Projection of Reality

A cognitive bias where one projects one's own experience of reality onto the world itself—assuming that the way things appear to one is simply how they are, and that others who experience differently are deluded, mistaken, or lying. Projection of reality operates when someone says "that's not real" about experiences they haven't had; when they dismiss alternative perspectives as fantasy; when they cannot accept that reality might appear differently to different people. The projection lies in mistaking one's own perception for the thing perceived—confusing the map with the territory, the experience with the reality. It closes off understanding of others' experiences, making genuine dialogue impossible because one's own reality is treated as the only reality.

Example: "He'd never experienced discrimination, so he insisted it wasn't real—projection of reality, assuming that what he hadn't seen couldn't exist."

Projection of Reality by Dumu The Void March 19, 2026