Reality is an Illusion- Einstein; Question, is an Illusion False or True?

The meme: “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.” -Albert Einstein Second dialogue below: Rob CK is illusion a false thing or a true thing?🙄 Reply Share 1dEdited Mark Rego Monteiro Rob CK Great question. Short answer, both, depending. Einstein here is also a great case study. Einstein trained as a physicist with philosophical orientation. He came to comment also on "epistemology," with a scientific emphasis. His comments about "reality" come from a scientific basis primarily, with much less insight in detail of the psychosocial studies philosophical disciplines that already had some important advances and shifts taking place in his days. He had a schizophrenic son, for example, and he never took advantage of Freud´s diverging student Wilhelm Reich´s successful treatment of a schizophrenic. We might note two aspects. Our individual existential perception of the Sun is that it rises in the East and sets in the West. That´s true for most practical tasks, meaning "that frame of reference." It´s only false from the point of view of empirical scientific and mathematical philosophical knowledge. It can also be framed as simply less true. A similar dynamic can be noted for the shift from Newtonian classical mechanics in scientific philosophy to Einstein´s relativistic physics, and then in turn Quantum mechanics in the subatomic realm. But that´s just mostly the narrow scientific angle. The broader empirical philosophical angle already presents what is really a more complex frame of reference, the psychosocial and symbolic realms of phenomena and knowledge, which includes the human development and use of "science" in the first place. The illusion might start with "science" being the "truth." Einstein, for one, already knew the term "epistemology," and so had a foot in the door, to that degree. Wilhelm Reich´s divergence from Freud, and successful treatment of a schizophrenic already suggests more. Max Weber in the 1920s was one of a group of psychosocial philosophers and scholars who formulated antipositivism and interpretivism to designate the distinction in the human realm from the scientific physical realm that had spawned logical positivism and then, or as part of, scientific materialism. Developments were bubbling in the psychosocial domains, with anthropologist B Malinowski doing field studies with Asian-based tribes and developing functionalism, or is it structuralism? His idea was based on human needs. Behavioral anthropologist ED Chapple drew on Pavlov´s salivating dog conditioning for the basic "symbol" biology, and more, including JB Watson´s Little Albert experiment with a baby and a rabbit, to develop emotional-interactional foundations of anthropology. In the spiritual-religious studies area, we can also note Mircae Eliade´s profane-sacred type concepts, and all being corralled in the developing field of comparative religious studies. Einstein´s own relative openness also characterized the spiritual angles he was capable of, as in his recognition of Jesus´ historicity based on the quality of the NT, and Einstein´s recognition of Gandhi´s spectacular accomplishment at his death, "Who would believe that one such as he ever walked upon the Earth?" Connecting all the dots there illuminates the levels of "illusions" and "lesser or greater more false or truer realities." &&& Doreen Davis-Ward 'Reality is formed by any number of an individuals experiences, education, culture, understanding, mental health, socialization etc., and therefore very much just that... individualistic ... inthat sense it is illusion. It doesn't mean it's any less felt or seen, but determined by and understood on an individuals level of understanding. Reply Share 2d Mark Rego Monteiro Doreen Davis-Ward Good scope in your starting an assessment. Individualistic points of view have gained broader recognition in modern times because of a very specific shared community framework, that the categories you mention derive from. In fact, I think you are implying that the individualist side is somewhat illusory without actually articulating the substantive reality of the psychosocial foundations. Common trends include ideological free individualistic materialism, with three main versions in secular, economic, and scientific. Individual ideological freedom is the focus. They are commonly referred to as Western Civilization. In fact, it is in Jesus´ legacy, to ground the term "Christianity" in a less easily stereotyped empirical term. I might offer the suggestion, building on others, that as any of us engage in spiritual practice, our self-awareness is encouraged, developed, or reinforced, that allows us to situate an externalized and objectified materialist view of "individualism" to an interdependent, interrelated spiritualized and responsible individualism in community and society. Spiritual and social responsibility has been a key focus there. An excellent case study of the forces in play took place when some number of UK Quaker Friends were acting in George Fox et al´s own component legacy for God through Jesus. The Quaker Friends by the 1780s were agitating against slavery, that inspired University-based activity, with essay winner T Clarkson becoming galvanized. He then joined a group of Quaker Friends and other Christians dissenting from the establishment Anglican church and other denominations, including W Wilberforce. Clarkson thus led the crucial organizing and research of the pioneering modern social movement campaign. Quaker lead co-founder George Fox had his context in British culture, its advanced educational culture since the likes of Alcuin the monk from around the year 800 and Charlemagne´s day, but up through the founding of two powerhouse Universities by monks who studied at either the U of Bologna or Paris, the latter where the monk Thomas Aquinas emerged from studying with Albertus Magnus to pivotal efforts. Thus, the little educated George Fox´s spiritual brilliance outside big city London in innovating silent meditative worship, stopping bowing to aristocrats, valuing individuals and women, and protesting injustice by 1650 is noteworthy. As is its convergence with University culture, and expression by individuals organizing in society at large. Newton´s and Locke´s own emergence at the same time, just after Copernicus, Vesalius, Galileo, Kepler, and Descartes and their groundbreaking work, reflects the role of the Christian University and society networks. Christian society, in fact, which we do well to call empirically, "in Jesus´ legacy with its standards of loving integrity." We can also then distinguish deviations into cruelty by the human bio-psychosocial component, which used to be identifiable already as the "temptations of the flesh" or perhaps the "animal nature." The context of the University also becomes important to identify, around Descartes´ so-called "Cartesian mind-body split." That is, while Pascal objected to Descartes directly about the problem as a doctrinal Catholic, we also can note the significance of Luther´s protests and inspiring the Reformation. Luther´s efffort was in fact a form of philosophical analysis, that owes its growing application to Thomas Aquinas´ Christianization of Aristotle´s esoteric First Cause at the U of Paris. Aquinas equated the co-eternal Universe and god. Aquinas used Zeno´s paradox that posited infinite divisions following mathematical abstraction. Aquinas observed the absurdity of that in empirical reality. No infinite regress between two points A and B in the real world. That insight was consistent with the Christian doctrinal hypothesis of a lawful Creator God creating a finite Universe. Aquinas approached that with his 5 arguments, including his empirical argument from motion. Even so, he seems to have been insecure in asserting the empirical hypothesis that the Universe was created. Perhaps a true scientific spirit in methodological naturalism. "I can´t do the experiments to prove it!" Meanwhile, the Cartesian split, mechanicist and secularist in nature, can be spiritualized by identifying Aquinas´ type of activity as Christian spiritual practice using the philosophical method, which uses principal methods of truth in logical coherence and correspondence to reality.