Quotes About Reality

It was the third dead body he'd found while fishing, but such was the reality of a childhood spent outdoors in Florida. It was a testament to the teen's passion for angling that he'd never considered

If I remember it, did it happen?

Sometimes, I think I dreamed it, or I am saying it like a thing that I would do, when I would never, and calling it art.

I'd remember the way everyone else does: later, when none of it matters, memory as good as a mirror for changing things, no good at all

Like asking at first Where am I after dream—and the room, in pieces, slow, comes back

The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may contradict deeply held prejudices. It may not be consonant with what we desperately want to be true. But our preferences do not determine what's true.

The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent.

It is said that men may not be the dreams of the god, but rather that the gods are the dreams of men.

The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.

If we long to believe that the stars rise and set for us, that we are the reason there is a Universe, does science do us a disservice in deflating our conceits?

Better the hard truth, I say, than the comforting fantasy.

Our perceptions are fallible. We sometimes see what isn't there. We are prey to optical illusions. Occasionally we hallucinate. We are error-prone.

We must understand the Cosmos as it is and not confuse how it is with how we wish it to be.

It goes with a courageous intent to greet the universe as it really is, not to foist our emotional predispositions on it but to courageously accept what our explorations tell us.

better the hard truth, I say, than the comforting fantasy. And in the final tolling it often turns out that the facts are more comforting than the fantasy.

And if the world does not in all respects correspond to our wishes, is this the fault of science, or of those who would impose their wishes on the world?

It is certainly true that all beliefs and all myths are worthy of a respectful hearing. It is not true that all folk beliefs are equally valid - if we're talking not about an internal mindset, but about understanding of the external reality.

We also know how cruel the truth often is, and we wonder whether delusion is not more consoling. HENRI POINCARÉ (1854–1912)

The Yale anthropologist Weston La Barre goes far as to argue that `a surprisingly good case could be made that much of culture is hallucination` and that `the whole intent and function of ritual appears to be... a group wish to hallucinate reality`.

In our time we have less severe standards. We tell children about Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy for reasons we think emotionally sound, but then disabuse them of these myths before they're grown. Why retract? Because their well-being as adults depends on them knowing the world as it really is. We worry, and for good reason, about adults who still believe in Santa Claus.

If a marker were to be erected today, it might read, in homage to his scientific courage: "He preferred the hard truth to his dearest illusions.

How can you tell when someone is only imagining?

Because science carries us toward an understanding of how the world is, rather than how we would wish it to be, its findings may not in all cases be immediately comprehensible or satisfying. It may take a little work to restructure our mindsets. Some of science is very simple. When it gets complicated, that's usually because the world is complicated—or because we're complicated.

The trapdoor beneath our feet swings open. We find ourselves in bottomless free fall. We are lost in a great darkness, and there's no one to send out a search party. Given so harsh a reality, of course we're tempted to shut our eyes and pretend that we're safe and snug at home, that the fall is only a bad dream.