Inevitably Brushing Up Against Reality

It is inevitable that even the most apathetic or unintelligent non-rationalist will still experience things that they will not fully understand the true nature of, either metaphysically or epistemologically.  Anyone who has experienced a fluctuation of emotions or the influence of any sort of drug/medication on perception already knows one level that consciousness and its contents are a core part of human life.  Without them, after all, there would be no such thing as human life!  It is still true that the typical person has never even taken the first steps towards understanding the most basic, self-evident fact about consciousness--that it is absolutely certain that it exists as long as there is any perception at all, even some perceptions might involve illusions or epistemological uncertainties--without making assumptions that deny or distort knowable truths.

There is a large difference between having inescapably normal thoughts and experiences and intentionally, consistently, and thoroughly dwelling on them and their logical ramifications for the sake of discovering the truth about them.  Everyone has some kind of experience, but only those who consciously dwell on logical axioms, their own experiences, and related concepts without making assumptions are sincere and rational thinkers.  Everyone could fall into both categories at once.  The terror of unfamiliar ideas, an unwillingness to acknowledge what reason reveals and to not believe what cannot be logically proven, apathy towards the only things that could possibly matter, and sheer stupidity deter some people from stepping beyond the first category into the second.

The second category is still within everyone's reach just as much as the first is; it is just that the first is an inescapable part of even the most philosophically shallow approach to life and the second requires actual effort.  This is what stops most people from ever making the transition to rationalism and embracing the logical truths and philosophical nature of everything: they, for one reason or another, are not willing to care about aligning with reason except with selective issues, and even then it is usually just to make themselves feel better instead of pursuing truth and exploring themselves at the same time.  They still rely on the inherent truth of logical axioms on a ceaseless basis even if they never realize what logical axioms are or why they cannot be false in any situation.  They still rely on the fact that they exist on a ceaseless basis even if they never ponder it or prove to themselves that their existence, like the existence and truth of logical axioms, is absolutely certain.

Even the only truths that could be self-evident and upon which all other metaphysical and epistemological truths depend can be ignored.  Yet it is not just the small handful of self-evident truths that everyone brushes up against regardless of their worldview and rationality, but also the many other issues and logical facts that hinge on the self-evident that everyone will brush up against knowingly or unknowingly.  There is so much to reason out and there are so few people who show any signs at all of even attempting to discover these truths, even if the truth is sometimes that certain things cannot be known.  Everyone will in some way face these truths even if they have no idea they are there, but it is each individual's choice to actually understand knowable truths as they inevitably brush up against reality.