I was recently looking at the proceedings of an adversarial trial. It was a situation where two sides were each presenting a case, with the goal of convincing an arbiter that their version of events was correct.
I noticed an interesting phenomenon. One side put on a case, presented facts and evidence, then used reasoning to proceed from those facts to a conclusion. The other side mostly made loud, ugly accusations and assertions with no facts to back them up, or heavily altered “facts.” They were very convinced that their version of reality was real and compelling — so compelling that they apparently thought all they needed to do was assert their “truths” loudly enough for others to see the light and become convinced.
To someone schooled in legal realities, this was a stark contrast. One side put on a case; the other side mostly just complained stridently, expecting others to be swayed by the volume level and emotional content of their position.
As I thought about this, I realized that these two different parties were arguing from two different ideas of truth. One was arguing from the truth of the physical universe — the universe where things happen, where everybody can see what happened, where there can be agreement about what actually happened, and where reasoning is a workable way of handling things and getting good results.
The other side was arguing from personal “truth” — the truth that only they see and know, which is personal and intimate to them and which changes with the rise and fall of emotions and reactions. This truth needs no facts, reasoning, or justification. It is true simply because somebody feels it and says it is true.
Each side believed its arguments to be true, and believed that all listeners should agree. However, one side had a grip on physical reality and proposed solutions based on some notion of workability, while the other side knew only its own feelings and proposed solutions aimed only at satisfying those feelings.
This dichotomy between personal reality and physical reality has a long history in philosophy, going back at least to Rousseau. The arguments in favor of one or the other have always held that their side is right and the other mistaken.
Given what modern science and philosophy have forced us to reconsider, we can now see that both have their own kind of “right.” Reality 2.0 argues that the individual participates in the creation of the physical. One could say, therefore, that the individual is always “right,” at least within his or her own private experience.
However, nobody actually wants to live entirely by, for, and within himself or herself. Being completely and utterly alone sucks, which brings us to the physical universe.
When it comes to the universe we share with others, certain agreements and concessions have to be made in order to have that universe “work.” Primary among them is an agreement that what’s there is there, what happened happened, and that there are certain rules to the game, such as reason.
Without agreement on these rules, the shared realities on which our cultures are based start to fall apart.
So, while a particular and idiosyncratic view of reality may be true for an individual, the only way to have a workable civilization is to have certain rules and realities on which we all agree; to recognize that reason is our tool for handling these rules and realities; and to recognize that we need to use and proceed from these common realities through reason if we want to succeed.