A Conscious Universe

[bennyboy]

The difference is that all these things are seen as expressions of ideas.

Why didn't you say Platonic Forms to begin with?

Maybe I'm an idealistic dualist

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That's a lot of talk for "We don't perceive the universe as it is."

We do perceive the universe as it is, albeit limited by the range with which our sense organs evolved.

Wait a minute. Are you suggesting because our perception isn't exhaustive, e.g. sight across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, that this somehow supports idealism; monist or other?

No. I'm saying that our limitations mean we interface with reality, WHATEVER it is, through symbolic representations, i.e. ideas.

This is the process of knowledge: we have experiences, we categorize and examine them, draw inferences, and test those inferences. Physicalism is itself an idea-- a representation of the commonalities in experience which lead most people away from solipsism. But establishing consistent relationships between experiences is not the same as proving that those commonalities are the source of experience.

One of you will have to explain how you go from objective experiential commonality ("You see that thing falling? Hey, so do I!") to the confident assertion that reality consists of physical mechanism and nothing else. That seems like a strange conclusion for purely experiential beings to arrive at.

[AFTT47]

One of you will have to explain how you go from objective experiential commonality ("You see that thing falling? Hey, so do I!") to the confident assertion that reality consists of physical mechanism and nothing else. That seems like a strange conclusion for purely experiential beings to arrive at.

i don't know about confident assertion but it looks like the default assertion to me. If we find evidence to the contrary, we'll go there. Otherwise...

[IATIA]

I've come across this very thought-provoking article that I thought I'd share with all of you.

I tried a while back to bring up the same subject, quite unsuccessfully. The problem is, if we are a 'brain in a vat', who is watching the vat?

I tried to suggest that each of our individual awarenesses have always existed and there was no one but ourselves in charge. The result? My ass still hurts!

[bennyboy]

i don't know about confident assertion but it looks like the default assertion to me. If we find evidence to the contrary, we'll go there. Otherwise...

The evidence is treated as objective support for a claim. However, we still have the same problem: the supposedly objective evidence is collected using purely subjective means: looking through microscopes, holding a stopwatch in your hand, etc.

Put it this way: what would be the difference between the Matrix running a simulated world in which all our physical commonalities are as we now experience them, and our "real" world? Unless you know where your experiences come from, we're looking at circular reasoning: I know where experiences come from, because I experience things, and based on those experiences, it seems most likely that they come from _____.

[Mudhammam]

The evidence is treated as objective support for a claim. However, we still have the same problem: the supposedly objective evidence is collected using purely subjective means: looking through microscopes, holding a stopwatch in your hand, etc.

Put it this way: what would be the difference between the Matrix running a simulated world in which all our physical commonalities are as we now experience them, and our "real" world? Unless you know where your experiences come from, we're looking at circular reasoning: I know where experiences come from, because I experience things, and based on those experiences, it seems most likely that they come from _____.

The mistake in your position, however, is to conflate subjective experiences with what is actually taken to be understood as objective. Any particular subjective experience can truly lead to a mistaken interpretation in how one perceives the context of the events in reality, and by objective we emphatically mean external objects that really exist independently of us and our sense intuitions, even if only known and understood through sense. This is why we separate purely subjective experience such as a lucid dream or hallucination from everyday experience in the world: it really is real, filled with many strange and unknown features that collaborative efforts illuminate all the time. Now, of course, reality as it is fundamentally may be completely different from the world we experience, but again, we know this by taking the world as a place where laws actually exist, and real things evolve from simpler constituents unlike anything we will ever encounter in experience. This is all taken as true upon both idealism and realism. Even space and time may not be fundamental, and it's always theoretically possible that we live in a holographic universe where events occur on the two-dimensional surface of an event horizon and what we perceive as "real" is merely a three-dimensional model. Either way, this does not imply idealism, which seems to me to be an unnecessary step.

[AFTT47]

i don't know about confident assertion but it looks like the default assertion to me. If we find evidence to the contrary, we'll go there. Otherwise...

The evidence is treated as objective support for a claim. However, we still have the same problem: the supposedly objective evidence is collected using purely subjective means: looking through microscopes, holding a stopwatch in your hand, etc.

Put it this way: what would be the difference between the Matrix running a simulated world in which all our physical commonalities are as we now experience them, and our "real" world? Unless you know where your experiences come from, we're looking at circular reasoning: I know where experiences come from, because I experience things, and based on those experiences, it seems most likely that they come from _____.

There is no way to rule out "The Matrix" that I'm aware of. Similarly though, as our theistic friends will happily point out, there is no way to rule out God. It's an interesting intellectual exercise but why would you go there in the absence of evidence?

[bennyboy]

There is no way to rule out "The Matrix" that I'm aware of. Similarly though, as our theistic friends will happily point out, there is no way to rule out God. It's an interesting intellectual exercise but why would you go there in the absence of evidence?

It's not necessary to "go anywhere." We have experiences, we make ideas about them. That's reality. Whatever it is that underlies our experiences, we cannot confidently say that we have access to it, though some insist we do.

That being said, I believe that since everything we experience is, at the moment of experience, an idea, the simplest explanation is that reality is idealistic.

[AFTT47]

There is no way to rule out "The Matrix" that I'm aware of. Similarly though, as our theistic friends will happily point out, there is no way to rule out God. It's an interesting intellectual exercise but why would you go there in the absence of evidence?

It's not necessary to "go anywhere." We have experiences, we make ideas about them. That's reality. Whatever it is that underlies our experiences, we cannot confidently say that we have access to it, though some insist we do.

That being said, I believe that since everything we experience is, at the moment of experience, an idea, the simplest explanation is that reality is idealistic.

You've lost me completely. I'll be intellectually honest and concede that I may not be smart enough to understand what you're getting at. Bud Light has taken its cruel toll over the years. I just don't see that you have the simplest explanation. It looks to me like you have added layers of complexity in order to satisfy your intuitive take on the situation. It looks exactly like when the theists invent God because they can't intuit a universe without one.

[IATIA]

We all know for a fact, that we can function, converse, feel, negotiate etc., in an imaginary world. So who can say for a fact, that this reality is any more real?

[Surgenator]

We all know for a fact, that we can function, converse, feel, negotiate etc., in an imaginary world. So who can say for a fact, that this reality is any more real?

Because we know that our consciences, ideas, or concepts do not dictate what we obsserve unlike in the imaginary world. This is a problem that idealism doesn't address, and my biggest complaint about it.