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THE NATURE OF REALITY: THE PERENNIAL DEBATE
Seminar on 'The Nature of Reality: The Perennial Debate’
The nature of reality has been a long debated issue among scientists and philosophers. Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) met Albert Einstein (1879-1955) at the latter’s house in Kaputh, Germany on 14th July, 1930 and had a long conversation on the nature of reality. This conversation has been widely quoted and discussed by scientists, philosophers and scholars from the literary world.
The important question that Tagore and Einstein discussed was whether the world is a unity dependent on humanity, or the world is a reality independent of the human factor. Einstein took the stand adopted by Western philosophers and mathematicians such as Aristotle, Plato, Frege, Russell etc, namely that reality is something independent of the mind and the human factor. On the other hand, Tagore adopted the opposite view. Nevertheless, both Einstein and Tagore claimed to be realists—their conceptions of reality were obviously fundamentally different. Where does the difference lie? Can it be harmonized at some deeper level? Can Wittgenstein, for example, be a bridge between the two views?
There are no universally agreed definitions of truth and reality in Western philosophy. Realisms of various shades of meaning have developed over the years, such as naive realism, representative realism, direct realism, transcendental realism, Platonic realism, moderate realism, new realism, organic realism, constructive realism, entity realism, etc.
In the philosophy of science, the focus has been more on to what extent the world described by science is the real world (critical or scientific realism). Classical science was clearly realistic in nature in the sense of being observer-independent and deterministic. Quantum mechanics changed this perspective. Whether or not the world described by quantum mechanics is real and deterministic has been hotly debated since its inception. The latest predominant view is that it is not. Since all experiments can give us is information about the world, there is a growing school of thought that looks at the world as a giant information processor and prefers to look at information itself as reality. What implications does this emerging view have on the perennial debate?
In classical Indian philosophy also this debate was carried out with amazing analytical skills, leading to developments in the Samkhya-Yoga world-view (a dualist view), Kashmir Shaivism (a monistic view), Buddhist philosophy (ranging from straightforward realism through the Middle Path to mind-only idealism), Jaina realism and anekantavada, Nyaya realism and the Vedanta schools varying from dualism through qualified non-dualism to strict non-dualism (advaitavada). Each school has its own subtlely nuanced concept of reality. Tagore developed his own view of reality based on Indian philosophy broadened by Western philosophy and science, and his own spiritual experience. How does it stand in relation to current developments in science and philosophy?
If we are concerned with the purpose of life, what we should be doing, and the meaning of life and death, then the issue of reality (what is) and ethics (what aught to be) is of crucial importance to us. If things are different from how they are presented to us, then the issue of reality becomes crucial to our survival and well being. Hence, the nature of reality has been an important concern in literature, art, philosophy and the social sciences. How do these concerns relate to the Tagore-Einstein debate?
It has long been realized that the mind plays a fundamental role in recognizing and characterizing reality. Hence, knowledge of the character of mind is crucial to understanding the nature of reality. Recent progress in understanding the evolution of language and recent advances in neuroscience and cognitive science have led to many discoveries with important bearings on the debate that need to be raised and discussed.
To commemorate the 150th birth anniversary of Tagore we are planning to hold a 3 days seminar on “The Nature of Reality: The Perennial Debate” from 1-3 March 2012 at the Indian Institute for Advanced Study, Shimla. The intention is to have wide ranging in-depth discussions on the entire gamut of man’s engagement with reality through science, philosophy, language, cognitive science and the social sciences while keeping the Tagore-Einstein conversation as a reference point.
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