The best online Debate website - DebateIsland.com! The only Online Debate Website with Casual, Persuade Me, Formalish, and Formal Online Debate formats. We’re the Leading Online Debate website. Debate popular topics, Debate news, or Debate anything! Debate online for free! Is Solipsism Disprovable?in Philosophy

Imbster

Looking at the philosophy section, it's all feminism so let's take up a much darker topic.

http://www.iep.utm.edu/solipsis/

Well you may know the term from Vsauce


http://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_solipsism.html

https://www.theguardian.com/notesandqueries/query/0,5753,-24820,00.html

Solipsism is belief that you only exist and that others could be a figment of your imagination.
I'm not a solipsist but it's a good idea to dismantle or weaken someone's total loyalty to realism.

frechelect

It's a great theory! 

Their are theories that the human brain imagines everything. The brain tells the eyes what to see potentially according to some theories. This theory could be simialar and say that everybody is a figment of your imagination.

billpassed

I respectfully disagree with @frechelect 's argument. 

This rheiry cnat can't be possible. The human brain may not have enouph power generally speaking to imagine all other people. Also, this could interfere with environment settings.

PowerPikachu21

I personally think this argument runs on a fallacy. Do I exist? I'd assume so, because I'm here. If someone else is very certain about their existence, then they exist. This raises a question: How many worlds are there; do people exist in 1 world each? If I exist in my world, and you believe you exist in yours, then we both must exist. So either we're a figment of the other's imagination, or we exist in the same world.

Erfisflat

This calls to mind the double slit experiment. Similar to a video game like minecraft, what isn't on the screen doesn't exist, due to the limits of the platforms' memory. What is seen is rendered simultaneously.

"[I can't accept quantum mechanics because] "I like to think the moon is there even if I am not looking at it." Einstein 



http://quantumenigma.com/nutshell/notable-quotes-on-quantum-physics/

Imbster

Well what I think disproves is the fact that discoveries happen in other regions of the earth that you may not have known of. Therefore your mind didn't generate that research but the other person did and it'd be impossible to already have known or generate the idea of every research ever conducted with your own brain alone.

AlwaysCorrect

frechelect said:

It's a great theory! 

Their are theories that the human brain imagines everything. The brain tells the eyes what to see potentially according to some theories. This theory could be simialar and say that everybody is a figment of your imagination.

That's not quite Solipsism. Solipsism basically only goes as far as "I think therefore I am" and views the trusting of your senses as an assumption.

On this basis you can't assume you have eyes or even a brain.

natbarons

@alwayscorrect , I respectfully disagree with part of that argument.

I believe solipsism is imagining what's around you, like humans beings.

Erfisflat

Imbster said:

Well what I think disproves is the fact that discoveries happen in other regions of the earth that you may not have known of. Therefore your mind didn't generate that research but the other person did and it'd be impossible to already have known or generate the idea of every research ever conducted with your own brain alone.

That research could be generated by the mind alone, and if it is practical, that new information can be used to create new information in your reality. Anything, you receive a phone call for instance, and until the phone rings, the other person doesn't exist, then, your subconscious creates their voice. Plan a visit, and your subconscious creates them.

PowerPikachu21

A shame I couldn't bend this world to my will if I am imagining it all. If it's possible to bend our lucid dreams, then why not a false reality?

comey_testify

@powerpicachu21, I'm sure that this comes with some sort of physical limit.

NonCredenti

I don't think it's disprovable without being circular. I accept the existence of an external reality and other minds axiomatically, and build from there. 

If I'm wrong--if I am only a brain in a vat--I can't think of how I could ever know it, or what I could do about it, so I don't waste much time worrying about it. Treating the external world as real seems to be working so far...

ViceRegent

Easily, via revelation by an omnipotent God who desires to be understood.

NonCredenti

ViceRegent said:

Easily, via revelation by an omnipotent God who desires to be understood.

How can you know any message you receive is actually coming from God, and not some other powerful being (Satan)?

How can you know any message is true? How can you know an omnipotent God is not lying to you?

How can you know you have not suffered some brain trauma and are not hallucinating this message?

ViceRegent

@NonCredenti

God says so.

NonCredenti

ViceRegent said:

@NonCredenti

God says so.

Interesting. I asked:
How can you know any message you receive is actually coming from God, and not some other powerful being (Satan)?
And your answer is "God says so"  
So a voice tells you something, saying it's God, and you believe it.  You never consider that it might be Satan?

I asked:
How can you know any message is true? How can you know an omnipotent God is not lying to you?
And your answer is "God says so" 
The Bible clearly says God can and does mislead humans, but you never consider that possibility?

I asked:
How can you know you have not suffered some brain trauma and are not hallucinating this message?
And your answer is "God says so" 
So any time you hear voices or see things--even wild, strange, crazy things--you just assume it's God?

This leads to a rather disturbing question. Why did God tell Dena Schlosser to dismember and kill her baby?
By your own claims, if anyone hears God telling them something, it's from God. So why would He command such a thing?  Before you answer, could you check with God first, so I can get His answer through you? I'd like to verify that whatever you tell me is coming from God. I mean... that's how you get all your knowledge.

ViceRegent

Your inferences are not my implications.  The problem with pagans is that they are constitutionally unable to see outside their tiny little boxes.

NonCredenti

ViceRegent said:

Your inferences are not my implications.  The problem with pagans is that they are constitutionally unable to see outside their tiny little boxes.

Which is why I've asked you a number of times to explain how this happens, but you haven't given one word beside "God says so," in which "says" doesn't mean "says."   

This is not your fault. I've asked dozens of people these questions and not a single one has ever made even the tiniest effort to answer it. That's not typical Internet hyperbole. Not a single Christian who parrots the presupp script has made the slightest attempt to answer.

ViceRegent

Perhaps they do answer but you lack the ability to understand?

ViceRegent

The problem with pagans is they they make themselves the measure of reality, which is proof they are mentally ill and morally reprobate.

NonCredenti

ViceRegent said:

Perhaps they do answer but you lack the ability to understand?

Wrong. Like you, they literally do not even attempt to answer the questions.  They do not understand the concepts under discussion. They saw some video on youtube, or downloaded some charlatan's app, and thought they were going to slay the world with "How do you know? How do you know? How do you know?"...   They follow the instructions not to ever answer questions, without understanding why they shouldn't. This is why you shouldn't. 

You can be the very first to even make the feeblest attempt.

How can you know any message you receive is actually coming from God, and not some other powerful being (Satan)?

How can you know any message is true? How can you know an omnipotent God--one who admits in the Bible that he sometimes deceives humans--is not lying to you?

How can you know you have not suffered some brain trauma and are not hallucinating this message?

You will never answer those questions.

Never.

ViceRegent

How do you know it is wrong?  Again, perhaps you are the problem?

The problem with pagans is they they make themselves the measure of reality, which is proof they are mentally ill and morally reprobate.

Nope

No

DrCereal

ViceRegent said:

How do you know it is wrong?  Again, perhaps you are the problem?

The problem with pagans is they they make themselves the measure of reality, which is proof they are mentally ill and morally reprobate.

That's a great dodge of all the questions he asked you.

Medic

Boring. Descartes smashed solipsism in the 1600s.

DrCereal

Medic said:

Boring. Descartes smashed solipsim in the 1600s.

Though I'm sure you have very interesting things in mind, it would better if we knew what you were referring to. There may be people here (sadly, e.g. me) who do not know what you are referring to.

Could you provide his argument for us?

Medic

@DrCereal

Fair enough.

Descartes started by thinking that an evil demon was attempting to make him think that he could trust nothing.

C1: You cannot prove, for instance, that an apple is real given that the demon could just be manipulating your senses into thinking that the apple was real
P1: However, it can only do so if you do actually exist - you cannot be persuaded that nothing is real if you do not exist.
C2: Therefore, it logically follows that you do actually exist and as such that the evidence of your senses is true
P2: Solipsism is absurd.

DrCereal

Medic said:

@DrCereal

Fair enough.

Descartes started by thinking that an evil demon was attempting to make him think that he could trust nothing.

C1: You cannot prove, for instance, that an apple is real given that the demon could just be manipulating your senses into thinking that the apple was real
P1: However, it can only do so if you do actually exist - you cannot be persuaded that nothing is real if you do not exist.
C2: Therefore, it logically follows that you do actually exist and as such that the evidence of your senses is true
P2: Solipsism is absurd.

"that the evidence of your senses is true"
Where is this coming from? Everything up to this statement was pretty valid, but you make a pretty large jump here.
I don't follow.

Medic

The logical foundation of Descartes is established by cogito, ergo sum, and as such he can establish that what he perceives is real in at least some way because he cannot be deceived into thinking that things were real were he not real himself. 

DrCereal

Medic said:

The logical foundation of Descartes is established by cogito, ergo sum, and as such he can establish that what he perceives is real in at least some way because he cannot be deceived into thinking that things were real were he not real himself. 

I'm completely on board with the assertion that the objects of our perceptions must at least exist in some way, since our perceptions of them do exist, but I don't at all understand how that means we can assume that they actually exist - independent of mind - which is knowledge that Solipsism asserts to be unknowable.

Medic

One could only attempt to convince someone that they did not exist if they did indeed exist independent of mind.

DrCereal

Medic said:

One could only attempt to convince someone that they did not exist if they did indeed exist independent of mind.

Why so?

MayCaesar

It is two philosophical interpretations leading to the same outcome. It is impossible to disprove solipsism, because solipsism does not give any experimental predictions that can be tested and verified or found wrong. It is like two statements: "Stacy gave me $100", or "I received $100 from Stacy" - the described event is the same, but the perspective is different.

Solipsism states that, since our perceptions are limited by our mind, we cannot interact with anything outside of this mind, and hence nothing beside it exists in our world. The mind exists objectively (otherwise, one could not invoke the concept of "existence"), and everything else is simply a product of the mind generating our perceptions.

Objectivism, on the other hand, states that the objective world exists independent of our mind, and that our mind affects how we perceive that world, but does not define that world and does not contradict its existence.

According to solipsism, when we die, the world dies. According to objectivism, when we die, our mind turns off, but the world keeps on existing. Experimentally it is impossible to test, since in either case our mind ceases to function at the moment of death. It is a philosophical distinction, but not a practical one.

---

However, it is important to not that the philosophical distinction can reflect our values. A solipsist that believes that the world dies with them might not care about the future of the world after their death (since there will be no world left, from their perspective), so they might make decisions that could have horrible consequences were the world to continue existing - for example, initiating a nuclear war shortly before death to entertain oneself with a beautiful sight of mushrooms on the horizon at the last moments. An objectivist believes that the world will keep existing after their death, and will not commit such an act, because they probably care about the future of the world more and do not want to damage it.

I tend to be more on the solipsist side in this regard ("Doesn't matter what happens after I die, since it won't affect my mind"), however I still care about the future of the world - if from a philosophical perspective, rather than a practical one. I know that what happens after my death will mean nothing to me, but it means something to those around me, and, in turn, their well-being matters to me right now - so I cannot throw the future of the world out of the equation completely.