What is Real?: Basic Nature of Reality, The
Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that probes the basic nature of reality, trying to find a simple explanation for that which is complex. It looks at the world from both an onotological and cosmological point of vi..
What is Real?: Breaking Through: Finding One's Own Reality
Getting in touch with true reality requires us to break through the time-encrusted schemes accepted by society rather than remain one of the prisoners Plato described in the Parable of the Cave. Cultural forces often enc..
What is Real?: Comparitive Realities of Children and Adults
What does it mean to say that a child gains a sense of reality? Recent studies of the brain suggest that each person's sense of reality is finely etched by the strength, size, or weight of the synaptic connections in the..
What is Real?: Idealist's View of Reality,The
Writing somewhat later in the Scientific Revolution, Bish George Berkeley sought to crush the threat that materialism posed to religion by arguing that reality is made up entirely of ideas. Since we know about the world ..
What is Real?: Materialist's View of Reality, The
Materialists maintain that only the physical world is real. This idea which dates back to Democritus, a Greek philosopher who lived in the 5th century B.C, rose to prominence during the Scientific Revolution. Seventeenth..
What is Real?: Realists' Side of the Debate with Anti-realists, The
The distinction between trying to capture the true nature of reality versus defining it in human terms has remained central to recent philosophy. The two sides in the debate are the realists and anti-realists. To realist..
What is Real?: Reality as a Social Construction
Realists agree with anti-realists that much of reality is a social construction--money, marriage, government, language. But realists also believe there has to be a world that's independent of our representation of how th..
What is the Meaning of Life?: What is the Meaning of Life?
Is there a Divine Plan that can give purpose and meaning to our lives? Hegel and Mark argued that meaning for individual lives comes from contributing to the progress of history, the arena in which humans come to the ful..
What is the Self?
Philosopher Daniel Dennett talks about the self, noting that every living thing has some sense that there is a difference between the rest of the world and itself. For non-human animals, the notion of self is based on ph..
Wittgenstein and Language
Philosopher John Searle discusses Ludwig Wittgenstein and his ideas about language. Professor Searle notes that Wittgenstein believed many of the most pressing problems in philosophy really come down to confusion arising..