This volume presents essays by pioneering thinkers including Tyler Burge, Gregory Chaitin, Daniel Dennett, Barry Mazur, Nicholas Humphrey, John Searle and Ian Stewart. Together they illuminate the very foundations of science and the scientific enterprise. The authors examine, from various perspectives, the complex relations between reality per se and our human descriptions of the world, as deduced in the process of scientific discovery. Are we living in Plato's Cave? If not, how far have we emerged from it? And what are the various layers of description we can apply to objects and phenomena? A simple apple, for example, can be analyzed from several viewpoints beginning with evolution and biology, all the way down its microscopic quantum mechanical components. Together, the cast of eminent scientists and philosophers shed light on how our various theories and constructs co-exist in a patchwork to produce a seemingly coherent reality. All aficionados of philosophy as well as budding researchers will find here much food for thought as well as new and stimulating perspectives.The book also includes a foreword by Sir Roger Penrose and an afterword by Dagfinn Follesdal