Possibility and Reality

A pair of categories that reflects the relation between the past, present, and future of things.

Possibility refers to all kinds of trends that are contained in real things and foreshadow the prospects of development of things, something potential and not yet realized. Before something or a phenomenon has become a reality, it is only a possibility. Reality refers the practical existence of all things and phenomena in the present. Reality is the possibility that has already been realized.

Possibility and reality are in a relation of unity of opposites. There is a qualitative difference between possibility and reality. A possibility is not yet a reality, and a reality is no longer a possibility. As a potential trend of things, possibility looks towards the “future”, and foreshadows the direction and prospects of things; as an existing objective reality, reality embodies the “present”, and marks the status que of things. Possibility and reality cannot be equated. Possibility and reality are interconnected and indissoluble. Possibility is contained in reality, a reality that has not yet been unfolded and realized; reality is a possibility that has been unfolded and realized, and at the same time breeds new possibilities. Reality does not appear out of thin air; it develops from some prior possibility. The ground for what makes a possibility a possibility exists in reality. Possibility and reality cannot exist separately from each other. Yet, possibility and reality transition to each other and transform into each other. The development of objective things is a process in which reality is constantly generated in possibility, and possibility constantly becomes reality.

The unity of possibility and reality requires men to stand on reality, look forward to the future, pay attention to the analysis of various possibilities of the development of things, give full play to man’s subjective agency, prepare well for unfavorable situations, and strive to realize good possibilities.