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Critical realism is a philosophical idea that focuses on the value of what is true or real over what is believed to be true. The critical realist philosophy states that reality exists outside of the human mind but that humans can, in fact, learn and understand the objective nature of the world using their limited cognitive resources. A key component of critical realism is the distinction it places on epistemology, the study of knowledge, from ontology, the study of being. Critical realism argues that knowledge is dynamic and ever-changing while being, or reality, is comparatively static and unchanging.