If one’s existence is based on his consciousness, which is subjective and individualized, what is reality? What is the same about every person’s experience? What is the same about the world to every person’s senses? It would seem that we come to understand reality by way of our mind, where it is observed and interpreted.
In statistics and research, there are two dimensions for understanding the soundness of a study: validity and accuracy. Validity is the dimension of the how well the study represents reality. Accuracy is the dimension of how well the study can produce consistent results. The field of science works on the assumption that there is an absolute reality, that there is no mystery, only the unexplained, that there are sound objective empirical ways of measuring it, and hence everyone can understand the same truths about the world. I would argue that even though a group of scientists are using the same method and external lens to understand an absolutely real truth, there is an internal lens that can cause the individuals to experience this truth differently. This absolutely real truth becomes phenomenon, a fact or situation that is observed to exist or happen. This means that just because it is observed, does not mean that it is absolutely “proven.” This subjectification of the phenomenon may not be seen sheerly due to language. The words they use to communicate about and describe the fact or situation are the same, but not perfectly descriptive.
This lens individuals use to observe, perceive, and understand the world is the mind, or consciousness. It isn’t perfect, but it’s who we are. Our thoughts are restricted to the limited amount of space inside our head.We know that the nature or the size of the universe is infinite. Our understanding of that goes as far as our ability to understand what is at the end of infinity. By all means, it is irrelevant to our earthly finite nature. The consciousness is invalid because we cannot possibly know everything of universe nor the everything of the next person’s conscious experience. It is inaccurate due to the lack of correlation between different people’s experiences and the lack of consistency in a given individual’s experience. The individual’s understanding of the world is never the same and always changing. Individuals forget facts and events and memories are distorted or manipulated by similar but different stimuli.
Take into consideration an eye witness who saw a car wreck scene. Five minutes after the event when asked to describe the scene, the individual did not describe broken glass on the ground. A few days later in a court room when asked if there was broken glass from the wreckage on the ground after being described the intensity at which the cars collided, the witness says “yes” in reasonable understanding that nasty car collisions result in glass on the ground. Was there broken glass on the ground?
It is true that through the methods and language of science, there is a high level of agreement on most earthly phenomenon. However, some of the big life questions, the “why” questions, aren’t as easily agreed upon.
