REALITY STUDIES

INEVITABLY SUBJECTIVE

The fundamental claim of critical ontology is that humanity's experience of reality, and therefore our knowledge of it, is inevitably subjective, altered by perceptive constructs that mostly exist beyond our conscious awareness.

Instead of making objectivity the goal, critical ontology sets it as a north star. If reality objectively exists, and we have really good reasons to believe that it does, then humanity will never have an objectively complete understanding of it.

We must develop not only epistemology but psychology and social structures that accommodate the only thing that is provable beyond a reasonable doubt; we've never objectively proven anything beyond a reasonable doubt.

FLUID LOGICAL STRUCTURES

Instead of trying to establish some absolute structures for both reality and logic, critical ontology seeks to establish the bare minimum foundation for more specific and robust beliefs to be defined.

Any categorization within critical ontology is pragmatic, not absolute. Nuance and exception should be tolerated and accommodated over time.

This calls for a balance between the traditional incrementation that our society is currently most comfortable with, and the emergent iterations that occasionally call for us to largely dismiss decades of conclusions.

ISOLATING THE PHYSICAL UNIVERSE

Critical ontology attempts to isolate the physical universe from the conscious experience of it as much as possible. This allows us to be more fundamentally tolerant of paradigm shifts, which is when large portions of our understanding of reality are adjusted at once.

The physical universe largely operates the same regardless of our understanding of it, and clarifying this better grounds critical ontology as both iterative and accommodating.

PHYSICAL DEFINITIONS

~ the universe is the physical component of reality as it exists independent of conscious life, the human experience, or any metaphysical properties

~ reality is both the universe and the conscious experience of it, including abstract conscious constructs such as love, society, and categories or definitions such as I'm listing right now

~ reality is a complex system, which is defined as a network composed of many interacting components that exhibit emergent behavior, which cannot be fully understood by examining the individual parts alone

~ components are either physical or abstract entities that interact within a relatively defined system and can be complex systems themselves, nested within a broader complex system

~ the existence of one entity within another entity of a similar overall structure but on a different scale is called nesting

~ nesting within complex systems may be permeable, meaning that system bounds are relatively defined and never entirely isolated

~cycles are repeating patterns of change, transformation, or recurrence within a system that may be physical, cognitive, or social and are the foundation for universal activity

For more on how the physical universe progresses from deterministic to chaotic to emergent to conscious, check out the emergent causality framework and the emergent awareness theory.

metaphysical definitions

~ a perceptive construct is any factor that shapes how we perceive reality and can be physical, such as our conditioned senses and neural capacity, or metaphysical, such as our fundamental beliefs and interpretations of abstract social contracts.

Examples of Perceptive Constructs

• Socioeconomic status
• Core understanding and knowledge
• Language and education
• Personal experiences
• Physical and mental conditioning
• Internal conscious choice sequences
• Specific beliefs and assumptions

No single belief or trait defines who we are or how we understand reality. Instead, our perception emerges from the dynamic interplay of all that we are, experience, and believe at any given moment. This does not mean that reality is merely a product of our thoughts and beliefs, but rather that they profoundly shape how we perceive both the physical universe and ourselves.

~ a belief is an internalized model or assumption about reality that an individual or collective holds to be true, regardless of whether it has been empirically validated

~ a fact is a belief that is repeatedly valid within at least one context; facts are always subject to revision and contextually dependent within critical ontology

~ knowledge is the structured organization of facts and beliefs into coherent frameworks that allow for prediction, explanation, and interaction with reality; in critical ontology, knowledge is always contextual and dependent on the recursive chains that produce it

~ truth is not an absolute state but an emergent coherence between multiple perspectives and causal structures. In cyclical epistemology, truth is the intersection of overlapping recursive frameworks, where independent validation chains reinforce one another.

~ paradigm is a system of interrelated beliefs, where the validity of certain ideas partially depends on others; while individual beliefs within a paradigm may hold independent explanatory power, many are mutually reinforcing, shaping a broader interpretive framework

Critical ontology itself is a framework—a structured approach to understanding reality. 

This framework isn't asserted as any absolute truth, just as a potential modification to your perceptive constructs. Cyclical epistemology describes more about the knowledge determination process recommended for critical ontology, while the constructed belief framework aims to provide a structured means of communicating complex claims.

AN OMNIST FOUNDATION

Critical ontology provides a flexible framework to categorize and compare all belief structures, serving as a foundation for a sort of constrained omnism.

It minimizes the claims about reality that it makes itself to better accommodate as many beliefs as possible on a fundamental level.

It is worth noting that even just by separating the concepts of the physical universe and our experienced reality, critical ontology directly refutes naive realism and gives positivist perspectives a run for their money.

CALLING FOR A CYCLICAL EPISTEMOLOGY

In order to accommodate the fundamental and absolute belief that humans cannot understand reality in any complete or objective sense, we immediately must re-examine the nature of epistemology.

Our society obsesses over the idealistic accuracy of answers that are destined to be inaccurate. 

As a result, we spend far too much time arguing how we already have the right answer whenever a better one comes along.

If we are to acknowledge humanity's knowledge as inherently flawed, then we must establish a cyclical epistemology that continuously refines our knowledge by design.