Are you real or is it just me?

@Alan McDougall,

Alan McDougall;97577 wrote:

Pinch yoursel and you will feel it, pinch someone else and you will not feel it

Try tickling yourself!

Wink

@Kielicious,

Kielicious;97839 wrote:

Try tickling yourself!

It does nothing you have to be tickled by someone else, so please tickle me because I need to laugh Very Happy

@Alan McDougall,

Alan McDougall;97836 wrote:

As far as you are concerned in you were to vanish, both you and the universe are no more

Maybe the universe is just an illusion of your vivid imagination and this post is just you debating with yourself

"So far as I am concerned" is not the way it is. Before I was born, there was no world, "so far as I was concerned". But there was a world, nevertheless.

What makes you think the world is my imagination? And it that were so, where would I be? What is logically possible need not be really possible. It is logically possible that there is a Spaghetti Monster flying around, but it isn't (really) possible. Yes, even in philosophy, you have to make sense. For something to be possible, there has to be some reason to believe it. Have you any reason to believe that the world is a product of my imagination? Of course not.

@Zacrates,

kennethamy wrote:

Have you any reason to believe that the world is a product of my imagination? Of course not.

Maybe he's referring to the Matrix.

Do we live in your imagination, kennethamy?

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;97890 wrote:

Maybe he's referring to the Matrix.

Same point. Has he any reason to believe I am in a Matrix?

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;97857 wrote:

"So far as I am concerned" is not the way it is. Before I was born, there was no world, "so far as I was concerned". But there was a world, nevertheless.

What makes you think the world is my imagination? And it that were so, where would I be? What is logically possible need not be really possible. It is logically possible that there is a Spaghetti Monster flying around, but it isn't (really) possible. Yes, even in philosophy, you have to make sense. For something to be possible, there has to be some reason to believe it. Have you any reason to believe that the world is a product of my imagination? Of course not.

How do you know that "there was a world before you were born"? "Because the Bible (of Science) told you so"? As Ortega said: "Science is an attempt to tell a story that's true every time it's told. But it's still a story."

You said "For something to be possible there has to be some reason to believe it." So what's the difference between "possible", "logically possible", and "really possible"?

I like to quote that late 20th century philosopher. Paul Newman, who possibly said: "Reality is a fig newton of my imagination." Yum, yum!

@longknowledge,

longknowledge;97908 wrote:

How do you know that "there was a world before you were born"? "Because the Bible (of Science) told you so"?

I don't know. Can I ask my grandparents?

@Zacrates,

One important argument against solipsism seems to be that we are born into a world in which we learn a common stock of knowledge that is "always already" there, a product of human history. It's utter complexity also seems to argue against it because of the seeming impossibility of a single mind imagining such a full and dynamic world in which we can "drill down" from one object to many layers of understanding; there is always an "so on and so forth" attached to the most simple thought.

Until one has a family, and rears a child, it is much easier to hold a solipsist perspective, as indeed it is if one is born healthy and whole.

@kennethamy,

kennethamy;97897 wrote:

Same point. Has he any reason to believe I am in a Matrix?

I was joking. :bigsmile:

@longknowledge,

longknowledge;97908 wrote:

How do you know that "there was a world before you were born"? "Because the Bible (of Science) told you so"?

Yes. Because there is overwhelming evidence. For instance, that I could not have been born unless I had parents, and my parents existed before I was born. (Don't you think you had parents, and that your parents existed before you were born?).

"We should not doubt in philosophy what we do not doubt in our heart". C.S. Peirce.

@Zacrates,

I guess I can tell the real world when I go out in it and I watch the news, ok. People can be fake but I can tell real people from the fakes because they display genuine love, I can certainly tell people who try to fake, generally because it's short, these people are shallow and only pretend to love to get what they really want, I can spot it! And they always reveal themselves in the end.
Thanks.

@Caroline,

Caroline;97967 wrote:

I guess I can tell the real world when I go out in it and I watch the news, ok.

You cannot tell the real world until you go out in it? You must find it very disorienting when try to dress yourself, or prepare meals while you are inside.

Caroline;97967 wrote:

People can be fake but I can tell real people from the fakes because they display genuine love, I can certainly tell people who try to fake generally because it's short, these people are shallow and only pretend to love to get what they reallt want, I can spot it! And they always reveal themselves in the end.
Thanks.

Sometimes you can spot fake people by removing their faceplates, or by throwing water on them, which often shorts out their sophisticated electronics.

@TickTockMan,

TickTockMan;97970 wrote:

You cannot tell the real world until you go out in it? You must find it very disorienting when try to dress yourself, or prepare meals while you are inside.

You what? I said I can, what I was referirng to TT is life is but a dream! How can you tell it's all real?

@Caroline,

Caroline;97971 wrote:

You what? I said I can, what I was referirng to TT is life is but a dream! How can you tell it's all real?

You said you can tell the real world when you go out in it. I inferred (perhaps incorrectly) that this meant that you could not tell the real world when you were not out in it.

Now I'm going to infer that you are saying that some of the world is real, but not all of it.

If life is but a dream, why do you go to to bed? Aren't you already asleep?
I'm very confused by your words.

@Zacrates,

Zacrates;96972 wrote:

I've been thinking about this for a while, and this came up: Are all of you real, or are you just objects that were created for "my" world. Maybe each of you have "your own" real world. Now just asking you this question completely messes with any bit of truth that this could even have a slight chance of having.

You were obviously created to be an object in my world. Wink

@Zacrates,

I was referring to the rhyme Row Row Row Your Boat. What do you think it means? Is there an afterlife? What it is real to us now is only now, what happens next when this is all over? Hmmm?

@Caroline,

Caroline;97977 wrote:

What it is real to us now is only now, what happens next when this is all over? Hmmm?

How can something that is real now, not be real later?

When what is all over?

@Zacrates,

When life is over TT.
Thanks and goodnight. Wink

@Caroline,

Caroline;97982 wrote:

When life is over TT.
Thanks and goodnight.

Whose life are you talking about?

@Zacrates,

Anyone, when you die.

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