Subjective realities are not all the same. If they were all the same, then we would agree on subjective reality. As it is, we do not disagree with other people’s subjective reality, because every body knows that there is more than one. Likewise, everybody knows that there is only one objective reality. There obviously can’t be two objective realities. If there were, then reality would be internally contradictory.
Now there is a well known set of laws about the difference between objective and subjective reality. They are the laws of non-contradiction.
Here are the laws:
Law #1: One cannot say of something that it is and that it is not in the same respect and at the same time. Postmodernist: Says who?! Shamby: So says Aristotle, that’s who!
Law #2: If someone is said rightly to be in violation of the first law, he or she shall cease to violate it (i.e. disappear). Gullible person: Really? Shamby: Not really, I made it up.
Law #3: If someone violates the first law and the second law, that person cannot be certain of what he or she is talking about. If one does become certain, one reverts to the second law. Gullible person: You’re not going to get me this time! Shamby: No, this one is actually true. Gullible person: Oh, really? Shamby: *shaking head*
I shall demonstrate these laws, and where I cannot, I will argue by convincing anecdotes. After all, everybody verifies truth through convincing anecdotes. Sarcasm: Hey, if it happened once, it obviously means its true for everything. Wow, what a discovery…Now I can write self-help books!
Anyway, oh, yeah, the first law. Take this pencil for instance. The Gullible person: “This pencil is yellow.” As you can see, there is nothing contradictory about this statement. Now, by contrast, see what happens when the gullible person tries to say the pencil is red; Go ahead, gullible person. “This pencil in the same respect and at the same time is rrrrrrrrr….rrrrrhee,he,he…*clear throat*…REEEEEEEEEE.” You see? Irrefutable proof.
Aristotle realized that this law worked with simple folk, partially because he had them reading off papyrus. Rather than concluding that they were illiterate, he devised the first law. It was only after Gutenberg’s printing press and the explosion of literacy that philosophers confirmed Aristotle’s premise. With the 20th century and the advent of Quantum Philosophy, postmodernists have discovered that Aristotle’s law only works on humans with medium-sized brains at medium-sized thinking capacities, such as my gullible friend. Gullible person: “What about really smart people and really stupid people?”
Thank you for asking. But,
Apparently most of us live in one of these two categories. Either we are really smart, and conclude that there is a somewhat mysterious, albeit transcendent objective reality, or we are really “smart in a different way”, and conclude that like “God” we can speak truth into being through a fancy little loophole called subjective reality. The “visual age” having scorned words and critical thinking has crept steadily closer towards the latter.
In either case, violation is possible and 2 extra laws are necessary to account for it. The laws spawn from Shamby's Uncertainty Principle which says that at any given moment one can neither know the whole truth nor the whole fallacy. This is because no human is omniscient. Our lack of omniscience, for the time being, allows us to escape the first law. We do it all the time, actually. Humans are walking contradictions. Subjectively, how else can a postmodernist assert absolutely that there is no absolute or a government bent on tolerance be intolerant towards intolerance? Likewise objectively, how else can Jesus be both God and Human or the Trinity be both Three and One?
In the future, I shall proceed to ridicule the law of non-contradiction. Stay tuned for more rapturous fantasy.
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