Poll about realism

[davidsmith73]

The question being unanswerable does not preclude being able to make any predictions based on any view.

Well no, but I don't think I was saying that. If theoretical predictions based on each view cannot be distinguished from one another then the question is empriically unanswerable as to which view is correct.

The pragmatic approach would assume the position which seems to make the most accurate prediction.

That statement implies that you can distinguish between each view based on their theoretical prediction, thus the question is answerable.

Edited to add:

I'm not convinced that the question is unanswerable!

Of course this assumption would be held tentatively as there is no possible way to objectively verify the position.

? If one of the three views makes a more accurate theoretical prediction then you can certainly objectively verify the position!

If, however, there is no way to distinguish between the theoretical predictions of any of the views then shouldn't we simply apply Occams razor and opt for the view with the least assumptions. Since non-realism does not incorporate any assumptions about an experience-independent reality, doesn't it qualify?

I don't know how experience dependent realities make any less assumptions than objectivism or similar veins of thought.

Non-realism does not say that reality is dependent on experience. It says that reality is experience. There is no assumption to the effect that reality is independent of experience within non-realism (as defined at the start of this thread). I suppose its analogous to the atheism/theism debate. One definition of atheism is simple that there is a lack of any notion of "god" in atheistic thought. Theism assumes that there is some kind of "god" (whatever that means). Similarly, non-realism does not have any notion of experience-independent/objective reality. Hence why it carries less assumptions.

 

[davidsmith73]

If we assume no experience-independent reality exists, how does this differ from solipsism?

You would have to define solipsism to me. I think that if an experience-independent reality did not exist, we would not have to necessarily conclude that "other peoples experiences" did not exist.

 

[Z]

You would have to define solipsism to me. I think that if an experience-independent reality did not exist, we would not have to necessarily conclude that "other peoples experiences" did not exist.

Why not? After all, isn't it an assumption to believe that those other experiences are actually other people at all?

In other words, the experience of another person, to use YOUR Occam's razor, carries less assumptions (if we make no assumptions about the experience itself) than if we assume that other person is actually another being of some form.

So, how does non-realism differ from solipsism? Or, in other words, at the point you decide that other beings are real, you are no longer practicing non-realism, are you?

 

[davidsmith73]

Why not? After all, isn't it an assumption to believe that those other experiences are actually other people at all?

In other words, the experience of another person, to use YOUR Occam's razor, carries less assumptions (if we make no assumptions about the experience itself) than if we assume that other person is actually another being of some form.

So, how does non-realism differ from solipsism? Or, in other words, at the point you decide that other beings are real, you are no longer practicing non-realism, are you?

Deciding other peoples experiences are real would be no different to deciding your own experiences of the future are real. Neither are experienced now. Is that Solipsism? I don't know. I don't even think its fruitful to play the comparison game. Better to concentrate on the meaning of our non-realism definition.

Its interesting to consider the self in relation to non-realism. I don't think non-realism requires that experiences belong to a specific experiencer in any fundamental way. The illusion of the self would be brought about in essentially the same way as contemporary psychological accounts of the illusiary self. The "building blocks" of the self would be a whole set of experiences that create the illusion of "me" as a fundemental thing. If a non-realist then speaks of "Johns experiences", what he is refering to is a set of experiences that form the illusiary self that is "John". It seems possible under non-realism for "me" to experience being "John", but of course under those circumstances, the illusiary self would simply be "John" and all that would have changed is the identity/quality of the experiences that make up each respective self. You are not experiencing your future "self" at the present time are you? In the same sense you are not experiencing being "john". The only difference is the character of each respective set of experiences that consitute each "self". Exactly why "I" continues to be me and not john is a challenge for non-realism.

 

[Z]

Deciding other peoples experiences are real would be no different to deciding your own experiences of the future are real. Neither are experienced now. Is that Solipsism? I don't know. I don't even think its fruitful to play the comparison game. Better to concentrate on the meaning of our non-realism definition.

Its interesting to consider the self in relation to non-realism. I don't think non-realism requires that experiences belong to a specific experiencer in any fundamental way. The illusion of the self would be brought about in essentially the same way as contemporary psychological accounts of the illusiary self. The "building blocks" of the self would be a whole set of experiences that create the illusion of "me" as a fundemental thing. If a non-realist then speaks of "Johns experiences", what he is refering to is a set of experiences that form the illusiary self that is "John". It seems possible under non-realism for "me" to experience being "John", but of course under those circumstances, the illusiary self would simply be "John" and all that would have changed is the identity/quality of the experiences that make up each respective self. You are not experiencing your future "self" at the present time are you? In the same sense you are not experiencing being "john". The only difference is the character of each respective set of experiences that consitute each "self". Exactly why "I" continues to be me and not john is a challenge for non-realism.

You didn't address my last post. Interesting.

 

[davidsmith73]

You didn't address my last post. Interesting.

I thought I did. In what way?

BTW, you didn't define solipsism to me either, lets be fair.

 

[Z]

You understand what solipsism is; that much, at least, you demonstrated in your reply.

Consider your experiences: have you ever experienced anything outside of the personal POV of yourself (taking into consideration the reliability of your memory, of course)? From that personal POV, the experience of all other sentient beings excludes any other first person experience (you haven't had them yourself, so it is an assumption to think they exist at all). Otherwise, a belief that other first-person points of view exists is an assumption that automatically includes an experience-dependent reality - that is, a reality which does not depend on the ONLY experience you have direct access to.

As you said yourself, "Exactly why 'I' continues to be me and not john is a challenge for non-realism." IF 'I' were to become John or Jane or Schubert, we might have a case for an experience-dependent reality; but as long as these experiential first-person points of view remain separate, we must either accept solipsism (denial of other first-person points of view) or make assumptions that include an experience-independent reality. I don't see any logical way out of this dilemma whatsoever.

A while back, lifegazer posited that all experiences are being had by the same entity, consciously divided and separated from the POV of each experietial packet, but united through the awareness of the All. He thought his reality reflected much what you're discussing here, but his reality also made an assumption of a greater experience-independent reality - his 'God' - in order to separate the unique experiences of each person.

As long as experiences remain unique and separated, we have to accept some form of an experience-independent reality, or accept solipsism.

Solipsism (from the Latin ipse = "self" and solus = "alone") is the metaphysical belief that only oneself exists, and that "existence" just means being a part of one's own mental states — all objects, people, etc, that one experiences are merely parts of one's own mind. This view is first recorded with the presocratic sophist Gorgias (c. ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

 

[davidsmith73]

Consider your experiences: have you ever experienced anything outside of the personal POV of yourself (taking into consideration the reliability of your memory, of course)? From that personal POV, the experience of all other sentient beings excludes any other first person experience (you haven't had them yourself, so it is an assumption to think they exist at all). Otherwise, a belief that other first-person points of view exists is an assumption that automatically includes an experience-dependent reality - that is, a reality which does not depend on the ONLY experience you have direct access to.

Not sure I understand what you're saying here. I have not experienced anything outside of "my" personal POV. Does this mean that I must state that the existence of another discrete set experiences (i.e., those that form the self labelled "John") is an axiom of non-realism? I'm not so sure about that. If experiences can somehow collate to create to illusion of "me", surely it can be reasoned, rather than assumed as an axiom, that they can also collate to form "John".

As you said yourself, "Exactly why 'I' continues to be me and not john is a challenge for non-realism." IF 'I' were to become John or Jane or Schubert, we might have a case for an experience-dependent reality; but as long as these experiential first-person points of view remain separate, we must either accept solipsism (denial of other first-person points of view) or make assumptions that include an experience-independent reality. I don't see any logical way out of this dilemma whatsoever.

As long as experiences remain unique and separated, we have to accept some form of an experience-independent reality, or accept solipsism.

Well, it seems like you recognise that it is at least, in principle, possible for the illusiary self to change. That it is, in principle, testable elevates the concept beyond an assumption I think. Also, solipsism seems to view all experiences as belonging to some fundamental unchanging "I". I don't think that I'm saying that. If the "self" is merely an illusion created from a collation of experiences then it follows that you could specify the conditions whereby other "selves" could be created from different groups of experiences. That's the major difference I can see between my view and solipsism.

 

[Z]

Therefore, your view has a fundamental non-experientially-dependent reality - one which contains different groups of experiences which you do not share. In other words, your experiences do not depend on the experiences of others; therefore, at least one factor is experience-independent.

 

[hammegk]

As long as experiences remain unique and separated, we have to accept some form of an experience-independent reality, or accept solipsism.

That's the first choice you need faith to make. Your choice of the monism to have faith in is another unknowable dichotomy.

 

[Z]

That's the first choice you need faith to make. Your choice of the monism to have faith in is another unknowable dichotomy.

That's the first thing I've ever read from you that I agree with. Amazing.

Hammy is absolutely right here - the prime faith required is in whether or not some form of reality exists at all (aside from your own experience). There are two choices: only you (the experiences that you are) exists; or something aside from you exists as well. (I suppose you could also posit that even you don't exist - as in, the experiences that you are don't exist either - but, I would think, only after some extended use with chemical substances of various interesting and probably illegal natures)

If you assume that reality is entirely experience-dependent, that would have to necessarily include the reality of other beings - in other words, other people would only exist because you experience them. Otherwise, you have an experience-independend model of reality - 'My set of experiences exist, and sets of experiences I do not have also exist; meaning experiencers exist, independent of my experience of the experiencers...' Yet even that statement makes the assumption that other experience sets exist!

The path of least assumptions will always be solipsism, but that is a pointless and irrelevant philosophy at best.

 

[hammegk]

That's the first thing I've ever read from you that I agree with. Amazing.

What is truly amazing is that I've never said anything else.

 

[Iacchus]

What is truly amazing is that I've never said anything else.

Solipsism rears its "ugly" head again, eh?

 

[davidsmith73]

Therefore, your view has a fundamental non-experientially-dependent reality - one which contains different groups of experiences which you do not share. In other words, your experiences do not depend on the experiences of others; therefore, at least one factor is experience-independent.

I don't follow you. How can the notion that experiences that form my point of view, and those that form Johns point of view, are different mean that there is a non-experientially-dependent reality? The experiential self that is Jane doesn't share John's experiences because Jane is made up from experiences that form Jane and not John. However, both sets of experiences are obviously experiential. Where does the non-experiential bit come in?

As a suggestion, I think we should not be confounding an experiential reality with unncessary temporal factors. For example, when we talk about someone else experiencing something, we should not assume that different peoples experiences are simultaneously co-existing in a temporal sense, in a similar way to two physical objects co-existing in a spatial sense. If non-realism is true then it seems to me that time itself (along with the rest of the physical world) must be explained as something that is generated from experiential reality.

 

[Z]

I really don't think I can explain it at all easier than I already have. Either there is some experience-independent phenomena - even if it's merely the experiences of some other being, they are independent of your own experience and therefore constitute an experience-independent reality - or non realism = solipsism.

I really don't know how to explain it any simpler.

 

[hammegk]

Sure, but The Solipsist may exist.

Some might term The Solipsist -- assuming the existence thereof -- 'god'.

 

[davidsmith73]

I really don't think I can explain it at all easier than I already have. Either there is some experience-independent phenomena - even if it's merely the experiences of some other being, they are independent of your own experience and therefore constitute an experience-independent reality - or non realism = solipsism.

I really don't know how to explain it any simpler.

Am I right in saying that you think the existence of other experiential selves necessarily means that there is an experience-independent reality? But how so? Essentially, we are discussing the existence of multiple selves within a singularly experiential reality (self being a whole collection of different experiences rather than a fundamental entity). My particular "I" exists by virtue of the experiences that make "I" possible. Similarly, it is possible that other "I"'s exist by virtue of their particular set of experiences. It also follows that each "I" is not fixed since experiences change (beit facets of the physical or mental aspect of our world). I understand that you are trying to point at the problem of privacy of individual experience. But I still don't see how this is a problem for an experiential model of reality. Perhaps someone else can provide a fresh perspective on this issue?

 

[Z]

Sure, but The Solipsist may exist.

Some might term The Solipsist -- assuming the existence thereof -- 'god'.

That's what lifegazer was saying... And it didn't make any sense then, either.

Am I right in saying that you think the existence of other experiential selves necessarily means that there is an experience-independent reality? But how so? Essentially, we are discussing the existence of multiple selves within a singularly experiential reality (self being a whole collection of different experiences rather than a fundamental entity). My particular "I" exists by virtue of the experiences that make "I" possible. Similarly, it is possible that other "I"'s exist by virtue of their particular set of experiences. It also follows that each "I" is not fixed since experiences change (beit facets of the physical or mental aspect of our world). I understand that you are trying to point at the problem of privacy of individual experience. But I still don't see how this is a problem for an experiential model of reality. Perhaps someone else can provide a fresh perspective on this issue?

Sounds like an awful lot of assumptions there, David. And underlying it all - and I don't know if you can even detect this in your thinking - you have a framework of existence that is not experiential in nature - that is, whatever it is that separates the sets of experiences and instantiates one self from another. Whatever that is, is beyond our realm of experientially-dependent reality. Basically, unless you can deal with the privacy issue using few or no assumptions, you have either solipsism (and might anyway) or a non-experientially-dependent form of reality (even if all we know is experientially-dependent, the privacy issue creates at least one non-experientially-dependent phenom for us to worry over).

Won't even get into the fact that there are a lot of things we don't have to experience directly that still influence us.

 

[davidsmith73]

Sounds like an awful lot of assumptions there, David. And underlying it all - and I don't know if you can even detect this in your thinking - you have a framework of existence that is not experiential in nature - that is, whatever it is that separates the sets of experiences and instantiates one self from another. Whatever that is, is beyond our realm of experientially-dependent reality.

Basically, unless you can deal with the privacy issue using few or no assumptions, you have either solipsism (and might anyway) or a non-experientially-dependent form of reality (even if all we know is experientially-dependent, the privacy issue creates at least one non-experientially-dependent phenom for us to worry over).

Is it an awful lot of assumptions? Or is it reasoning from a smaller number of assumptions? I don't really know right now. I must retire to a darkened room.
However, good points, and I think that you are raising the role of laws or physical relationships within an experiential reality. Indeed, "whatever it is" that separates the sets of experiences must be conceived of as a quantitative relationship, just like any physical "law". I know I might be repeating myself, but why does "whatever it is" have to be non-experiential? The very notion of a purely experiential reality means that physical relationships do not represent some kind of mathematically adherent set of laws that transcend experience. Non-realism would suggest that physical relationships are purely expressed in terms of experienced relationships and nothing else. And in fact the privacy relationship (however it may be described) is an experienced relationship by virtue of "I". I'll admit that this particular issue of privacy is very difficult to express, whichever side of the debate we're on!

Won't even get into the fact that there are a lot of things we don't have to experience directly that still influence us.

Only true if you accept direct or indirect realism. The notion of direct vs indirect experience is a consequence of an assumption about the existence of experience-independent reality. Within non-realism, unconscious perception falls into category of how to explain the emergence of the physical realm.

 

[Z]

Is it an awful lot of assumptions? Or is it reasoning from a smaller number of assumptions? I don't really know right now. I must retire to a darkened room.
However, good points, and I think that you are raising the role of laws or physical relationships within an experiential reality. Indeed, "whatever it is" that separates the sets of experiences must be conceived of as a quantitative relationship, just like any physical "law". I know I might be repeating myself, but why does "whatever it is" have to be non-experiential? The very notion of a purely experiential reality means that physical relationships do not represent some kind of mathematically adherent set of laws that transcend experience. Non-realism would suggest that physical relationships are purely expressed in terms of experienced relationships and nothing else. And in fact the privacy relationship (however it may be described) is an experienced relationship by virtue of "I". I'll admit that this particular issue of privacy is very difficult to express, whichever side of the debate we're on!


Only true if you accept direct or indirect realism. The notion of direct vs indirect experience is a consequence of an assumption about the existence of experience-independent reality. Within non-realism, unconscious perception falls into category of how to explain the emergence of the physical realm.

Unfortunately, the answer of 'unconscious perception' can also be used to explain the privacy issue, and any and all other problems within non-realism. It's like when you're a kid, and you run out of reasonable explanations in a story, so you resort to 'magic' or 'high-tech'. Resorting to 'unconscious perception' leaves us pretty much nowhere.

Plus, it's yet another assumption.