Truth and Reality By Linda Stowe
Much has been said about truth and reality over the past few years. Most of us were humming along with our lives, assuming that everyone agreed upon what was true and real. We’d learned all that stuff in school, in all those dusty, musty books. We all had a good understanding of what was what.
Then things skidded to a halt when Donald Trump hit the scene and Kellyanne Conway suggested that what he was presenting were “alternative facts.” What?? That crowd size wasn’t that big. That hurricane wasn’t heading that way. That election wasn’t stolen.
Confused, I asked Bard to differentiate the difference between truth and reality. According to Bard, reality describes those things that are consistent and provable. Such as gravity. Gravity is real. Truth is what we believe about things, our personal interpretation of the world. We can believe that we can fly, but the reality of gravity will always tell us different. In essence, reality is the fixed element, and truth is our evolving attempt to understand it.
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Polly here.
This is all so very interesting. There is a scene from the play Hamilton where they all move around the stage slowly, singing, “The world turned upside down. The world turned upside down.”
I know I am the minority in this county, because 90% of my fellow Preble Countians voted differently than I did.
So my opinion here will not be viewed kindly. Nonetheless. My feelings about truth and reality is this:
Our world, since 2016, has turned upside down. I’m not sure how one person flopped it on end, but there it went. And now, more than ever, it continues to go. Discerning the truth has become difficult because one person started claiming that everything said against him was fake news despite the facts.
What is real? What’s real is this. We are a nation divided. It didn’t used to be this way. And that is a fact.
One person has put the word “truth” on its ear. In a terrible way. And as a result, we all will most likely suffer.
But please know. I wish the best for everyone.
