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Julie G.'s picture

Stories

 In Thomas King's The Truth About Stories, he states that "the truth about stories is that that's all we are" (first seen on page 2). The studies of the brain that we have been exploring indicate that King is right: everything that we perceive or think is a construction of our brain and there is nothing that we can know other than our own perceptions or thoughts. Yet, we can collaborate the stories we tell ourselves (our realities) and agree upon what seem to be similarities in both our perceptions and our reasonings. For example, we can agree on various scientific methods to determine how the universe was created, or how biological evolution took place. We can agree upon noticing commonalities and differences within and between cultures. We can observe an individual, or read their life story, to see the changes they underwent. And we can agree about methods and reasonings of neurological and psychological studies that indicate that each of our realities is a construction of our own minds. Or not: we can choose to disagree. We can choose to, or not to place qualitative values on particular notions of reality, or particular stories. But viewing everything as a story has the benefit of allowing us to try and open our minds and understandings to change.

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