Nick Prince wrote:
> This is a form of solipsism - it is difficult to attack it and
> defending it can be similarly time consuming. I think we have to move
> on and believe there is a better approach – if only to get somewhere
> other than back to the beginning every time.
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> ----- Original Message -----
>
> *From:* Norman Samish <mailto:ncsamish.domain.name.hidden>
>
> *To:* everything-list.domain.name.hidden
> <mailto:everything-list.domain.name.hidden>
>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 09, 2006 12:53 PM
>
> *Subject:* Can we ever know truth?
>
>
>
> In a discussion about philosophy, Nick Prince said, "If we are
> living in a simulation. . ."
>
>
>
> To which John Mikes replied, "I think this is the usual pretension.
> . . I think 'we simulate what we are living in' according to the
> little we know. Such 'simulation' - 'simplification' - 'modeling' -
> 'metaphorizing' - or even 'Harry Potterizing' things we think does
> not change the 'unknown/unknowable' we live in. We just think and
> therefore we think we are."
>
>
>
> This interchange reminded me of thoughts I had as a child - I used
> to wonder if if everything I experienced was real or a dream. How
> could I know which it was? I asked my parents and was discouraged,
> in no uncertain terms, from asking them nonsensical questions. I
> asked my playmates and friends, but they didn't know the answer any
> more than I did. I had no other resources so I concluded that the
> question was unanswerable and that the best I could do was proceed
> as if what I experienced was reality.
>
>
>
> Now, many years later, I have this list - and Wikipedia - as
> resources. But, as John Mikes (and others) say, I still cannot know
> that what I experience is reality. I can only assume that reality
> is how things appear to me - and I might be wrong.
>
>
>
> Norman Samish
I think this is wrongheaded. You doubt that you really assume "things are
how they appear to me" - the Earth appears flat, wood appears solid, and
electrons don't appear at all. What one does is build, or learn, a model
that fits the world and comports with "how they appear". I see no reason
not to call this model "reality", recognizing that it is provisional,
because there's no point in speculating about a "really, real reality"
except to suppose there is one so that the model is a model *of* something.
Brent Meeker
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Received on Fri Aug 11 2006 - 21:31:50 PDT