But the issue isn’t my existence it’s that of other people. How do I care or love what you are essentially saying are piles of information? That would be like loving a textbook. Even then, what good are any words or kindness from the so called piles. You are essentially breaking down people into something less than human and throwing out all the morality that goes with it.
That’s something I have been trying to avoid doing because I don’t want to end up as one of those psychotic lunatics who murders becuaee he thinks no one is real or that they aren’t really human. The Nazis did that and I’m not keen on joining them. In fact it makes me feel even more alone than ever before. Regardless of how you put them, if the people are not real and exist in some external world then I truly am all alone. No connection with people or anything like that.
We may be on the wrong track in responding to Machinaforce.
I’m begining to think that what’s really bothering him is not solipsism at all, but the concept of philosophical zombies.
It’s not that he denies that there is a world out there, but rather that he thinks he is the only conscious being and everyone else is an automaton who goes through the motions as though they are conscious, but are not really.
From Wikipedia:
Yet there’s a reason this is called ‘philosophical’, nobody imagines that it’s really the case.
The simplest counter argument is to ask why only one person out of billions (or trillions if you include other animals) should be conscious, and not all the rest? What makes Machinaforce unique in the history of the universe in being the only one to possess consciousness?
Refusal to accept evidence is not absence of evidence. And it’s the height of arrogance to continue to insists that you are the center of a reality created to service your singular existence. What’s special about you that would justify the construction of this incredible illusion? And by whom?
Just because you choose to shut your eyes and plug your ears, the world and everyone in it doesn’t just vanish. No amount of special pleading will make your argument true.
Recognizing that there are piles of information is only the first step - one which is important in your case because it forces you to realize that there is something real besides yourself. Which, obviously, is important.
The next thing to consider is that the information you are receiving tells you with remarkable consistency that, for example, Sue is a charming person who acts exactly like a charming person, reacts exactly like a charming person, displays the knowledge and opinions one would expect of a charming person, and displays fear and pain when being hacked up with an axe just like a charming person.
This observable behavior is too consistent to plausibly be random - and therefore there is a source behind it. A real source. And this source understands being charming. The source of Sue’s behavior, the force that is puppeting Sue’s body, actually does in fact have the knowledge Sue does, including the knowledge of how to be charming - and they do in fact choose to actually be charming. Oh, and they also answer to the name Sue, when you talk to Sue, so it’s a confirmed fact that Sue is real, and Sue really does act charming.
At this point about the only real avenue of objection you have left is something like “But perhaps Sue is only pretending to be nice! Perhaps whatever force is driving Sue’s behavior is merely playacting as a nice person, when in fact they are somebody else entirely!”
But the thing is, people who believe that people are real have to ask the same question too! None of us can read the minds and intentions of the people around us. This doesn’t mean the other people aren’t real; it just means we can’t predict their behavior perfectly, and sometimes we make mistakes.
The thing is, though, the same rules that tell us not to stick our hands into fire apply to reacting to people, too. Sure, it’s theoretically possible that this newest fire will turn out to be other than it appears, and will be cold. But we assume it’s roughly what it appears to be until we have a reason to think otherwise. (That’s science!) Similarly, when a person has been walking like a nice person, and talking like a nice person, it’s reasonable to just assume they really are a nice person.
And while you might be wrong about that, you aren’t wrong about them being real, with a real mind behind their actions. That much is proven to be true.
They include information, but they are more than textbooks in that they apparently process inputs and produce relevant outputs. You can easily tell entities which do not, like the early Eliza program.
In fact, these entities all pass the Turing test as applied by you, and so whether they are real people or robots you are still morally obligated to treat them well.
If they indeed are figments of your imagination, however, things are a bit different. If we invent a fictional character for a novel, we are not obligated to treat that character well. We can kill or torture him without compunction. However since you are not aware of creating other people (and probably don’t have the processing power to do so) by definition they are not created by you. So you are not sure if you created them, and had better be nice to them just in case you did not.
I’m not arguing that I want this to be true, in fact I go to great lengths to try to disprove that it’s just me. I would rather feel small in a world of grandeur than be the author of an illusory one
You’re talking about people who do things you don’t expect them to do – things you don’t want them to do – and who create stuff you aren’t creative enough to come up with: poems and paintings, screenplays and symphonies, jokes where you wonder where they’re going with this until they hit you with the punchline. And they show you inventions that prompt a Wow, I Never Would’ve Thought Of That; and they make choices that prompt an I Didn’t See That Coming And I Don’t Like It One Bit.
Have you ever literally authored anything? If so, is that how it went?
I am glad to hear you say this. If you choose not to isolate yourself, you’ll find an abundance of proof that you are not alone in the world. I encourage you to keep this forefront in your mind such that it becomes your default position of reality. If you are ever in doubt, re-read the very compelling arguments many have offered in this thread.
The compelling arguments you speak of just really talk about how there is information comin to my senses. But then what of dreams? Those are worlds created by the brain, so what about this just being a creation of the mind.
You haven’t cited any evidence that I am not alone in the world. The main sticking point is data, but I can’t have any meaningful relationships or connections with data. They could be real or they could not, but I have no way to prove it. The way solipsism says it, or in this case uncertainty, is that nothing can be verified beyond the existence of the self. I know that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist though.
But hearing arguments like the teapot in which a positive claim (like the people being real and existing) must be supported by evidence. Otherwise we can assume they aren’t real or are just figments. This further cements the issue of me being alone in the world around me and it’s hard to break that view of things seeming illusory to me. I miss the certainty of a real external world, but it doesn’t look like that’s coming back.
So far the argument so have read aren’t very compelling for dealing with this, and just asserting that there is evidence without giving any doesn’t help either.
Again, it’s something I don’t want to be true. But when it comes to philosophical matters, it’s not a matter of what you want but what is. They could all be real and the fact that I can’t verify it is isolating. I never knew how many assumptions I made about the world all through life and now they are falling away.
You keep saying stuff like that – “are just figments”.
Why the adjective? What, in your opinion, makes them “just” figments?
Imagine a sexist who (a) needs medical help, and (b) waves off women who offer, dismissively saying that they “are just females”. But then one of them saves his life, because she’s a terrific doctor. And maybe he got that injury when he tried to lift something heavy – and maybe he laughs off the idea of a mere woman doing what he couldn’t, since he’s a big strong man and she’s “just a female”. And then she picks it up and carries it around for him, because she really is that strong.
And so on; you know this story; you’d expect that, at some point, he’d see the light and “just” would drop from his phrasing, right? Like, there’s something that women could do that would sufficiently impress him, to where he’d stop tossing in the “just” for them. Oh, he’d still do it for other entities; if he needed a smart doctor or a strong mover, he’d gladly sneer that, no, so-and-so is “just a toddler”. But fill in the blank for something that could get him to quit saying “are just females”.
So, fill in the blank for me here: what, exactly, would some entity have to do to convince you that – even if it’s a figment – you wouldn’t dismissively say it’s just a figment, because it’s proven to be so danged impressive?
And yet, most people have the capacity to distinguish between a dream and reality. Most easily dismiss dreams as non-reality. I assume you can as well.
Solipsistic argument is a logical fallacy. A fallacy you use willfully and petulantly to reject any and all evidence that has been presented to you by many of those who have contributed to this thread. I cannot offer you any more or better evidence than that which has already been offered - neither I nor anyone you interact with is an illusion of your own making because you cannot predict what will happen next nor can you reverse the measurable consequences of what just happened.
Once again, rejection of evidence does not mean absence of evidence. I can’t keep you from rejecting out of hand all the evidence that been presented to you.
This is strong evidence that you are experiencing a mental disorder and should seek professional help.
No, the physical world is what is. Philosophy is a what the idle mind engages in when it has too much time on its hands. Endeavor to engage more in the former and much less in the latter. Step away from your computer. Leave your house. Interact with the world that you call an illusion and it will become much more real to you. Or continue to isolate yourself and use that isolation as an excuse not to deal with reality (and the reality of your questionable mental state) while indulging in your self-involved obsession that you are the center of the universe.
Reality is under no obligation to comport itself to your philosophical blundering.
By dreams do you mean the dreams you have, or the dreams you read of in fiction or see in the movies? Because I can count on the fingers of one hand works of fiction that accurately portray dreams as opposed to realistic dreams of the type you seem to think the world is.
Do you shift from one scene to another? Do people ignore you when you are walking around naked? If not, you aren’t in a dream.
Evidence is data and data is evidence. You seem to be asking for proof, not evidence. That no one can give you.
You may start by assuming that people are figments, but there is tons of evidence against this - people having independent action, for instance. Say you are on the road and stuck in a traffic jam caused by an accident now cleared. You don’t even see the cause of the jam - isn’t that evidence that an independent actor caused it? You don’t seem to be willing to subject your hypothesis to the same tests you submit the reality exists hypothesis to.
As another example, people create things using knowledge you don’t have. You can even see the details. Do you know everything, but don’t know you know it, or do these people know things you don’t.
If you can’t accept that the real world is certain, how about 99.9999999% probable? That’s as good as you can do. No one can make you think that anything is certain. That’s in your (existing) head.
When you delve into philosophies like solipsism, what they do is acknowledge the fact that our senses are suspect. The moon may appear physically larger at the horizon, but that may not really be the case. Television screens might not in fact be windows into a world of tiny people living inside the teevee box. When your parents disappear from view, they might not have utterly ceased to exist.
The unreliability of our senses is a real thing and a useful thing to be aware of. And it is indeed the case that literally none of our senses are 100% reliable, and that, in theory, we really could be inside the Matrix or in some kind of dream state.
But the idea that that means nothing is real? That’s not the correct takeaway here. It’s the same as deciding that your parents leaving the room means they have ceased to exist, and that when they return they’re completely new people and your old parents are still dead.
The thing to take away from the unreliability of our senses is that the information in them needs to be assessed for evidence of truth. You shouldn’t just straight up assume that your senses are reliable when you think you’ve seen a ghost; you should keep observing, and keep thinking, and use that to decide whether you think what you see is real - or rather, if it’s based in something real.
If you leap to the conclusion that nothing is real without first finding evidence that it isn’t, then you are making the exact same error as those who presume their senses are perfectly accurate. You’re making an assumption without evidence.
The people that exist in our dreams aren't always within our control either. Their independence of action doesn't prove anything. Most of our dreams are also not entirely within our control so this could be the same as you are arguing for reality.
People ignoring your when walking naked doesn’t really prove you are dreaming either, the people in the dream could react in the manner you expect them to if you were naked.
Philosophy is what pokes holes in our certainties. I have been engaging in the world FYI but it doesn’t make it any more real. You also fail to understand the nature of what I am asking and the issue I am dealing with. Your leaps of judgment say it all.
But the problem with “proving it isn’t real” is that would be proving a negative. The problem there is I don’t think you can prove something isn’t real, at least I think so. The same thing with proving something real.
All I know is that the world around me is consistent, and I wake up to it each day. To tell something is a dream, one would have to wake from it. But we really only know it after the fact. Since the only two places are the somewhat erratic and fleeting world in my head at night, and this consistent and predicatable (somewhat) world I live in, I guess by that logic I could call this one reality if consistency is my aim. That would not be proof though, and someone could argue that dreams can be consistent as well. But to be honest, I don’t find their retort very persuading.
As for evidence, there really isn’t any in either direction. Learning that was hard, because the way I viewed the world was changed. I can’t verify either one, all I can do is believe. To be honest though, the more I wonder about this being a world my mind created the less plausible it seems. I can’t even wrap my head around as to why such a thing would even happen.
It’s the same way people dismiss a nightmare as “not real” or a character in a comic as just a character. They aren’t “real”. I guess it would also be like a robot saying that it loves you, it would not carry any weight unless it came from a human being. A real one. If it came from a “figment” it would be empty because they don’t REALLY exist, they are just in your head.