“I believe it (or at least respect it) because there is no hard evidence to suggest an alternative viewpoint (other than personal comfort and social convenience), it is seemingly impossible to disprove, and it is the final product of Occam’s razor.”
Also your comment suggests you might not understand solipsism. IF they are projections of your mind then they aren’t in danger, nothing will happen to them, there is no reason to save them. Your logic only applies if they are real, exist, and can feel emotions.
“If there’s no way to know if solipsism is true or not, acting as though it is true is the only good and rational option.”
As the quote above shows, there is no evidence to suggest an alternative viewpoint and you can’t pretend it’s real because the whole time you’ll be aware you are pretending it is so. There is always going to be that fear at the back of your mind that none of this matters, that the curtain will fall away and you’ll find yourself alone with no one else, because they never were.
There is always going to be that fear at the back of your mind that none of this matters, that the curtain will fall away and you’ll find yourself alone with no one else, because they never were. -- Xain
Well, that's kind of the human condition isn't it? That's why we accept promises, not knowing if they will be kept. But as we build trust, the fear subsides and we find ourselves surrounded by trusted allies.
Soooo, solipsism is a self-defense mechanism to protect yourself from being rejected by others, since one has beat them to the punch by dismissing their validity from the gitgo.
Sort of like the promise some make to themselves, never to love, because it only lead to heartbreak.
Which work fine and dandy until someone crosses paths with a someone that resonates with them, and all those intentions go out the window.
You missed the mark greatly CC, like not even in the same ballpark. It’s not a defense, it’s a problem that prevents such a connection from happening. It’s not about dismissing validity but the fact that you cannot know from the get go. You can’t dismiss what you can’t even be sure was ever there. Like I said you wildly missed the mark.
1) A PÁGINA NÃO FOI ENCONTRADA awesome dude, so impressed.
To quote Morpheus from The Matrix, “What is ‘real’?” All you know is what you perceive. The most fundamental thing you can perceive is your own self-awareness; that requires no sensory input from the “outside.” Beyond that, all you have is processed nerve signals.</blockquote>
And EGO.
That the best you can do snowy???
DH: “If we construct everything we see, and if we see neurons, then we construct neurons. But what we construct doesn’t exist until we construct it. So neurons don’t exist until we construct them.” (¶7)
Cc: In order to see an object light needs to first bounce off that object, then travel to one’s eyes, then be processed more or less the way Hoffman described, only then can it be perceived by one’s mind.
The light beams bouncing off that object wouldn’t be entering our eye’s to begin with, if that object didn’t already exist. Or ?
Prof Hoffman #3 - Playing Basketball In Zero-Gravity - (objective) Reality
A dog will chase its tail wondering why it cannot catch it. He believes its really there. He believes he’s really here. Perhaps he really doesn’t believe he should be able to catch it.
CC, since solipsism can’t be disproven, to some people that means it is as good as true (in spite of the fact you can’t disprove anything with absolute certainty, and therefore nothing is not true).
It’s a problem that can only be fixed if the person with the problem wants to learn.
The coolest thing about this thread is, you and I are either Xain explaining things to himself or humans with a separate minds who are trying to help him. Either way he should read and think about what is written.
Yet again, the truth of solipsism is irrelevant to how one should act and live their life.
"No philosophy is in itself ‘bad’, but this one can have negative effects if taken too seriously.
I have thought about this over many years and found that, if you allow yourself to go all the way down the rabbit hole, it can start to have a depressing effect. To keep ourselves sane we must be open to the reality that is presented to us, regardless of the possibility that it may all be an illusion.
Not wishing to go off topic… but I consider it a similar situation to the free will question; despite the unavoidable conclusion of a predetermined universe (the only escape from which is to descend into mysticism), I really have no choice than to ‘pretend’ I have free will. Which is easy because it really feels as though I do. Of course I’m acutely aware of the paradox in that last sentence. Reluctantly I admit this is the closest I’ve ever come to a religion, in that I behave in a way that contradicts logic.
In the same way, whether it’s objectively real or all in your mind, you’re stuck in this reality like it or not and you have to accept it at face value. Otherwise you’d become depressed, insane, or a monster.
My advice is not to think about it too much :)"
Even the link used as proof of solipsism says exactly what I’ve been saying all along.
Xain, for your own good, listen to someone!! Get help from a professional if you can’t escape the pull of these destructive ideas.
Please don’t keep dwelling on whether solipsism is true or not. It’s obviously mentally and emotionally draining and ruins your ability to live. We all get one chance at life so before you lose any more of yours to this issue, get some help.
You clearly didn’t read the rest of the comments or the original ones I posted earlier about how solipsism is the default position.
There’s also more from here:
"
It is true, but it is a dead end to be an overtly uncompromising and dogmatic solipsist.
Indeed, all we can know is that we “experience”, that we are “aware” - beyond that there is no certainty of anything, as to true 100% certainty or empirical provability.
Even any words or symbols we use are constraints. constructs, and false as well - we cannot recognize (“be aware”, ”experience”) we know anything beyond that we do “have experience”.
Everything else is up in the air, in that only what is actually Real and True hath not nary a care.
Simply as solipsistical as that."
Also nothing thinking about it is terrible advice since you inevitably end up thinking about it. It’s like telling someone not to think about pink elephants.
“Also nothing thinking about it is terrible advice since you inevitably end up thinking about it. It’s like telling someone not to think about pink elephants.”
The difference is that my thinking of pink elephants for a few seconds doesn’t affect me negatively in any way. You are absolutely being negatively affected by this obsession with solipsism. And don’t pretend you aren’t. No mental health professional wouldn’t agree that you are overly preoccupied and being negatively affected by this obsession.
I think you mistake people not agreeing with your personal interpretation of your internet links as them not reading or thinking about them. After the 637th time accusing someone of not reading them, maybe you should consider the possibility that you aren’t seeing what we’re telling you. It’s unlikely in the extreme that those of us interested in communicating with you also refuse to read your links (especially since we often quote from your link.) It is more likely that you are missing what we, and usually the links themselves, are saying.
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Don’t forget, if solipsism is true I’m merely you telling you what you already know (so don’t be too hard on me (yourself), and if it’s not true then I really am someone trying to talk to you (so don’t be too hard on me.)
Yet again, solipsism doesn’t affect how you should act.
Again I keep saying that solipsism does impact how someone should act. If I recognized that no one else was real or had feelings I’d be doing some pretty horrific stuff because “they aren’t real”.
I’m not missing what the links are saying. Also no mental health professional would agree that I am overly preoccupied with this. They all recognize this is a very real issue that most haven’t come in contact with in their lives. They treat it seriously because it exposes the phantasm that we built our certainty on, they know they can’t do anything to really help the person because in a sense it’s true, you cannot verify an external reality only believe in it (same with the other direction).
If I recognized that no one else was real or had feelings I’d be doing some pretty horrific stuff because “they aren’t real”. -- Xain
The fact that you don't do horrific stuff disproves that no one has ever thought of this. The fact that some people do horrific stuff proves that some people did think about it and think nothing else matters or exists outside of them. I was at lunch today with an amoral old guy who no longer cares because he thinks he has less than 5 years to live. He insults people, he's rude, he doesn't care about what he's leaving to his kids. But you have noticed that your actions have consequences. None of us fully understand how a tiny change in our lives affects something on the other side of the world. Whether that is all in our head, or that world really exists, it still appears to come back and bite us in the ass sometimes, so we act accordingly.
In this world, which is in your head or otherwise, or my head, it is not 100% provable that other beings have thoughts like me. Everyone experiences that feeling sometime in their life. Not everyone extends it to solipsism, but it’s not that different from just feeling alone and unable to express yourself fully. It only “exposes a phantasm” if you are indeed correct, but as we all keep saying, you can’t know that. You can only know that you can’t know. There’s nowhere else to go with this, so, yes, you are overly preoccupied with it.
"If I recognized that no one else was real or had feelings I’d be doing some pretty horrific stuff because “they aren’t real”."
I wouldn't want to live in a world where I was cruel to people, regardless of whether that world was physical or only in my mind [solipsism is irrelevant.] There are prisons with inmates who thought that it was okay to be cruel. If you choose to be cruel you will join them, either in the physical world or in your mind [solipsism is irrelevant.]
You can’t treat the world you inhabit like a story you are writing. Many gruesome movies are made by nice people who recognize that their imagination is separate from their reality. There are no repercussions to imagining a story full of terrible stuff, but try doing that stuff in real life and you’ll soon have a terrible life yourself.
Xain, if solipsism is real, do you think you control your reality? What I mean is, if nothing is real and you create your reality, are you in total control of all of it?