Am I just "trusting" my senses?

[nejisan]

Hello all,

I've been lurking on another thread, which you can examine for yourself if you have a couple of days to spare, called Which Worldview is Supported by Evidence. I'm confessing right now that I have not read the entire thread as it is huge, and I have limited time. However, there is one consistent theme that really disturbs me throughout nearly all the posts I have read; that the information processed by our human senses is NOT a fact, but actually more akin to an accepted axiom that cannot be debated as it ends in circularity.

I vehemently disagree. I understand that evidential demands in some of these threads can be tedious, and in my only other topic it effectively destroyed the thread, but this idea seems to scream 'there is no such thing as evidence'. Worse yet it seems to be commonly accepted as fact among those individuals.

So here is my dilemma:
When I get close to fire, I get hot. This always happens when I get close to fire. I have never been cold when standing next to fire. These observations lead to my knowing that fire is hot.

I had to investigate my environment with senses as a child, and later as an adult, to come to these conclusions in my conciousness. When I don't respond to my environment there are consequences, sometimes terrible and permanent ones. How does any of that equate to "trust"?

Questions for debate:
1. Is existence really a debatable topic? (I mean we're here right?)
2. What are the alternatives to existence, and are they really worth discussing?
3. Are human senses trusted by default, or are they consistent, biological devices that teach us about our environment? Is there a difference?
4. Does this seem like a valid way of leveling the evidentiary "playing field", or is it tantamount to rubbish?

Disclaimer: I am posting from an iPhone so my responses may not be quick.
Everything I've said is my opinion, I'm not making any claims, 'cept the ones about fire being hot, and I'll happily back those if you'd care to come to my house.
I am also a full time student with a full time job which is why I haven't posted very often so please be patient if your waiting for responses from me.
Thanks to all who reply.

[FinalEnigma]

The issue is that if someone wants to argue solipsism hard enough, there really isn't any recourse - at least none that I'm aware of - which is why everybody wants to smack them and tell them to go away. Solipsism isn't possible to prove wrong so far as I know, but it also is completely useless. It's an intellectual dead end, but it's difficult to argue against.

I had a serious debate with a solipsist once. it didn't last too long and we eventually just quit because it was pointless.

[nejisan]

The issue is that if someone wants to argue solipsism hard enough, there really isn't any recourse - at least none that I'm aware of - which is why everybody wants to smack them and tell them to go away. Solipsism isn't possible to prove wrong so far as I know, but it also is completely useless. It's an intellectual dead end, but it's difficult to argue against.

I had a serious debate with a solipsist once. it didn't last too long and we eventually just quit because it was pointless.

So here is my problem with that, at least one thing HAS to exist even in this equation. That is, the mind of the person who is subject to the delusion of reality. Where is that reality? What is it like? Do they have Unicorns?

What I mean to say is how is this an argument? Wouldn't that make the "delusional one" god?

It seems to me that this is only given merit because its given merit? The proof against it seems to be all around me yet I seem to be hearing " this is possible".

NO. Emphasis on the no.

I understand that your not arguing if favor of this so please dont take anything the wrong way I'm just trying to better understand why this is gets a free pass for chaotic absurdity.

[FinalEnigma]

The issue is that if someone wants to argue solipsism hard enough, there really isn't any recourse - at least none that I'm aware of - which is why everybody wants to smack them and tell them to go away. Solipsism isn't possible to prove wrong so far as I know, but it also is completely useless. It's an intellectual dead end, but it's difficult to argue against.

I had a serious debate with a solipsist once. it didn't last too long and we eventually just quit because it was pointless.

So here is my problem with that, at least one thing HAS to exist even in this equation. That is, the mind of the person who is subject to the delusion of reality. Where is that reality? What is it like? Do they have Unicorns?

What I mean to say is how is this an argument? Wouldn't that make the "delusional one" god?

It seems to me that this is only given merit because its given merit? The proof against it seems to be all around me yet I seem to be hearing " this is possible".

NO. Emphasis on the no.

I understand that your not arguing if favor of this so please dont take anything the wrong way I'm just trying to better understand why this is gets a free pass for chaotic absurdity.

The idea is basically that we cannot know anything beyond cogito ergo sum "I think therefore I am" All that you can know as an individual is that you exist. everything else could be delusion. you cannot know anything about the non-delusion universe, or if the apparent universe is the real one.

The reason this argument is given even the merit that it is(which isn't really that much) is that it is impossible to prove false - ALL information we have access to is contained within the potentially 'delusional' universe, and therefore not 100% reliable.

you cannot trust any of your senses to provide reliable information, and every device you use to measure anything relies on your senses to give you back information.

essentially, solipsism says we could be sitting in a vat dreaming, and it would be impossible to prove or disprove short of waking up.

[dusk]

It is usually not an idea people base their lives around but it is one among others that you need to understand and value for their logical reasoning if you want to have some philosophical understanding.
It teaches you the limits of philosophy that some ideas maybe completely reasonable while being entirely useless. Take the movie the Matrix witch revolves around this idea. If you are in the Matrix you can imagine because it is possible it is reality in the Movie but you will never know until somebody comes along and gives you the magic red pill. And it also doesn't really help you in your life in anything else but getting a bigger understanding of your limits.

In a debate Sam Harris quote some guy, I forgot the name and am to lazy to check it out again, who had a similar idea of weird afterlife theory.

Imagine that in the future Moore's Law holds and Computer get ever more and more powerful. At some point people may start running simulations of the past to for fun, for historic value, for whatever reason. Perfectly accurate simulations like a virtual Matrix. The Information is stored on hard drives (or whatever datastorage), everything anybody knows is stored data. The thinking and interactions and happens as they are computed. Basically your consciousness is in a computer everything around you is as virtual as you are. In todays understanding of many people you don't exist.
It is a sort of afterlife.
Now the fun part comes in when you reach further implications. The people in the future would probably not run one but many simulations. In the end, as there is only one "real" past, it is more likely that we/I/You are part of the simulations than the actual real past.
You can never know.

It is just a mind game because since you can never know it is also pretty much irrelevant as you couldn't do anything about it anyways. Ergo you can ignore it whether it is true or wrong.

Inception is another movie that plays along that route.

[dusk]

What if somebody says that computing the whole world would require endless computation power we'd never reach?
If you think that argument holds, you failed at understanding the idea.

[ThatGirlAgain]

Imagine that in the future Moore's Law holds and Computer get ever more and more powerful. At some point people may start running simulations of the past to for fun, for historic value, for whatever reason. Perfectly accurate simulations like a virtual Matrix. The Information is stored on hard drives (or whatever datastorage), everything anybody knows is stored data. The thinking and interactions and happens as they are computed. Basically your consciousness is in a computer everything around you is as virtual as you are. In todays understanding of many people you don't exist.
It is a sort of afterlife.
Now the fun part comes in when you reach further implications. The people in the future would probably not run one but many simulations. In the end, as there is only one "real" past, it is more likely that we/I/You are part of the simulations than the actual real past.

The problem is that computers as we know them are not capable of accurately reproducing the world we observe. Simulation by computer requires solving mathematical expressions. Computers solve difference (iterative) equations. The solutions are in general only approximations of the differential (relational) equations that are developed to model the reality. The approximation comes in because only a finite number of iterations can be performed in a finite time. Programs are set to stop when the difference between iterations drops below a certain threshold or the limited precision of the computer in question is reached.

In addition, to create difference equations from differential equations, the differential equations must be linear. Physical reality itself is extremely non-linear. The differential equations used to describe physical reality are themselves only approximations. Also, at this time at least, we must deal with a set of separate laws that govern a particular circumstance: gravity, quantum effects, electromagnetism, chemistry etc. In principle it may be possible to have a single mathematical expression that takes all of that into account but it is an act of faith to assume it can be done.

In the meantime, physical reality goes merrily on, effortlessly and instantaneously doing what it does, non-linearly and with ultimate precision, with all factors simultaneously operative. We do not know how to make a computer that does that. It is not a question of computing power or storage capacity or instruction sets. Moores law does not help. This is not at all what computers do. Until we can conceptualize how a device that can do this (other than physical reality itself) would work, we have no right to say that such a thing is possible.

[McCulloch]

The problem is that computers as we know them are not capable of accurately reproducing the world we observe.

Yes, digital data cannot accurately represent analogue reality. But wait! At the smallest level, reality is in discrete quanta. So, yes, in principle, computers could be capable of accurately reproducing the world we observe. The problem is that a machine large enough to house a digitized representation of the universe, would be larger than the universe. Or would it? I've got an iPad which is a bit smaller than the symphony orchestra, yet it holds a digitized representation of a symphony.

Details and technicalities aside, if we were able to simulate a world of sufficient complexity, would the inhabitants of that world be able to know that they were simulated? If you wish to explore this concept further, read the highly entertaining Thursday Next series of novels by Jasper Fforde. In it, the characters in novels are self aware, knowing they are in a book. They make comments stating they are not needed until page 'such and such,' rather like actors in a play, and thus have time to help Thursday Next, the protagonist. The world of fiction has its own police force - Jurisfiction - to ensure that plots in books continue to run smoothly with each reading. Thursday ends up hiding in a book, and working for Jurisfiction. Her uncle Mycroft gets stuck in a book and becomes Sherlock Holmes' brother.

[ThatGirlAgain]

The problem is that computers as we know them are not capable of accurately reproducing the world we observe.

Yes, digital data cannot accurately represent analogue reality. But wait! At the smallest level, reality is in discrete quanta. So, yes, in principle, computers could be capable of accurately reproducing the world we observe. The problem is that a machine large enough to house a digitized representation of the universe, would be larger than the universe. Or would it? I've got an iPad which is a bit smaller than the symphony orchestra, yet it holds a digitized representation of a symphony.

Not the point. It is the interactions between the quanta that are non-linear and all at once. What we call computers cannot do that regardless of speed or capacity. It is not what computers do.

Your iPad does not contain a digitized representation of an orchestra. It only contains an approximation of certain sound waves that hit some microphones that emanated from an orchestra in a particular timeframe. The orchestral performance itself is not there. That involved lots of complex physical movements by numerous elements, and only some of those movements had anything to do with the recording of the sounds. All the cells in all the bodies of all the members were busily doing cell things. All the atoms in all those bodies and all the instruments and the entire concert hall were doing atom things. All the quanta everywhere were influencing and being influenced by all the other quanta in their past light cones in very non-linear ways. The past and future of the orchestra outside of the performance is unpredictable by anything in that recording. In fact, the detailed progress of the recording is not inherently predictable from the past of the recording. It is only a recording, not a process.

To contain all of that may very well require exactly all of that, the universe itself. Unless we can conceptualize what kind of device can do that " and it is not a computer " we cannot talk about it happening. Until then it is a species of magic. To claim that it is common is unjustifiable.

Details and technicalities aside, if we were able to simulate a world of sufficient complexity, would the inhabitants of that world be able to know that they were simulated? If you wish to explore this concept further, read the highly entertaining Thursday Next series of novels by Jasper Fforde. In it, the characters in novels are self aware, knowing they are in a book. They make comments stating they are not needed until page 'such and such,' rather like actors in a play, and thus have time to help Thursday Next, the protagonist. The world of fiction has its own police force - Jurisfiction - to ensure that plots in books continue to run smoothly with each reading. Thursday ends up hiding in a book, and working for Jurisfiction. Her uncle Mycroft gets stuck in a book and becomes Sherlock Holmes' brother.

I have a long reading list now, and I rarely get around to fiction these days. But this sounds intriguing. In the arena of books as real have you ever read Silverlock?

[McCulloch]

Not the point. It is the interactions between the quanta that are non-linear and all at once. What we call computers cannot do that regardless of speed or capacity. It is not what computers do.

Sure they do. If within the simulation, a second of the sims time took 1000 seconds to compute, would the sims notice?

To contain all of that may very well require exactly all of that, the universe itself. Unless we can conceptualize what kind of device can do that " and it is not a computer " we cannot talk about it happening. Until then it is a species of magic. To claim that it is common is unjustifiable.

Not really. The simulation we are in does not need to have the level of granularity of detail in a distant galaxy that we would never see.

I have a long reading list now, and I rarely get around to fiction these days. But this sounds intriguing. In the arena of books as real have you ever read Silverlock?

No I have not. If you get a chance, however, read the first of the Thursday Next books, The Eyre Affair. It is a quick read.