I think Xain is smart enough not to listen to you Sree. – Lausten
He doesn’t have a choice anymore than you have. The spoken word is like the sound of a bell. You may not like its peal but, nevertheless, the chime makes its mark in your subconscious and modifies it.
The “bang your head” response is a common one to solipsism. The entire basis of solipsism is that the human condition is that we only know what is in our own heads and we don’t completely understand our own heads.
We don’t? Who are “we”? If it is a “we” that includes you, then to make a pronouncement that “we don’t completely understand our own heads” is to set a limit to the inquiry.
You are defining solipsism from the perspective of a human digit. In that case, it’s pretty cut and dry. One head, one mind. Two heads, two minds. End of story.
The problem arises when the human digit has philosophical pretensions and tries to examine reflections that came out of nowhere.
AS I have mentioned before banging my head on a wall isn’t proof I exist. I could just be an illusion, consciousness and my selfhood and mind could just be an illusion. I could be a figment or a dream. Banging my head doesn’t prove I’m real. It doesn’t prove I have a mind either. I mean, what is a Mind? How do you know you have one? If all the data I have is sensation but according to solipsism sensation can’t be trusted then how can I know I am real and have a mind? No amount of bangs on the wall will prove I am real any more than watching someone else doing it will prove it to me. When you doubt evidence you forfeit any claims to truth or facts. – @snowcity
Would you doubt the sensation of the pain you feel when you bang your head on the wall? The only time I banged my head and felt no pain was when I slipped on the slippery sidewalk. It was winter in Pusan, South Korea; after a joyous meal and a copious amount of soju, a rice wine. I was conscious of my body falling and the back of my head hitting the concrete. No pain. And yet, I had no doubt that I was real.
Consciousness is real. I am not an illusion. Selfhood is something else. It is the belief that I am a human digit, a particular person with a body, and a mind. It is this delusion that makes solipsism confounding. I don’t doubt the evidence of pain. Sensation proves that I am real. What I am is something else.
Consciousness is real. I am not an illusion. Selfhood is something else. It is the belief that I am a human digit, a particular person with a body, and a mind. It is this delusion that makes solipsism confounding. I don’t doubt the evidence of pain. Sensation proves that I am real. What I am is something else.
Again, nothing more than beliefs. I can't really say if consciousness is real or not if it's based on the senses, which could be lying to me. I mean if I can't prove others are conscious (based on senses) then how I can prove I am conscious? How would I even know what consciousness is? You say you're not an illusion but that is still another belief. Selfhood isn't something else from that and it's still subject to the same doubts.
Sensation proves nothing, as the skeptics have pointed out. What one IS is irrelevant. Solipsism is confounding to you because you keep adding what isn’t there to it and revealing your ignorance of the matter.
He doesn’t have a choice anymore than you have. The spoken word is like the sound of a bell. You may not like its peal but, nevertheless, the chime makes its mark in your subconscious and modifies it.
Not true at all. The only time your words are present is when I'm on this forum, once I close this window you don't impact me. I'm here for the REST of people with more lucid observations. But proving you wrong is equally amusing at times.
We don’t? Who are “we”? If it is a “we” that includes you, then to make a pronouncement that “we don’t completely understand our own heads” is to set a limit to the inquiry.
You are defining solipsism from the perspective of a human digit. In that case, it’s pretty cut and dry. One head, one mind. Two heads, two minds. End of story.
The problem arises when the human digit has philosophical pretensions and tries to examine reflections that came out of nowhere.
Again…no. It’s not setting a limit but recognizing one. It’s the height of stupidity to not believe in limits, like a prisoner who can’t see the bars of their cage. I’m not defining solipsism from any perspective, I’m giving the literal definition of it. If you want to argue something else that’s fine, but don’t call it solipsism. Also the case is not cut and dry as having a head does not equal a mind or prove a mind. The reflections also don’t come out of nowhere.
You strike me as the prisoner who can’t see the bars on the cage and believes themselves to be free. You remain ignorant or deny the very real limits of our ability to know and perceive.
Again, nothing more than beliefs. I can’t really say if consciousness is real or not if it’s based on the senses, which could be lying to me. – @snowcity
How do your senses lie to you? Do you not shove the food you see on your plate into your mouth? Get real. Can you feel what is in your mouth before you swallow? How do you know when to go to the crapper? Do you shit in your pants and ignore it because you don’t trust your sense of smell which could be lying to you?
I mean if I can’t prove others are conscious (based on senses) then how I can prove I am conscious?
Why would you care if others are conscious? As long as people interact with you in a manner that meets your expectations, that’s all that matters. I write and you respond. You could be a computer program. So what?
How would I even know what consciousness is?
Consciousness is awareness of your environment. It enables you to navigate, move around, and avoid walking into a wall, place your fingers on the keyboard and write your posts.
You say you’re not an illusion but that is still another belief. Selfhood isn’t something else from that and it’s still subject to the same doubts.
Selfhood is the state of having the individual identity of a human digit. Being a human digit is an illusion. I am not a human digit. Consciousness, to me, is not the same as consciousness to you. I can live like a mentally programmed human digit but you can’t live in the freedom of psychological conditioning as I can.
Sensation proves nothing, as the skeptics have pointed out. What one IS is irrelevant. Solipsism is confounding to you because you keep adding what isn’t there to it and revealing your ignorance of the matter.
Skeptics are duds and similar to a first-generation classical computer with limited processing power. They are blind men groping elephants. Philosophy to duds is like jewelry to women. It’s an intellectual adornment to make them look sharp. Apparently, solipsism is not easy to wear.
Sree, just stop. At first proving you wrong was fun but now it’s tiring.
Consciousness is not awareness of the environment, that is reacting to stimulit. Mushrooms do it, but one wouldn’t argue they are conscious. Robots react to stimuli too. Again, consciousness and selfhood are senses and senses can lie. Phantom limbs, optical illusions, rubber hand illusion, etc. Senses can lie and be easily tricked (it’s why magicians can make money and know how to trick the senses). Consciousness could be an illusion, a convincing simulation or program, same with the mind. I say I can sense my body and mind and consciousness but what if that is what the program designed for maximum immersion and realism? Only an IDIOT says that senses don’t lie or that they prove you are real.
Your final comment shows an ignorance of what philosophy is about.
Also if you fancy yourself free from psychological conditioning, you’re deluding yourself. But then again, that’s what humans do.
I want a response from someone who isn’t them because they just keep digging their hole. I thought the lady I quoted was right, but looking at the leap and errors in logic reminds me of Sree to be honest (I doubt they’re the same person). She goes from doubt to FACTS (even though said facts are just beliefs) and acts like I used to do in thinking that believing others exist is self deception (I soon learned there is no evidence to hold such a belief). Getting some distance the two of them sound way less believable than I initially felt. I also found it weird that if she said she was alone that she would be posting on Quora, the same with anyone else who believes solipsism to be “True”.
Sree, just stop. At first proving you wrong was fun but now it’s tiring. - @snowcity
Why do you want to prove me wrong? I thought we were having an inquiry together. Checking things out cooperatively – even as robots - is fun. It could even be beneficial if we end up discovering the cause of human suffering and save mankind. Proving each other wrong is evil and counterproductive.
Consciousness is not awareness of the environment, that is reacting to stimulit. Mushrooms do it, but one wouldn’t argue they are conscious. Robots react to stimuli too.
What is it to be conscious then? When you sit on a thumbtack, you react to the prick. When you feel cold, you put on a coat. Plants grow towards sunlight: phototropism. Everything is programmed to react to stimuli, robots too. Why do you feel that “Conscious Experience” (Klinko) is different?
Again, consciousness and selfhood are senses and senses can lie. Phantom limbs, optical illusions, rubber hand illusion, etc. Senses can lie and be easily tricked (it’s why magicians can make money and know how to trick the senses).
Senses detect stimuli the way the thermostats detect temperature variations. You are confusing consciousness (A) and selfhood (B) with senses (C). Tidy thinking is crucial. Selfhood is an illusion, and illusions are fabrications of the mind. When you watch a magician performing, your sense of sight doesn’t lie. It’s your mind that is being tricked to fabricate the magician’s lie. The image in the mirror is a real reflection captured accurately by your sense of sight. The belief, that it is you, is an illusion of selfhood fabricated by the mind.
Consciousness could be an illusion, a convincing simulation or program, same with the mind. I say I can sense my body and mind and consciousness but what if that is what the program designed for maximum immersion and realism? Only an IDIOT says that senses don’t lie or that they prove you are real.
You really need to clean up your act. Your mind is a cluttered mess. I say this with affection and not to belittle you. The state of your mind is a reflection of the way you must be living. Not good.
Your final comment shows an ignorance of what philosophy is about.
I am neither a philosopher nor do I philosophize. I examine philosophies and take them apart.
Also if you fancy yourself free from psychological conditioning, you’re deluding yourself. But then again, that’s what humans do.
I know I am free of psychological conditioning. I believe in nothing. I verify this by watching the way I live in freedom from the screwed-up lives of human digits.
Wasn’t Hypatia of Alexandria a philosopher of solipsism?
That said, when I was studying religion at a state college, a professor gave the example of the Buddhist asking about a table in a room and does it still exist after you leave the room? In the Buddhist thought, it doesn’t.
Solipsism (/ˈsɒlɪpsɪzəm/ from Latin solus 'alone', and ipse 'self')[1] is the philosophical idea that only one's mind is sure to exist. As an epistemological position, solipsism holds that knowledge of anything outside one's own mind is unsure; the external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist outside the mind.
Some interpretations of Buddhism assert that external reality is an illusion, and sometimes this position is [mis]understood as metaphysical solipsism. Buddhist philosophy, though, generally holds that the mind and external phenomena are both equally transient, and that they arise from each other. The mind cannot exist without external phenomena, nor can external phenomena exist without the mind. This relation is known as "dependent arising" (pratityasamutpada).
So… @snowcity we could go on the idea that Sree doesn’t actually exist, except when you look at the words in his post and even then, Sree doesn’t actually exist because he and his posts are external to our minds. We know for sure, when we leave the forum, Sree does not exist, thus doesn’t exist on the forum and therefore can be ignored. After all, everything outside the mind, according to solipsism doesn’t exist.
In other words, ignore Sree and don’t respond to him.
That said, when I was studying religion at a state college, a professor gave the example of the Buddhist asking about a table in a room and does it still exist after you leave the room? In the Buddhist thought, it doesn’t. - @mriana
The Buddhist is correct.
So… @snowcity we could go on the idea that Sree doesn’t actually exist, except when you look at the words in his post and even then, Sree doesn’t actually exist because he and his posts are external to our minds. We know for sure, when we leave the forum, Sree does not exist, thus doesn’t exist on the forum and therefore can be ignored. After all, everything outside the mind, according to solipsism doesn’t exist.
The mind is a metaphor, a figure of speech. You cannot be outside the mind.
What you don’t think about or perceive through your senses doesn’t exist. For example, if you don’t see the back of your head or think about it, it doesn’t exist. Crazy but true.
Proving each other wrong is evil and counterproductive. -- Sree
Is evil right? You're confusing "wrong" and "evil". Xain is trying to establish logic and examine facts. He can call things wrong if that's what he sees. You do it all the time.
He did say he was proving me wrong FOR FUN. Check his post #336721.
If you don’t have a standard for right, you aren’t doing science
There is no standard for right in scientific inquiry. Every accepted principle is on the table to be broken. It's like progressive social reform. Nothing is sacred. It's the practice of amorality. But you have to go about it in a scientific way: systematic, methodical, orderly, meticulous, rigorous, accurate, and rational.
What I do is a scientific inquiry for pointing out errors in perception, not for proving others wrong for fun.
I wouldn't exactly call what you do science.
There is no standard for right in scientific inquiry. Every accepted principle is on the table to be broken. It’s like progressive social reform. Nothing is sacred. It’s the practice of amorality. But you have to go about it in a scientific way: systematic, methodical, orderly, meticulous, rigorous, accurate, and rational.
There technically is and that is repeatability and consistency. Hence peer review and being able to replicate an experiment and get the same results. I also wouldn't saying social reform holds nothing sacred, otherwise there would be no reform. It's replacing one value with another. Unlike science though there is no standard to measure morality that doesn't boil down to value. Science doesn't measure value statements, it merely states how things behave/are. It's the "is-ought" problem. Going about social reform in an amoral way not only robs the movement of momentum and drive but is a surefire way to destroy the world
Also in science every principal is not on the table to be broken, it’s not something scientists actively set out to do. What they do is follow the evidence and if that evidence is strong enough to overturn previous views then it does so.
But considering you lost when trying to argue what “looked like” solipsism I’m not surprised by this.
