We awaken each morning assuming the world is there. We move through space and time, encounter other people, experience beauty and suffering, ask questions, discover patterns, and gradually construct an understanding of ourselves and the universe we inhabit. Long before we become scientists, philosophers, or theologians, we are already participants in reality.
Yet one of humanity's oldest and most enduring questions remains remarkably simple:
What is reality?
The question has inspired philosophers for more than two millennia. It has animated the sciences, shaped civilizations, informed religions, and challenged every generation to reconsider what is ultimately real. Is reality fundamentally material? Is it mental? Is it relational? Is it process, substance, energy, information, consciousness, or something deeper still? Each answer has illuminated part of the landscape while leaving other questions unresolved.
This essay does not begin by defending a particular philosophy. Instead, it begins where philosophy itself has always begun - with wonder. Before we can compare competing metaphysical systems, we must first appreciate why the question of reality continues to matter. The history of philosophy is, in many respects, the history of humanity's attempts to understand the world it already inhabits.
Our journey throughout this section follows that same path. We begin with the question itself. We then explore the major philosophical approaches that have sought to answer it, examine the contemporary conversations shaping our understanding today, and only afterward ask whether an open and relational process metaphysics offers a coherent and compelling way of interpreting the whole.
The goal, therefore, is not to close the discussion but to open it more fully. Reality is larger than any single philosophy, scientific theory, or religious tradition. Every perspective offers insight, yet every perspective remains partial before the inexhaustible richness of the real.
If philosophy begins in wonder, then perhaps its greatest achievement is not certainty but humility - a willingness to let reality continually enlarge our understanding. The observations which follow are offered in that same spirit: as an invitation to explore, to question, and to participate more deeply in the reality we all share.
Every age has asked what is true, what is good, what is beautiful, and how human beings ought to live. Beneath each of these questions, however, lies another that is even more fundamental: What is reality? Before we can understand ourselves, our world, or our place within it, we must first ask what kind of reality we inhabit.
The preceding Reality and Cosmology series explored this question through the discipline of ontology which is the philosophical study of what exists. There we sought to describe reality as faithfully as possible, developing an ontological framework described as Embodied Process Reality (EPR). This ontological framework articulated a relational understanding of a processual reality in which coherence, emergence, embodiment, and becoming arise together within a relationally open and evolving universe. That substantive development will consequently provide the coming foundation for everything that follows in our current series, Reality and Metaphysics.
Accordingly, this series now turns from ontology to metaphysics. If ontology asks "What exists?" metaphysics asks "Why is reality the way it is?" "Why does the universe possess order rather than chaos?" "Why do relation, emergence, life, consciousness, and value arise at all?" "What kind of reality makes such things possible?" These are not questions that replace ontology; they are the deeper questions that ontology naturally awakens and can only be addressed metaphysically.
Moreover, such questions are not confined to philosophy alone. Scientists investigate the structure of the cosmos. Psychologists explore the nature of mind. Historians reconstruct the human past. Theologians ask whether reality discloses a sacred depth or transcendent meaning. Though their methods differ, each discipline begins with the same assumption: that there is a reality worthy of careful investigation and thoughtful interpretation. The search for reality is therefore not the possession of any single discipline but the common horizon toward which every genuine inquiry is directed.
Every philosophical tradition begins from that same encounter. We inhabit one reality before we begin describing it. We experience existence before we formulate theories about it. Philosophy does not create reality; it seeks to understand the reality already experienced.
For this reason, the central question of philosophy remains as compelling today as it was in the ancient world. Scientific discoveries have profoundly expanded our understanding of the universe, yet they have not rendered the philosophical question obsolete. Rather, they have deepened it. The more we discover about reality, the more we are invited to ask what reality ultimately is and why it is capable of giving rise to such extraordinary complexity, beauty, and possibility.
The essays that follow in Section III, The Philosophy of Reality, do not seek to close this conversation with a final system or definitive answer. Rather, they seek to encourage participation in one of humanity's oldest and most enduring inquiries, trusting that reality itself is always richer than our descriptions of it. Philosophy begins not by possessing reality, but by remaining open to what reality continues to reveal.
Before philosophy can ask why reality is the way it is, it must first consider what the word reality itself intends to describe. The question may appear deceptively simple, yet it has occupied philosophers for more than two thousand years because the answer is anything but obvious. We experience reality every moment of our lives, but experience alone does not explain what reality is.
In ordinary language, reality often refers to "the way things actually are." We distinguish reality from imagination, illusion, dreams, fiction, error, or appearance. Such distinctions are practical and useful, allowing us to navigate everyday life with confidence. Yet philosophy soon discovers that these familiar contrasts only deepen the mystery. How do we know that what appears to us corresponds to what truly is? Does reality exist independently of our perception, or is our understanding always shaped by consciousness, language, culture, and experience? These questions have animated philosophical inquiry from antiquity to the present.
At its broadest, reality may be understood as the totality of all that exists, has existed, or may exist. This includes not only the observable universe but also the structures, relations, processes, possibilities, and meanings through which existence unfolds. Reality, in this sense, is not merely a collection of objects. It is the encompassing context within which matter, energy, life, mind, consciousness, culture, value, and even philosophical reflection become possible.
This broader understanding also helps explain why reality has resisted every attempt at reduction. Throughout history, some have identified reality primarily with matter, others with mind, others with ideas, consciousness, language, mathematics, or information. Each perspective has illuminated genuine features of the world while simultaneously revealing the limitations of any single explanatory framework. Reality consistently proves richer than the concepts we use to describe it.
For this reason, the present series adopts an intentionally open posture. Rather than beginning with a predetermined metaphysical system, it begins with the conviction that reality itself must remain the final measure of every philosophical proposal. Our task is not to compel reality to conform to our theories but to allow our theories to be continually refined, corrected, and enlarged by reality itself.
This posture of openness is neither skepticism nor indecision. It is an acknowledgment that philosophy remains a living conversation. Every generation inherits the questions of those who came before, contributes its own discoveries, and leaves a richer conversation for those who follow. The search for reality is therefore not the pursuit of an unreachable certainty but an ongoing participation in humanity's deepest and most enduring inquiry.
Long before philosophy became an academic discipline, it began as a profoundly human experience. Every civilization has looked upon the heavens, observed the rhythms of nature, witnessed birth and death, celebrated beauty, endured suffering, and wondered about the meaning of it all. These experiences gave rise to questions that no simple description of the world could fully answer. Why does anything exist? Why is there order rather than chaos? Why do the seasons return, life emerge, consciousness awaken, and the universe exhibit such remarkable coherence? Wonder became humanity's first response to reality.
The earliest answers were often expressed through story, symbol, poetry, and myth. Ancient cultures sought to explain the world by weaving together narratives of creation, divine activity, cosmic struggle, and human purpose. These stories should not be dismissed simply because they are pre-scientific. They represent humanity's earliest attempts to understand reality as an ordered whole rather than as isolated events. Long before formal philosophy, myth sought coherence.
Yet over time another way of asking emerged. Rather than explaining reality primarily through inherited stories, some began asking whether reality itself could be investigated through careful observation, reasoned reflection, and disciplined inquiry. The question gradually shifted from Who governs the world? to What is the world itself? This transition did not reject wonder; it redirected wonder toward rational investigation. It marked the birth of philosophy.
Among the earliest Greek thinkers, this new spirit of inquiry became especially pronounced. Rather than accepting inherited explanations, they sought to discover the underlying principles that give coherence to reality itself. They searched for an arche - the originating principle from which everything else might be understood. Their answers differed considerably, yet together they inaugurated the first sustained philosophical investigation into the nature of reality.
Together these early philosophers introduced the major themes of Western metaphysics that would echo across the next twenty-five centuries of philosophical inquiry. Their diverse insights would later be synthesized, expanded, and systematized through the enduring (some would say, foundational, or monumental) works of Plato and Aristotle, establishing the foundations upon which much of Western philosophy would thereafter be built.
The Pre-Socratic Philosophers
Thales of Miletus (c. 624–546 BC) is often regarded as the first philosopher because he sought natural rather than mythological explanations for the world. Believing that water was the fundamental principle (arche) of reality, he initiated the search for a rational understanding of nature.
Anaximander (c. 610–546 BC), a student of Thales, proposed that the origin of reality could not be any ordinary substance but the apeiron - the boundless or indefinite - from which all things emerge and to which they eventually return. His thought introduced the idea that reality possesses a deeper, underlying principle beyond immediate observation.
Anaximenes (c. 586–526 BC) argued that air was the fundamental substance of reality. Through processes of rarefaction and condensation, he believed that all other forms of matter arise, offering one of the earliest attempts to explain natural change through continuous physical processes.
Heraclitus (c. 535–475 BC) famously emphasized that reality is characterized by perpetual change, symbolized by his observation that one cannot step into the same river twice. Beneath this continual flux, however, he discerned an underlying logos - a rational order that gives coherence to the ever-changing world.
Parmenides (early 5th century BC) offered a strikingly different vision. He argued that genuine reality is unchanging, eternal, and indivisible, maintaining that change and plurality are ultimately deceptive appearances. His challenge forced later philosophers to confront the relationship between permanence and becoming.
Pythagoras (c. 570–495 BC) proposed that number and mathematical harmony constitute the deepest structure of reality. For him, mathematics revealed an underlying order that united nature, music, astronomy, and human existence into a coherent whole.
The Classical Philosophers
While the Pre-Socratics primarily sought the underlying principles of nature, Socrates redirected philosophy toward the examination of human life itself.
Socrates (c. 470–399 BC) redirected philosophical inquiry from the search for the material origins of the cosmos toward the examination of human life, virtue, knowledge, and moral responsibility. Through relentless questioning rather than written treatises, he demonstrated that wisdom often begins by recognizing the limits of one's own understanding. His method transformed philosophy into a lifelong pursuit of truth through dialogue and critical reflection.
Plato (c. 427–347 BC) synthesized many earlier insights of his predecessors and brought them into a comprehensive philosophical vision. He distinguished between the changing world of experience and the enduring reality of the Forms, arguing that truth, beauty, justice, and goodness possess an objective reality beyond their imperfect expressions in everyday life.
Aristotle (384–322 BC), Plato's student, redirected philosophy toward the careful study of nature, substance, causation, and empirical observation. His synthesis of logical analysis, scientific investigation, and metaphysical reflection established an intellectual framework that profoundly influenced Western philosophy, science, and theology for nearly two thousand years.
Within this brief history we already encounter one of the great conversations in Western metaphysics.
- Heraclitus emphasized becoming.
- Parmenides emphasized enduring being.
- Plato understood enduring reality to be more fundamental than the changing world of experience.
- Aristotle sought to explain change through enduring substances and their causes.
Together these four perspectives established a conversation that would shape nearly every subsequent philosophical discussion concerning the nature of reality.
Although these philosophers often disagreed profoundly, they shared one remarkable conviction: reality possesses an intelligible order that human inquiry can discover. They differed over whether reality is fundamentally one or many, permanent or changing, material or mathematical, yet the questions they raised became the enduring foundation of Western philosophy. Every subsequent metaphysical system would inherit, refine, challenge, or reinterpret the conversation they began.
This conviction transformed the history of thought. Philosophy did not begin by providing final answers. It began by asking better questions. The search for reality became an open conversation rather than a settled conclusion. Every succeeding generation inherited that conversation, refined it, challenged it, and expanded it. The history of philosophy is therefore not simply a succession of competing systems but a continuing effort to understand the reality we all inhabit.
That conversation has never ended. Modern science has greatly expanded humanity's understanding of the universe, while philosophy continues to ask questions that science alone cannot answer. The wonder that inspired the earliest philosophers has never disappeared; it has simply taken new forms. Whether we explore the origins of the cosmos, the emergence of life, the mystery of consciousness, or the foundations of morality, we remain participants in the same enduring search for reality.
The next essay will turn to this larger historical conversation. For now, having considered how philosophy was born from wonder, we next will examine how the major philosophical traditions have interpreted reality across more than two millennia of intellectual history.
The earliest philosophers did not exhaust the question of reality; they inaugurated it. Their diverse answers demonstrated that reality could be investigated through reason, observation, and reflection, yet no single explanation proved sufficiently comprehensive to bring the conversation to an end. Instead, each philosophical generation inherited both the insights and the unresolved questions of those who came before.
This enduring conversation reveals something important about the nature of philosophy itself. Unlike many practical disciplines that seek definitive solutions to specific problems, philosophy continually returns to its foundational questions. What is reality? What is truth? What does it mean to exist? Why is there something rather than nothing? These questions persist not because philosophy has failed, but because reality consistently proves richer than every attempt to explain it completely.
Far from diminishing the importance of these questions, the extraordinary achievements of modern science have often deepened them. Cosmology has revealed a universe billions of years old, populated by countless galaxies and governed by elegant mathematical laws. Biology has uncovered the evolutionary history of life and the remarkable complexity of living systems. Physics has transformed our understanding of matter, energy, space, and time, while neuroscience continues to illuminate the extraordinary capacities of the human brain. Each discovery enlarges our knowledge of the universe, yet each also invites new metaphysical questions concerning the nature of existence, consciousness, order, possibility, and meaning.
Consequently, philosophy and science should not be viewed as rivals competing for the same territory. Science excels at investigating how reality functions through observation, experimentation, and empirical verification. Philosophy asks the broader interpretive questions that scientific discoveries themselves inevitably provoke. Together they participate in humanity's continuing search to understand the reality we inhabit.
Every significant advance in human knowledge has expanded rather than diminished our appreciation of reality. The telescope revealed an immense universe beyond the visible sky. The microscope uncovered unseen worlds of extraordinary complexity. Evolution revealed the deep history of life. Relativity transformed our understanding of space and time, while quantum theory challenged our intuitions concerning matter, causality, and observation. More recently, investigations into consciousness, information, complexity, and artificial intelligence have opened entirely new frontiers of inquiry. The more humanity learns, the larger reality appears to become.
The same may be said of academic subjects such as history, psychology, the arts, and religion. Each explores reality from a different perspective, each contributes genuine insight, and each encounters questions that extend beyond the boundaries of its own methods. Reality continually invites interdisciplinary conversation because reality itself is not divided into academic disciplines. Those divisions are human ways of organizing knowledge, while reality remains an interconnected whole.
For this reason, the question of reality has never disappeared. It has simply become richer with every generation. New discoveries do not replace earlier questions; they enlarge them. Every advance in knowledge opens fresh horizons for philosophical reflection, ensuring that the search for reality remains one of humanity's most enduring and necessary endeavors.
After more than two thousand years of philosophical reflection, the question remains remarkably open. Humanity has never reached complete agreement concerning the nature of reality, not because philosophy has failed, but because reality has continually proven richer than every attempt to explain it. Nevertheless, the history of philosophy has produced a number of enduring ways of understanding what reality is.
Here are a few historical samples in answer to the question, "What Is Reality?"
Reality has been understood as the totality of existence - covering everything that exists, has existed, or may exist. This broad understanding remains one of philosophy's most inclusive definitions, allowing every subsequent interpretation to ask what kind of existence ultimately constitutes reality.
Reality has been understood as enduring substance. Classical Greek philosophy, especially through Plato and Aristotle, sought stable and permanent foundations beneath the changing world of experience. Reality was understood as that which truly is, while change represented the unfolding or appearance of enduring being.
Reality has been understood as continual becoming. From Heraclitus to many contemporary process philosophers, reality is seen not as a collection of static things but as an ongoing process of events, relations, emergence, and creative transformation.
Reality has been understood as mind or consciousness. Various philosophical traditions, from Advaita Vedanta (a Hindu philosophy of the "self/atman") to aspects of Western Idealism, have proposed that consciousness, spirit, or mind constitutes the deepest ground of existence, while the physical world derives from or depends upon that more fundamental reality.
Reality has been understood as relation. Buddhist philosophies, especially The Buddhist school of thought, Madhyamaka, together with many contemporary relational philosophies, argue that nothing exists independently. Everything exists through relationships, interdependence, and mutual participation rather than isolated substance.
Reality has been understood as matter and energy. Scientific naturalism, materialism, and physicalism generally understand reality as fundamentally physical, governed by natural laws that give rise to the extraordinary complexity observed throughout the universe.
Reality has been understood as lived experience. Pragmatists, phenomenologists, and existential philosophers have emphasized that reality cannot be separated from human participation, experience, action, and meaning. Reality is encountered before it is theorized.
Reality has been understood as information, mathematics, and structure. Some contemporary philosophers and scientists suggest that the deepest level of reality may consist not primarily of matter, but of information, mathematical order, or fundamental structural relationships from which the observable universe emerges.
Each of these perspectives represents a serious attempt to understand reality. Some illuminate enduring truths; others expose important questions; still others reveal the limitations of earlier systems. The task of philosophy is not to preserve every insight equally, but to allow reality itself to become the measure by which every philosophical proposal is continually examined, refined, or, when necessary, abandoned. Thus, the history of philosophy is not a museum of equally valid ideas. Rather, it is humanity's continuing effort to discover which understandings correspond most faithfully to the reality we all inhabit.
The essays that follow explore these traditions in greater depth, not to declare philosophical winners and losers, but to understand how each has contributed to humanity's enduring search for reality. Only then will we ask whether an open and relational process metaphysics offers one coherent and comprehensive interpretation of the world we all inhabit.
The question with which we began remains before us.
What is reality?
More than two thousand years of philosophical reflection have not diminished the significance of that question; they have deepened it. Every generation has inherited it. Every civilization has answered it differently. Every scientific discovery, philosophical insight, religious tradition, and human experience has contributed another perspective toward understanding the world we inhabit.
Perhaps this should not surprise us. Reality has always proven greater than the concepts we use to describe it. Every philosophy illuminates something genuine, yet none appears capable of exhausting the richness of existence itself. If reality continually exceeds our understanding, then philosophy's task is not merely to delineate inherited systems but to cultivate an openness toward continual discovery.
For this reason, the question "What is reality?" should never be regarded as one that admits a final or exhaustive answer. Rather, it remains an invitation toward contemplating life's mysteries - one that calls each generation to observe more carefully, think more deeply, feel more completely, and participate more faithfully in the world we share.
The essays that follow will continue that invitation. We will listen to the many voices that have shaped humanity's understanding of reality across cultures and centuries. Only then will we ask whether a more comprehensive metaphysical vision might emerge - one capable of honoring both the enduring wisdom of the past and the expanding horizons of the present.
For if philosophy begins in wonder,
perhaps it also should end there -
with the quiet realization that our wonder has become a little wiser.
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Hadot, Pierre. What Is Ancient Philosophy? Harvard University Press, 2002.
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Nagarjuna. The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way (Mūlamadhyamakakārikā). Translated by Jay L. Garfield. Oxford University Press, 1995.
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Plato. The Republic. Translated by G. M. A. Grube, revised by C. D. C. Reeve. Hackett Publishing, 1992.
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**Adi Shankara. Vivekachudamani (The Crest Jewel of Discrimination). Translated by Swami Prabhavananda and Christopher Isherwood. Vedanta Press, 1978.
Taylor, Richard. Metaphysics. Prentice Hall, 1992.
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