Philosophy Discussion Forums

Burning ghost wrote:If logic is either discovered or made, and you take it as “discovered” then solipsism an option.

Firstly, and to clarify -- logic is 'given' to us. It is our innate (a priori), and our ONLY, means of coherency; of "making sense" of anything. Without it, nothing is sensical; everything is non-sensical.

Secondly, I don't get what you mean when saying "solipsism is optional" with "discovered" logic. Can you expound on this?

Burning ghost wrote:It makes no sense to say on one hand that solipsism is impossible to dismiss whilst claiming to “discover” rather than “create” logic.

Logic has no say-so in the matter. It can't "dismiss" solipsism. Logic can't prove or disprove solipsism, or say if others 'are' or are 'not' zombies. For one to claim/assert, one way or the another (zombies or no-zombies), does so without any logical justification. Any claim made is therefore just a 'blind faith' claim, and not a 'logical' claim.

Burning ghost wrote:One must insist on psychologism in order to adhere to solipsism.

To clarify - one must insist on psychologism in order to take a stand EITHER WAY (to adhere or dis-adhere to solipsism) without a logical basis to do so. If one greatly dislikes the notion of solipsism, then they will be psychologically unable to accept such a scary notion, and will dismiss it outright (without any logical justification).

Burning ghost wrote:If that is the case then any logical argument given is on shaky ground (given that your foundation is “logic” it follows that you know nothing other than some choice to accept “logic” on blind faith whilst calling it psychologism by way of denying any counter to solipsism).

I don't follow your point here. There is no logical argument for or against solipsism. There is no logic that supports or counters solipsism.

Furthermore, if we wish to "make sense" then we don't have a choice to accept or not accept logic. If we wish to "make sense", then logic is the ONLY tool we have. If we don't wish to "make sense", then we can bypass logic, and claim anything we want.

Fooloso4 wrote:Again, you miss the point. You are using both ‘beliefs’ and ‘truths’ in a narrow and constricted way.

So again, are you trying to imply that we should consider some "beliefs" as "truths"? I don't understand your point. Are you trying to say that some beliefs are closer to truths than others, and if so, then by what basis is one belief more "truer" than another?

RJG:

So again, are you trying to imply that we should consider some "beliefs" as "truths"?

I do not consider the fact that my neighbor is conscious a belief. It is simply not something that I question. It is not something I accept as true either. It is part of my pre-rational relation to others.

I don't understand your point.

Agreed. Wittgenstein’s On Certainty may offer some clarity. It is a short and deceptively simple text. It can be found free online.

Mistake : “is NOT an option”

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/psychologism/

Merry Christmas

Fooloso4 wrote: ↑December 25th, 2018, 11:26 pm I do not consider the fact that my neighbor is conscious a belief. It is simply not something that I question. It is not something I accept as true either. It is part of my pre-rational relation to others.

I use the word fact to describe anything I do not question. That's why I'm so much fun at parties, and have been dismissed from 43 juries.

RJG -

For emphasis ... you’ve repeated over the years that you adhere to “logic,” yet above you’ve pretty much just said it is only blind faith in logic because you don’t see “logic” as fundamental.

From that position you can obviously contest that solipsism isn’t an idea that can be easily dismissed/abandoned.

As usual you shouldn’t expect the reader to understand the multiple uses of terms you use and/or their fuzziness. As a example, and I know I’m repeating myself to you again, Fool refers to his “conscious neighbour” and in this is framed in philosophical terms by some as “apodictic knowledge” - this relates to items of consciousness like attention and it is a reason I find it useful to refer to “knowledge” as being something “questioned” or “possible to question”, whereas you seem to often prefer to chase our tail in pursuit of some “unquestionable truth” which cannot possibly be known in the way I’ve framed the meaning of “knowledge” above (consciousness). That said, we can of course set up rigidly defined rules (and being human this is a natural facility we have) in order to navigate “in-the-world”; by way of setting up rules with which we ca declare “true” and “false” logical answers - this is a veryi teresting fork in the road regarding the issue of “psychologism” (the philosophical/mathematical rather than what you took it to mean).

Rather than doubt if there is a world or if others are conscious we as philosophers should ask what it means that we exist in a world with other conscious subjects. What is this community? Who are the others? Why am I not alone? Does my existence presuppose the existence of others? Can there be a world without a community of subjects? These are much more interesting questions than the question if the world is real or if others have thoughts, for me at least. Some things are beyond doubt, but asking their meaning is in the core of philosophy, as it was for Heidegger when he took the challenge of asking the meaning of being, the hardest of all challenges.

As for why we are not alone, it appears that, like ants, we are incomplete without the colony. As with a bee or ant colony, the aggregation is doing all the powerful and influential stuff; we are just its constituents.

Our individual consciousnesses themselves are incomplete, evolved for connection. Most of that consciousness consists of subculture, culture, species, genus etc. What we as individuals have to offer is much less, like the visible tip of an iceberg. Our expression seems to largely exist as the choices we make when we decide (consciously or otherwise) which items from society's bodies of knowledge on which to focus.

Greta wrote: ↑December 26th, 2018, 6:08 am As for why we are not alone, it appears that, like ants, we are incomplete without the colony. As with a bee or ant colony, the aggregation is doing all the powerful and influential stuff; we are just its constituents.

Our individual consciousnesses themselves are incomplete, evolved for connection. Most of that consciousness consists of subculture, culture, species, genus etc. What we as individuals have to offer is much less, like the visible tip of an iceberg. Our expression seems to largely exist as the choices we make when we decide (consciously or otherwise) which items from society's bodies of knowledge on which to focus.

Quite. But then there is my personal, subjective point of view to all this, and this is what makes it crucial to ask the meaning of everything. Without my existence, there is no meaning. Without your existence there is no meaning. Without someone to be there, to exist, there is no meaning. Without the community of subjects there is no meaning. And all meaning is meaning for me, whoever I happen to be. The achievements of the community have meaning only for each individual personally. There is no collective meaning. And there is no being without meaning.

RJG wrote:Logic is 'given' to us. It is our innate (a priori), and our ONLY, means of coherency; of "making sense" of anything. Without it, nothing is sensical; everything is non-sensical.

...Furthermore, if we wish to "make sense" then we don't have a choice to accept or not accept logic. If we wish to "make sense", then logic is the ONLY tool we have. If we don't wish to "make sense", then we can bypass logic, and claim anything we want.

Burning ghost wrote:For emphasis ... you’ve repeated over the years that you adhere to “logic,” yet above you’ve pretty much just said it is only blind faith in logic because you don’t see “logic” as fundamental.

It is not clear how you derived these 'false' conclusions from my words above.

1. There is no "blind faith" with logic, it is our ONLY means of sense making, ...or is there another 'means', or a better 'tool' somewhere to use?
2. Logic is "fundamental", it is 'innate'. We have no other way to "make sense", ...right?

Without logic, then how do you propose we make sense of anything?

Burning ghost wrote:From that position you can obviously contest that solipsism isn’t an idea that can be easily dismissed/abandoned.

Correct, from the position of LOGIC, solipsism CANNOT be refuted (or supported).
And from the position of NON-LOGIC (aka "fantasy"), solipsism CAN be refuted (and supported).

Burning ghost wrote:Fool refers to his “conscious neighbour” and in this is framed in philosophical terms by some as “apodictic knowledge” - this relates to items of consciousness like attention and it is a reason I find it useful to refer to “knowledge” as being something “questioned” or “possible to question”, whereas you seem to often prefer to chase our tail in pursuit of some “unquestionable truth” which cannot possibly be known in the way I’ve framed the meaning of “knowledge” above (consciousness).

It seems from your words here, that you are claiming that it is "apodictic knowledge" (i.e. that it is absolutely certain) that our neighbor is not a zombie, ...correct? And if so, then what (specifically) makes this, or any, piece of knowledge, "apodictic"? ...is it one's emotional 'dislike' for the contrary position?

Burning ghost wrote:That said, we can of course set up rigidly defined rules (and being human this is a natural facility we have) in order to navigate “in-the-world”; by way of setting up rules with which we can declare “true” and “false” logical answer...

We don't "set up the rules" of making sense; logic. These are given to us; are innate; an a priori. We couldn't possibly "set up rules" without the "sense-making" ALREADY instilled/implanted in us to do so in the first place! Again, the truth's of X=X (X does not equal not-X, etc.) are not man-made, or man-setup truths.

Burning ghost wrote:...this is a very interesting fork in the road regarding the issue of “psychologism” (the philosophical/mathematical rather than what you took it to mean).

If Logic is not man-made, then logic is not a matter of psychology.

RJG -

If like you say logic is our only means of knowing anything and that solipsism cannot be logical then it is illogical. It is not a case of proving there isn’t a teapot orbiting Jupiter.

It is hard to discuss anything with you if you use terms in strange ways. Apodictic doesn’t mean “absolute knowledge” and frankly I’m surprised you would suggest it did considering this has been mentioned to you over dozen times over half a dozen years.

An example of an apodictic knowledge would be “I am on Earth.” All that I was adding to this was to say that by attending to my “being on Earth” I have brought the matter into the realm of questioning and by doing so opened up a crack of disbelief in the reality previously left unattended (the same is applicable to anything else you cae to think about yet more easily applicable to some items of thought more than others).

I wasn’t talking anout setting up rules of logic. I was saying we can only KNOW definitively by application of abstract rules in an abstract realm. If you disagree then you are refuting logic ... which you’ve not been doing apparently.

Burning ghost wrote:If like you say logic is our only means of knowing anything and that solipsism cannot be logical then it is illogical.

But this is not what I've said. I said -- logic cannot prove solipsism true or false. This absence of proof, is not proof of absence! The inability to logically prove something, does not mean (or is not proof) that this something is somehow illogical (or is true, or is false). If we have no proof, then we have no proof to prove anything! To put it simply: With no proof, we can prove nothing!

And therefore, to claim solipsism is false, without any proof, does not make (or prove) it is false. There is no "apodictic knowledge" to the falseness of solipsism.

RJG wrote:It seems from your words here, that you are claiming that it is "apodictic knowledge" (i.e. that it is absolutely certain) that our neighbor is not a zombie, ...correct?

Burning ghost wrote:It is hard to discuss anything with you if you use terms in strange ways. Apodictic doesn’t mean “absolute knowledge” and frankly I’m surprised you would suggest it did considering this has been mentioned to you over dozen times over half a dozen years.

Here are my interpretation sources of "apodictic":

• Merriam-Webster -- Expressing or of the nature of necessary truth or absolute certainty
  Oxford Dictionaries -- Clearly established or beyond dispute
  Synonyms.com -- Necessarily true or logically certain

By the way Burning ghost I really like your avatar -- it's pretty cool, a nice artistic touch/feeling to it.

Dictionaries won’t cut it unless they specifically mention philosophy. You seem inclined to protest rather than inveestigate.

You need to understand that what you said is what you said. I doubt it is what you meant though. That is not really my problem.

Tamminen wrote: ↑December 26th, 2018, 9:09 am

Greta wrote: ↑December 26th, 2018, 6:08 am As for why we are not alone, it appears that, like ants, we are incomplete without the colony. As with a bee or ant colony, the aggregation is doing all the powerful and influential stuff; we are just its constituents.

Our individual consciousnesses themselves are incomplete, evolved for connection. Most of that consciousness consists of subculture, culture, species, genus etc. What we as individuals have to offer is much less, like the visible tip of an iceberg. Our expression seems to largely exist as the choices we make when we decide (consciously or otherwise) which items from society's bodies of knowledge on which to focus.

Quite. But then there is my personal, subjective point of view to all this, and this is what makes it crucial to ask the meaning of everything. Without my existence, there is no meaning. Without your existence there is no meaning. Without someone to be there, to exist, there is no meaning. Without the community of subjects there is no meaning. And all meaning is meaning for me, whoever I happen to be. The achievements of the community have meaning only for each individual personally. There is no collective meaning. And there is no being without meaning.

Awareness is, of course, famously odd. We dread losing it but almost equally dread not losing it each night. We hope for continuity of awareness while pretty sure that whatever continuity continues, at some point it won't as the killed off self.

While that self loses beingness, it still exists informationally in memories and other residual influences, and it exists to some extent in those who are like-minded, both now and in the future.

Also, collective meaning may well exist. If it did we probably wouldn't notice it, objectify it, misinterpret it or list certain phenomena as "mysteries". Conversely, collective meaning may not be here now but may emerge in the future.

Greta wrote: ↑December 27th, 2018, 8:22 am While that self loses beingness, it still exists informationally in memories and other residual influences, and it exists to some extent in those who are like-minded, both now and in the future.

I guess you do not see a paradox here.