The philosophical position I hold is that solipsism isn’t true. Because to ask yourself if others exist requires language, which we all learn from other people. We can doubt our senses without language, but this is psychosis, not philosophy.
And I think most Western people haven’t really solved the question of solipsism and still live in the Cartesian theater. And that this is a major reason why we’re mindlessly killing the planet (and ourselves).
How do you even know which things are part of the self and which are ‘external’? That feels arbitrary or a ‘I know it when I see it’ to me.
You could say the self is things you control but under any scrutiny in almost any domain that’s not true for what we think of as ‘self’ either.
I agree solipsism isn’t true, but I don’t know that I agree you couldn’t doubt the external world without language. I think language is just the mechanism we use to describe our inner thoughts. Math is ‘real’ and describes the world whether you use base 10 or 12 or don’t know about math at all.
How could you convince a solipsist of that? It seems impossible to disprove the position “I am imagining that anything outside my consciousness is real”. Anything you cite as evidence is premised on the conclusion.
Language is how we create our stories. The story is “I am imagining that anything outside my consciousness is real.”
Without language the story cannot be formulated. But language presupposes an other. It exists to pass information. So the fact that we have language disproves solipsism.
This isn’t my argument btw. It’s Wittgenstein’s argument against Decartes “I think therefore I am”. Which was flawed anyway because he still believed in God and the Devil, so two others in Decartes solipsism.
Anyway, it’s a hard argument to break because solipsism is so imbedded in Western thinking. I had to drop LSD to break through it and get what Wittgenstein was saying.
I think there’s a difference between solipsism and being skeptical about what your senses are experiencing.
For example, there’s an other in the Matrix. It’s not a form of Solipsism but a form of prison. Ditto for the brain in a vat. Not sure if that’s the brain hypothesis.
Also, me being asleep and dreaming all of this doesn’t disprove that others exist. Just that we can’t prove that the people we’re interacting with currently aren’t dream characters. Language still proves that somethone else is out there. Otherwise we imagined the whole thing and imagination is ultimately derivative regardless of what we tell ourselves.
The brain in the vat and matrix also fall into this. Someone else (an other) put you in the box to fool your senses (Descartes made this same fallacy assuming the devil maybe tricking his senses, which is silly to draw the conclusion that the fact you think proves you exist since the devil could surely change your thoughts if he could change everything else you experience).
Not sure what your last example is but I assume it’s similar to the other three in essence. If not please let me know and I’ll check it out.
And again, not my argument btw, I’m not this smart. It’s Wittgenstein’s and it was hard to grok at first due to social conditioning. But he’s widely regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of the last generation partially because of his debunking solipsism.
The philosophical position I hold is that solipsism isn’t true. Because to ask yourself if others exist requires language, which we all learn from other people. We can doubt our senses without language, but this is psychosis, not philosophy.
And I think most Western people haven’t really solved the question of solipsism and still live in the Cartesian theater. And that this is a major reason why we’re mindlessly killing the planet (and ourselves).
How do you even know which things are part of the self and which are ‘external’? That feels arbitrary or a ‘I know it when I see it’ to me.
You could say the self is things you control but under any scrutiny in almost any domain that’s not true for what we think of as ‘self’ either.
I agree solipsism isn’t true, but I don’t know that I agree you couldn’t doubt the external world without language. I think language is just the mechanism we use to describe our inner thoughts. Math is ‘real’ and describes the world whether you use base 10 or 12 or don’t know about math at all.
Well self other is a false dichotomy ultimately. This is what the Buddha means by no self.
Language is how we form concepts, like self amd other. Without these concepts the question of solipsism can not arise.
And language is about communication. Moving information between two points. It presupposes these two positions. And thus falsifies solipsism.
then why does language occur internally and create new things, like you say, if its only function is about moving information:
Because the brain is made up of individual cells moving information around.
How could you convince a solipsist of that? It seems impossible to disprove the position “I am imagining that anything outside my consciousness is real”. Anything you cite as evidence is premised on the conclusion.
Language is how we create our stories. The story is “I am imagining that anything outside my consciousness is real.”
Without language the story cannot be formulated. But language presupposes an other. It exists to pass information. So the fact that we have language disproves solipsism.
This isn’t my argument btw. It’s Wittgenstein’s argument against Decartes “I think therefore I am”. Which was flawed anyway because he still believed in God and the Devil, so two others in Decartes solipsism.
Anyway, it’s a hard argument to break because solipsism is so imbedded in Western thinking. I had to drop LSD to break through it and get what Wittgenstein was saying.
The hard solipsist would disagree with you already from the 4th word. Your assuming an other to try to convince someone of their existence.
Here are a few theoretical realities:
The perceived existence of language is compatible with all of these, is it not?
I think there’s a difference between solipsism and being skeptical about what your senses are experiencing.
For example, there’s an other in the Matrix. It’s not a form of Solipsism but a form of prison. Ditto for the brain in a vat. Not sure if that’s the brain hypothesis.
Also, me being asleep and dreaming all of this doesn’t disprove that others exist. Just that we can’t prove that the people we’re interacting with currently aren’t dream characters. Language still proves that somethone else is out there. Otherwise we imagined the whole thing and imagination is ultimately derivative regardless of what we tell ourselves.
The brain in the vat and matrix also fall into this. Someone else (an other) put you in the box to fool your senses (Descartes made this same fallacy assuming the devil maybe tricking his senses, which is silly to draw the conclusion that the fact you think proves you exist since the devil could surely change your thoughts if he could change everything else you experience).
Not sure what your last example is but I assume it’s similar to the other three in essence. If not please let me know and I’ll check it out.
And again, not my argument btw, I’m not this smart. It’s Wittgenstein’s and it was hard to grok at first due to social conditioning. But he’s widely regarded as one of the greatest philosophers of the last generation partially because of his debunking solipsism.