Reality

“There are two worlds: the dream world and the reality. You have to figure out which is which. If you die in the dream you wake up in reality. Now ask me what happens if you die in reality.”

“What happens?”

“You die, stupid. That’s why it’s called reality.”

-The Dream Lord to Doctor Who

Reality is an interesting question. How much of what we do is reality. Is what we think reality? Think about it. When you were a little kid and you made up fantasies in your head, you thought they were real. You don't anymore though. You recognize that there is no such thing as unicorns- as far as scientific knowledge is concerned- and dragons. So if those worlds we made in our head were not reality, then what makes our thoughts reality? First off, I guess you have to ask yourself was reality is.

re•al•i•ty 
Noun:
Real things, facts, or events taken as a whole; state of affairs: the reality of the business world; vacationing to escape reality.
Philosophy
Something that exists independently of ideas concerning it.
Idiom:
In reality, in fact or truth; actually.

So, our thoughts are real things, aren't they? They exist in our mind. Thee create our actions. However, they are not always a truth, nor do they exist independently of ideas concerning them. Thoughts can be changed, making them dependent on other concepts.

Perhaps reality is not so easy to define after all. Another definition refers to it as "the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or may be thought to be." So this implies that thought is something beyond reality. So are thoughts the perception that leads to the clouding of reality? I think I could accept that. Sure our thoughts as individual concepts are real in the barest sense of the word, but their content? Certainly not. For the content of a thought to define reality is a scary thing. Rather, it seems, the content of thought is what makes reality so hard to grasp.

What does this have to do with literacy? Nothing whatsoever. I suppose I could say I'm drawing a line between the world of a book and that of reality but I'm really not. I'm just babbling again. At this rate I'm going to become a philosophy major. Oh dear.