Are there any contemporary philosophers who claim the world doesn’t exist in a form similar to what we think?
Or any who claim the world could as well be created 2 mins ago?
Or anything that results in historical facts being denied or doubted?
Well, to answer that, we’ll need to define “world”, “exist”, “form”, “think”, “created”, and “fact”, for starters. 
Definitely GD territory.
Well, the “world created 2 mins ago” thing is a subset of “you can’t know for sure that the world exists outside of your head”, which is known as “solipsism”.
It is a briefly illuminating notion to entertain, if only for the solidly lethal poke it provides to any pretentious “I’m only going to believe in things I know for certain” perspective that one might otherwise entertain. But once you’ve done that number, there’s nothing you can build directly on it, i.e., you aren’t going to run across too many philosphers whose grand treatise is that your life and the world around you is just a meaningless dream you’re having. Even the eastern spiritual teachings, which famously hold that “the everyday life is an illusion”, don’t mean that, but rather that the struggles and value-systems of the world are not of the worth that is attached to them.
What some philosphers do build from the solipsism-question is the unavoidable centrality of human uncertainty. If life in its entirety has to be approached on faith (i.e., “I don’t know for certain that any of this is real, but I’m going to proceed on the assumption that it is”), the precedent has been set for doing the best you can to ascertain what is so but then going with that with neither perpetual fretting over lack of absolute certainty nor pompous pretense of possessing it.
Do the producers of “The Matrix” count as “contemporary philosophers”? 
Buddhists?
No, that’s skepticism. Solipsism is the affirmative belief that the world isn’t as perceived. Very few serious philosophers are solipsists, because it’s unsupportable. Lots of them are skeptics, because skepticism is rational. However, it’s not like it really matters. So what if the world isn’t as I think it is? So far it’s been pretty consistent, so I’ll worry about wandering off the edge when I get there.
–Cliffy
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Even though we sometimes deny the existence of Great Debates, it nonetheless exists and therefore, Mod has decreed all questions such as this shall be placed there.
Thus sayeth Mod.
Moveth.
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Philip K. Dick, fictionalizing philosopher extraordinaire, wrote a great deal about his interpretation of reality which borrowed heavily from Gnosticism. Check out his nonfictional series of essays in The Shifting Realities of Philip K. Dick, or any of his novels, which in addition to being great fiction also talk about his philosophy. Valis in particular.
Clarification readily accepted. Concluding that, in fact, the world doesn’t exist outside your head is solipsism, whereas positing the question of whether or not such is the case is not; and as I alluded before, it is the latter that is philosophically useful. Solipsism itself is just kinda useless.
Unless you have a dream in which you are a solipsist, I suppose…
Solipsism is sterile because if solipsism is true there’s no point in trying to convince us annoying illusionary people that solipsism is true. If you’ve discovered that you’re the only real person in the universe and the rest of us are just hallucinations, why would you argue with the hallucinations over whether they are hallucinations or not? We’re just hallucinations, we don’t matter.
Likewise if you say that the proposition “propositions are either true or false” is false, you’ve embraced a logical paradox. If you really believe that, then there’s no point in talking to you, because there’s no way we can agree on anything. If existance is meaningless, then trying to convince people that existance is meaningless is meaningless.
The great early-21st-century philosopher Liberal lays out his case why the universe is not real in this thread
Unfortunately, I still haven’t read that thread further than Post 65, in which he explains the basic arguments. Still on my list of Things To Do Before I Die…
OK! From the top.
To answer this question, we need to know, or decide, what the “form we think the world exists in” actually is - in other words:
a. Is there such a thing as “folk metaphysics”?
b. If so, what does that constitute?
Other opinions are welcome, but I would say that the “obvious” view of the world would be along the lines of:
- Things such as chairs, tables, and trees have existence independent of the mind, and are made out of something called “matter”.
- “I” exist, I am something that can be distinguished from “my body”, I have “thoughts” and “desires” and “feelings”, I have free will and the ability to make choices and decisions.
- Other people exist, and have the same distinction between “mind” and “body” that I perceive in myself.
In other words, Cartesian substance dualism. I can’t think of any contemporary philosopher who’s an uncritical disciple of Descartes, so the answer to this question would be “Yes, all of them claim that.”
If by “could as well” you mean something like “a world that was created two minutes ago could be identical to a world that was created 13 billion years ago, or one that has been in existence for an infinite time”, then I don’t see how any philosopher could make a different claim. Again, the answer to the question is “Yes, all of them claim that.”
To answer this, we need to know what an “historical fact” is, and how it differs from an “ordinary” fact. Any suggestions?
Having read a couple more posts of that thread, there was this link to Donald Hoffman. Seems he qualifies as a Contemporary philosopher, and he certainly has an interesting twist on whether “the world exists in a form similar to what we think”.
wow.
You guys certainly got philosphical on my ass.
I probably should explain what I wanted with my question. As you’ve probably heard David Irving has recently been imprisoned for denying the holocaust.
Now my thought was, guys like ol’ Parmenides (IIRC) would also actually “deny the holocaust.” So I was wondering if there were any contemporary philosophers of whom you could say the same.
I know what you mean. The other day, I ordered a cheeseburger with mayonnaise and pickles. When they did not bring me a turkey sub with mustard and glue, I was furious.
Ahh, I see what you mean.
You’re probably going to have to go back as far as McTaggart to find as thorough-going an anti-realist as Parmenides; unless anyone can think of a modern philosopher with similar views about time…
Dummett is a pretty stodgy antirealist. Chihara, too. And to a lesser extent, Field. (His embroglio over “3 is a prime number” being false is still being argued as to interpretation, even by Field.)
Did I come across as angry or disappointed? I, of course, thought it was great with all those thoughtful answers. It was just way more than I had expected or needed.
And thanks for the answers second time around also.
I think solipsism is a great philosophy, and I can’t understand why everyone doesn’t accept it.
No, you don’t, and yes, you can.