Things that only exist in our collective consciousness.
Three Realities
- There’s an objective reality, aka the physical world. It’s made up of tigers, rock, and rain.
- Then there is subjective reality, aka what exists only on the mind of an individual. This is full of things like thoughts, perceptions, ideas, and feelings.
- Then there’s intersubjective reality, aka what only exists in the minds of the members of some group. These are hugely important. Examples below.
Membership of the Intersubjective Reality
- The value of money
- “Google”, “CitiBank”, or “Quiktrip”
- “The United States”, “Kansas”, “England”
- The concept of ownership
- The concepts of liberty, justice, and freedom
IBM - an example
IMB does not exist anywhere. If you burned down all their buildings and murdered their entire body of workers, IBM could hire new people, build new buildings. Likewise, IBM could be absolved as a company and stop existing in the present, without a single physical thing happening (aside from someone in a position of authority deeming it so).