Dr. Jordan B. Peterson

What's more real?

The world of brute material facts or the world of numbers?

How powerful are you if you are a master of the world of numbers?

Well, our computational devices are a consequence of our mastery of the world of numbers.

Our technological prowess is a consequence of our mastery of the world of numbers.

Are numbers more or less real than what they represent?

Well, I think the proper answer to that question is it depends on your definition of real.

It depends on the purposes toward which you're putting the levels of abstraction.

But you're a bloody fool if you think the answer to that question is simple.

And you're certainly a fool if you think that...

Making the claim that the realm of numbers is real is a preposterous claim.

That just means that you have a definition of reality that you really know nothing about.

Abstractions can be plenty real, and deep fiction is the ultimate abstraction of value.

And that's crucial because we see the world through a structure of value.

Now, the postmodernists figured this out.

in the 1970s.

Why?

Well, how about because they were literary critics?

Now you'd think literary critics, no wonder they're in the university, nothing more useless than a literary critic.

What if you live by stories?