if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

Reality is one’s own perception of it.

Woodie said:

Reality is one’s own perception of it.

yes, but its a statement not a dumb question

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

The mind’s capacity to predict.

reality is sensed by people

the body senses, sight, hearing, smell, taste and feeling

what happens when you close off all the senses?

CrazyNeutrino said:

what happens when you close off all the senses?

I am a Frisbetarian. We believe that your soul goes up on the roof and you can’t get it down any more.

(also, there are several more senses than the ones you listed)

Woodie said:

Reality is one’s own perception of it.

or isn’t.

roughbarked said:

Woodie said:

Reality is one’s own perception of it.

or isn’t.

Yeah, I have always been pretty uncomfortable with the ‘reality is perception’ stuff. Seems like an entirely egotistical projection of the mind onto the world around it, and would seem to deny the possibility of the ‘consensus reality’ in which we all mostly live.

Rule 303 said:

roughbarked said:

Woodie said:

Reality is one’s own perception of it.

or isn’t.

Yeah, I have always been pretty uncomfortable with the ‘reality is perception’ stuff. Seems like an entirely egotistical projection of the mind onto the world around it, and would seem to deny the possibility of the ‘consensus reality’ in which we all mostly live.

There is something about manifestation that needs to be comprehended.

Probably the existence of the proposition no reality exists in human minds requires that some reality exists in human minds.

I am 1, self-referencing of the singular entity comes near it (1 as quantity, with qualities)

After that I got around to wondering of proximity sensing, when the presence of another is felt. Presence awareness.

Then I was wondering about sensing presence of self, like sensing the presence of ones own mental activity.

Then to sensing that presence and that generating I am 1, this.

I am 1

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

—-

pain

I take it no-one likes the ‘ability to predict’ approach?

What if I said ‘The ability to predict, with greater certainty that random chance, is the basis of all scientific endeavour.’ ?

;-)

Rule 303 said:

I take it no-one likes the ‘ability to predict’ approach?

What if I said ‘The ability to predict, with greater certainty that random chance, is the basis of all scientific endeavour.’ ?

;-)

—-

He asked for the “shortest most simple”

>I take it no-one likes the ‘ability to predict’ approach?

predictive power is important, it related to expectation, anticipation, that sort of thing

I am 1 now, and expect to be in future nows.

tauto said:

He asked for the “shortest most simple”

The ability to predict. Four words. The rest was just window dressing for dumb people.

There is no short and simple for philosophical questions…

furious said:

There is no short and simple for philosophical questions…

not sure it is so much that, I have a hunch the answer is of the practical-every-day and a functional working necessity.

furious said:

There is no short and simple for philosophical questions…

or there isn’t.

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

—

Mortality.

Rule 303 said:

CrazyNeutrino said:

what happens when you close off all the senses?

I am a Frisbetarian. We believe that your soul goes up on the roof and you can’t get it down any more.

:D :D :D

I’m going to use this as often as I can.

transition said:

I am 1, self-referencing of the singular entity comes near it (1 as quantity, with qualities)

Lepidus: What manner o’ thing is your crocodile?
Antony: It is shap’d, sir, like itself, and it is as broad as it hath breadth; it is just as high as it is, and moves with its own organs. It lives by that which nourisheth it, and the elements once out of it, it transmigrates.
Lepidus: What color is it of?
Antony: Of its own color too.
Lepidus: ‘Tis a strange serpent.
Antony: ‘Tis so. And the tears of it are wet.

kii said:

I’m going to use this as often as I can.

Heh. Glad you like it.

I thought that there was no such thing as a “dumb question” but there are stupid bastards asking stupid questions.

>I thought that there was no such thing as a “dumb question” but there are stupid bastards asking stupid questions.

ontological crisis, bob

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

There’s an anecdote that answers that. A student at a philosophy class, on hearing Descartes’ “Cogito ergo sum. (I think; therefore I am.)” asked the lecturer “How do I know that I exist?” to which the lecturer replied “Who is talking?”.

From a scientific viewpoint, what we blithely call “reality” is a product we conjure up. Our interface with reality is only our senses, and we well know that what we sense is influenced by brain chemistry, LSD for example. So what is to say that what we sense when in a mentally pathogenic state is any less real than what we sense is a supposedly normal state? There can not be any fully logical proof that anything real exists outside our own senses. Even the existence of those senses themselves is conjured up by the mind as a semi-consistent way to interpret my thoughts.

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

That would depend on what whoever made that statement meant by those words.

The definitions of words 2, 3, and 6 are so broad that as it stands it could mean almost anything.

Nonetheless, if I assume the words mean what I would have meant if I had made that statement I would say:

The fact that all well documented observations of external events are consistent, and the better the documentation the greater the consistency, suggests that there is an external reality, and our perception of it is accurate (although incomplete).

mollwollfumble said:

There can not be any fully logical proof that anything real exists outside our own senses. Even the existence of those senses themselves is conjured up by the mind as a semi-consistent way to interpret my thoughts.

He didn’t ask for a fully logical proof.

He asked for a short statement of what is likely to be true.

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

I, personally, like to take a step back and express an answer in set theory notation.

∃∃
“∃∃“∈ thought
∴∃ thought

Roughly translated into English this becomes:

Existence exists (which is the definition of existence)
“Existence exists” is a thought (which is the definition of “a”)
Therefore thought exists (which provides a convenient definition of symbolic logic)

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

What we mean by the “human mind” is the experience of human cognition, which is actually experienced and therefore real.

(Regardless of whether that experience accurately models the world outside the human mind. Hallucinations, for example, are real experiences).

I think I agree that whilst we are thinking about thoughts, there is at least one thought that exists.

I think that’s what mollwoll and bubblecar just said.

If they exist.

mollwollfumble said:

transition said:

if I stated as fact that no reality exists in human minds, what would the shortest most simple explanation/example be that convincingly demonstrates the statement to be likely false

I, personally, like to take a step back and express an answer in set theory notation.

∃∃
“∃∃“∈ thought
∴∃ thought

Roughly translated into English this becomes:

Existence exists (which is the definition of existence)
“Existence exists” is a thought (which is the definition of “a”)
Therefore thought exists (which provides a convenient definition of symbolic logic)

To express the logic more sensibly in English, first note that in set theory the words “is” “real”, “exists” and they derived forms “am”, “reality” etc. are treated as synonyms.

So an alternative translation in English of the set theory notation is:

Reality is real.
Therefore “reality is real” must be the element of at least one set. Call one such set “thought”.
Therefore thought is real.
One place for thought is likely to be in my mind.
Therefore it is “likely false: that “no reality exists in human minds”.

mollwollfumble said:

So an alternative translation in English of the set theory notation is:

Reality is real.
Therefore “reality is real” must be the element of at least one set. Call one such set “thought”.
Therefore thought is real.
One place for thought is likely to be in my mind.
Therefore it is “likely false: that “no reality exists in human minds”.

Is this saying the same as “I think therefore I am”

Or more or less?

Or more, or less?

What do you think?

The Rev Dodgson said:

What do you think?

Or if you are a figment of my thought, what do I think?

Fairy much any occasion an expectation is affirmed it contributes to reality being reality.

The kettle was where I expected, so the coffee, sugar and milk.

If the kettle wasn’t where I expected I would have gone found it and returned it to where it were meant to be.

The wetware got me a coffee fix.

I (self-referencing) i’d expect is the shortest answer to the original question I posted, which physically gestured would be to point at myself.

Yeah, this thread is all about me.

transition said:

Fairy much any occasion an expectation is affirmed it contributes to reality being reality.

The kettle was where I expected, so the coffee, sugar and milk.

If the kettle wasn’t where I expected I would have gone found it and returned it to where it were meant to be.

The wetware got me a coffee fix.

I (self-referencing) i’d expect is the shortest answer to the original question I posted, which physically gestured would be to point at myself.

Yeah, this thread is all about me.

Unless you are a figment of my imagination, in which case it is all about me.

>Unless you are a figment of my imagination, in which case it is all about me.

I am happy to be a figment, and that you are all about you. It works.

:)

The Rev Dodgson said:

What do you think?

Or if you are a figment of my thought, what do I think?

Exactly, you have the idea perfectly (or do I just think you have). This is question that goes all the way back to Socrates, if not earlier. “Ontologist” would have said that it is the first question in ontology, ontology being “the study of what is really real”.

So the three answers I offered above are:
“Cogito ergo sum”
“Who is asking?”
and the set theory answer.

Fairly much any occasion an expectation is affirmed it contributes to reality being reality. The kettle was where I expected, so the coffee, sugar and milk. If the kettle wasn’t where I expected I would have gone found it and returned it to where it were meant to be.

Exactly, hypothesis and test, the scientific method. For many altered states of consciousness this test distinguishes between the unreality of thought and the reality of thought in normal states of consciousness.

But not all, it’s remarkable how many expectations associated with paranoia actually end up being fulfilled. That is an example of unreality existing in the human mind despite application of the scientific method.

The mind does not exist?

nut said:

The mind does not exist?

Mine does!

There is a thought experiment imagining a child who is born without any senses at all, no sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, appetite etc, in all respects unable to detect an outside world or inner world, If that child is raised by medical interventions to be twenty years old, what might they be thinking?

AwesomeO said:

There is a thought experiment imagining a child who is born without any senses at all, no sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, appetite etc, in all respects unable to detect an outside world or inner world, If that child is raised by medical interventions to be twenty years old, what might they be thinking?

“Are we there yet?”

>There is a thought experiment imagining a child who is born without any senses at all, no sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, appetite etc, in all respects unable to detect an outside world or inner world, If that child is raised by medical interventions to be twenty years old, what might they be thinking?

if asked, or do I do what Spock does, the mind melding thing.

AwesomeO said:

There is a thought experiment imagining a child who is born without any senses at all, no sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, appetite etc, in all respects unable to detect an outside world or inner world, If that child is raised by medical interventions to be twenty years old, what might they be thinking?

Depends what you include in “inner world” I suppose.

If the “inner world” included all thoughts, and they were unable to detect this inner world, then by definition they would have no thoughts.

If on the other hand they had the same mental abilities at birth as any other new-born, but absolutely zero external stimulus, they would have thoughts of some sort, but I don’t think we can know what they might be.

If they were deaf, dumb, and blind, but had a sense of touch and smell,

then they’d think about pin-ball.

The Rev Dodgson said:

AwesomeO said:

There is a thought experiment imagining a child who is born without any senses at all, no sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, appetite etc, in all respects unable to detect an outside world or inner world, If that child is raised by medical interventions to be twenty years old, what might they be thinking?

Depends what you include in “inner world” I suppose.

If the “inner world” included all thoughts, and they were unable to detect this inner world, then by definition they would have no thoughts.

If on the other hand they had the same mental abilities at birth as any other new-born, but absolutely zero external stimulus, they would have thoughts of some sort, but I don’t think we can know what they might be.

Inner world meant no cues from heart beat, breathing, etc.

And yes, I think they would think, but we would have no clue what those thoughts would be. The other side would say the person does not think at all. I forget the ins and outs but it was supposed to point to two divides in schools of philosophical thought.

>Inner world meant no cues from heart beat, breathing, etc.

I don’t know if that degree of brain damage would leave much there to do any thinking.

Bubblecar said:

>Inner world meant no cues from heart beat, breathing, etc.

I don’t know if that degree of brain damage would leave much there to do any thinking.

The brain is ok, just no sensory input. Brain in a bottle. Plus it is a thought experiment.

The Rev Dodgson said:

If they were deaf, dumb, and blind, but had a sense of touch and smell,

then they’d think about pin-ball.

Who would?

>There is a thought experiment imagining a child who is born without any senses at all, no sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, appetite etc, in all respects unable to detect an outside world or inner world

it might depend on the details of this (absolute seems to be the idea) example of sensory deprivation.

would the totally isolated organ develop consciousness is probably part of the proposition.

sibeen said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

If they were deaf, dumb, and blind, but had a sense of touch and smell,

then they’d think about pin-ball.

Who would?

The kid who couldn’t see or hear, but could touch and smell.