Metaphysics By Ayn Rand

"Are you in a universe which is ruled by natural laws and therefore, is stable, firm, absolute - and knowable? Or are you in an incomprehensible chaos, a realm of inexplicable miracles, an unpredictable, unknowable flux, which your mind is impotent to grasp? Are the things you see around you real - or are they only an illusion? Do they exist independent of any observer - or are they created by the observer? Are they the object of the subject of man's consciousness? Are they what they are - or can they be changed by a mere act of your consciousness, such as a wish?

The nature of your actions - and of your ambition - will be different, according to which set of answers you come to accept. These answers are the province of metaphysics - the study of existence as such or, in Aristotle's words, of "being qua being" - the basic branch of philosophy."

~ Ayn Rand