there are real things that we do not know about. But that is all we can say.

I also don't think that ontic reality depends at all on the "meaning" that we give to it, or what sentence it is constructed in.
I don't know what this means.

~~ Paul
 
But since we don't know if they actually exist, we cannot say whether they are real.

Right. But that's a different question. A question of epistemics.

There is no point in talking about things that are real even though they have no effect on us. In that case, the invisible pink hamster orbiting Neptune exists, along with every god ever invented.

Well, I didn't say that, at all. That seems to be verging on saying that *because* we cannot say for sure that something doesn't exist, therefore it exists. And I've never said anything like that. What I was saying is that a definition of real based on interaction must be incomplete or flawed if things could exist in principle, without us knowing about them. But I don't think that things could be real at all without existing independently or depending upon existing things...thus I think it is a deeper and more correct definition.

I agree that there are real things that we do not know about. But that is all we can say.

There *might* be. But that there simply can be...is my point.

I don't know what this means.

I was responding to others who claimed that reality was somehow dependent upon "the context."
 
Right. But that's a different question. A question of epistemics.
Aren't questions of real versus not real all epistemological questions? How can we possibly know what actually exists?

Well, I didn't say that, at all. That seems to be verging on saying that *because* we cannot say for sure that something doesn't exist, therefore it exists. And I've never said anything like that. What I was saying is that a definition of real based on interaction must be incomplete or flawed if things could exist in principle, without us knowing about them.[/quote]
What does it mean for something to exist in principle? If our world is the same with or without the thing, then the thing does not exist.

But I don't think that things could be real at all without existing independently or depending upon existing things...thus I think it is a deeper and more correct definition.
I don't think you're getting anywhere when you say "real things are things that exist." It sounds circular to me.

There *might* be. But that there simply can be...is my point.
I don't see why things that we don't know about should be said to be real.

~~ Paul
 
Aren't questions of real versus not real all epistemological questions? How can we possibly know what actually exists?

Again though, the question of what we can know actually exists, and what actually exists, are not the same question.

What does it mean for something to exist in principle? If our world is the same with or without the thing, then the thing does not exist.

It means that something could exist without our knowing about it. We might one day discover bacteria on Mars, but if so, it will almost certainly have been there for a very long time, before we knew about it.

I don't think you're getting anywhere when you say "real things are things that exist." It sounds circular to me.

What I said was things that *independently* exist or that depend upon other things that independently exist. I'd be entertained to hear a definition of real that managed to leave that out.

I don't see why things that we don't know about should be said to be real.

Because they would be real. Is that not reason enough?
 
There are two definitions of real according to our metaphysics: if we are idealists / constructivists, then real is what can be perceived. If we are materialists / realistics, then real is what happens in space-time.
 
Wow : That's a highly controversial issue that has been debated by philosophers , ancient wisdom ...since time memorial lol .

QM has by the way been challenging classical realism ,the latter in the sense that there is a so-called independent objective reality out there that's allegedly independent from the observer .
I'm not asking people to give a "what the 'experts' say" definition. I'm asking what they mean when they use the term. Also I'm puzzled why the meaning of a term would be debated by philosophers. I'd guess that they have a definition and are mulling the application of that definition. But . ..[shrug]
 
Again though, the question of what we can know actually exists, and what actually exists, are not the same question.
I agree, but there is no point in defining real to encompass things we cannot know.

It means that something could exist without our knowing about it. We might one day discover bacteria on Mars, but if so, it will almost certainly have been there for a very long time, before we knew about it.
And so then we will add it to the set of known real things.

What I said was things that *independently* exist or that depend upon other things that independently exist. I'd be entertained to hear a definition of real that managed to leave that out.
My definition is the real things are things that have some effect on other real things. I don't think using the word exist is useful.

Because they would be real. Is that not reason enough?
I agree that it is reasonable to say "There are probably things we don't know about that interact with things we do know about." From that it follows that those things are real.

We need to differentiate between the definition of real and the sets of known real things and hypothesized real things.

~~ Paul
 
There are two definitions of real according to our metaphysics: if we are idealists / constructivists, then real is what can be perceived. If we are materialists / realistics, then real is what happens in space-time.
But in both cases those real things interact with us.

~~ Paul
 
I'm not asking people to give a "what the 'experts' say" definition. I'm asking what they mean when they use the term. Also I'm puzzled why the meaning of a term would be debated by philosophers. I'd guess that they have a definition and are mulling the application of that definition. But . ..[shrug]

Philosophers love this kind of stuff - especially definitions. But it sure can make your head hurt at times.

My Best,
Bertha
 
Hmmm . .I'd say no. Not the definition of words. That's - at its most complex - more a type of semantics.
Pffft. Definition of words is a philosophy in itself for some philosophers. Wittgenstein is pretty famous regarding use of language.

My Best,
Bertha
 
Pffft. Definition of words is a philosophy in itself for some philosophers. Wittgenstein is pretty famous regarding use of language.

My Best,
Bertha
Philosophy of language deals with meaning - not definition. Though commonly treated as similar - even interchangeable- terms, they are not.
 
I'm not asking people to give a "what the 'experts' say" definition. I'm asking what they mean when they use the term. Also I'm puzzled why the meaning of a term would be debated by philosophers. I'd guess that they have a definition and are mulling the application of that definition. But . ..[shrug]

Chill, bro .

What people might or might not think depends largely on their own cultures , beliefs or world views , education, nurture, experience , knowledge, intelligence in the larger sense ....

People do not think out of a vacuum, so to speak .Every one here and elsewhere would try to answer your question through the filter of his /her own world view or beliefs that do shape their consciousnesses and thus behavior .

There are also biological psychological environmental cultural and other factors that do shape human thought and thus behavior ,especially when it comes to what they 'think " reality might be thus .

What we take for granted as reality , for example, is mainly just a product of the mutual interactions between our consciousnesses and between the "outer " environment through our senses and thus brain= through perception .

Materialists positivists , for example, would say that only what is observed is real , only the observed physical or material is real .

Only what we feel, see , hear , learn , touch , smell ,taste is "real " : only what we sense or perceive is real , except optical and other illusions and delusions that is .

Non-materialist world views think differently : they assume that there are levels of reality out there people can reach or approach only through the corresponding higher levels of consciousness,as they assume also that some sober forms of extra-sensory perception is also real .

On the other hand , mentally ill people like schizophrenics , psychopaths , people with hallucinations, , depressed people , anxious people , people with obsessive compulsory disorder , people with some specific brain damage have different views of what reality might be from relatively healthy or happy people .

So,You're implicitly asking a question about the very nature of reality , not just what reality means . When one asks what is reality , or what reality means, that's not a question about just the meaning or definition of reality but also about its nature .

What is reality ? = what is the nature of reality ?

What does reality mean ? = that's not just a matter of definition but also a matter of meaning thus ,and meaning is also a matter of morality and ethics or world view .

Furthermore , the meaning ,definition or nature of any concept such as reality are also philosophical questions and hence a matter of world view .


Even science itself tries to answer the question regarding the nature of reality, its own way ( science used to say that reality was just a mental construct , and philosophy used to say that reality is just a social construct ..)

.QM. for example, has been challenging classical realism , classical locality as well as classical determinism ,which means that what we take for granted as the nature of reality might not be deterministic ,causally closed or objective as classical physics made people believe it was .

Religions do deliver also their own versions of what the nature of reality might be .

But if you 're just asking people what they think reality is or what real is ,then , each person would have his/her own definition or meaning of reality , and mainly in accordance with one's own culture or system of beliefs, experience . knowledge , education.....

Our own conceptions of what reality might be or mean depend thus largely on our cultures , beliefs or world views , nurture , environment , education, knowledge , experiences ...

Western cultures ,for example, have been dominated by the materialist world view or conception of nature , philosophy ,ideology ....at all levels , not only at the level of philosophy , exact sciences , but also at the level of human sciences , history writing , politics , ethics and morality,society ...

Democracy.for example, , its economic capitalist wing , liberalism ,secularism , humanism ....are thus just products of a certain secular world view regarding the nature of reality .

Eastern cultures, on the other hand , have their different take on the nature of reality .

Long story thus .

P.S.: I personally think that the ultimate nature of reality is spiritual ,which also means that the so-called physical reality is an illusion .But then again , i am a child of my own culture , upbringing , education, relative knowledge .....in that regard too ,so .

Better still , i also think that if one wanna know about the real nature of reality (what is reality or what it means thus, really ) , one has to look within by trying to know the self and hence by letting go of the false illusory ego .

But , that's just me indeed .

.
 
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