I am far more sympathetic to rationalsim over empiricism. For me empirical thiings are always in an existential state. Physical things do not hold their identity over long periods of time. If we were to run the clock forward say, ten million or 70 trillion years, then these objects lose their identity. So, how can we say they are real? In what sense are they real?

The universe seems to posess some order. I cannot believe that the regularity found in the universe could be purely accidental. From this point one may hold that the laws of nature are in principle seperable from the flux of materials which it holds together and encompasses.

This rational form, because it is an order or a form of reason, is the ground. Space and time are possibilities of reason. However, most people will not grant that eternal 'reason' could somehow be the producer of cosmos and intelligent life. But I am coming to believe that reason itself somehow generated life.

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They are real just in the sense that they exist independent of mind. Rationalism does not hold that Realism is false. Descartes was a Realist. And Berkeley, who was an Idealist, and denied the mind-independence of material objects, was an Empiricist. I think you are confusing Realism with Empiricism, and Idealism with Rationalism. Those distinctions cut across each other.

I always have trouble with this because usually my position is not that clear cut one versus the other.
Is not it usually
Rationalism versus empiricism (both are needed for knowledge)
and
Idealism versus Realism (although both are needed for perception)?

The pairs are contraries, and in the case of each pair, both cannot be true.

I do not think it quite that clear cut.
Reason may guide you to the correct equation or hypothesis but without empirical confirmation it does not become knowledge.

There may be (are) mind independent objects but without perception you will have no experience, no knowledge and for practical purposes they will not exist for you.

In real life rationalism does not exclude empiricism as a tool for knowledge it is just not the only tool.

In reality, mind is indespensible for experience of reality even if there are mind independent objects.

One can be rigid and dogmatic about it, of course.

The point I made is that rationalism and empiricism are incompatible, and idealism and realism are incompatible, although, idealism and empiricism are not incompatible, and rationalism and realism are also, not incompatible. It is true, of course, that most empiricists would say there in a place for reason in knowledge. For example, Hume, an empiricist if ever there was one, held that inferential knowledge is important, but that it must be strictly based on perception. He denied we could know anything about the world using what Kant later on called, "Pure Reason". That is, reason not based on perception. But both Descartes and Spinoza (and Plato) held that "real knowledge" could be achieved only by pure reason, unadulterated with perception. You can say that Descartes, and Spinoza, and Plato, were rigid and dogmatic, but that is what they held, nevertheless. And they, of course, were the fathers and grandfather of Rationalism.

Well, I am in the final analysis a pragmatist and for a pragmatist
Knowledge is the goal- and both reason and empiricism are required.
What is reality?- probably not as important a question but both mental and material aspects seem to be involved (for me neutral monism).

But that does not mean there is no distinction between Rationalism and Empiricism, nor between Idealism and Realism, and nor does it mean that the distinctions are not clear ones.

I understand the distinctions well enough. I also understand that as a practical matter you do not have to choose one or the other: that both are involved in seeking knowledge and in constructing a picture of reality.

They are real just in the sense that they exist independent of mind. Rationalism does not hold that Realism is false. Descartes was a Realist. And Berkeley, who was an Idealist, and denied the mind-independence of material objects, was an Empiricist. I think you are confusing Realism with Empiricism, and Idealism with Rationalism. Those distinctions cut across each other.

No, I was merely speculating. But if they are independent of mind how then does one account for mind on the one hand and the intelligibility of the physical on the other hand?

If, due to the regularity of cosmos, we were to assert that reason is the ground of existence, then reason would be intelligent. This is Hegel's idea of Absolute Idealism, I think.

Sorry. Don't understand your question.

That's allright. Reason is the primary cause of the universe.

I suppose so. But only because you say so.

No, I was merely speculating.

Didn't sound like it, but if you say so.

I said it twice. What of it?