Philosophy Now Forum

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 6:10 pmYou can't be my barometer because you way out there.

It's bog standard epistemology. How you know you are not dreaming?

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 4:27 pm All my life people behaved as if they were real. Some even said they were real. Now some philosopher comes along and says perhaps the world is not real. But his argument is not based on proof but instead it is based on imagination. Since his proof is missing I will go with the intuitively obvious and challenge him to prove I am wrong.

Like I said it's intuitively obvious and most likely it was intuitively obvious to your 5 year old self. Only when you heard of the emperor's new clothes did you say "Yeah, that's right. He has clothes."

Besides the reason you are "in the barrel" is to think there is a reality. So, get with the program and BELIEVE that here is a reality. Or not. But you will never outsmart the barrel master because he doesn't exist (or he is too well hidden).

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 6:32 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 6:10 pmYou can't be my barometer because you way out there.

It's bog standard epistemology. How you know you are not dreaming?

I know it's your mind game and since it's your game, you think you are winning. But in reality your not.

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 7:24 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 4:27 pm All my life people behaved as if they were real. Some even said they were real. Now some philosopher comes along and says perhaps the world is not real. But his argument is not based on proof but instead it is based on imagination. Since his proof is missing I will go with the intuitively obvious and challenge him to prove I am wrong.

Like I said it's intuitively obvious...

And like I said:

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 4:47 pmSounds like a good plan. I'm not claiming that any of those possibilities is true and wouldn't bother trying to persuade you. The point of this thread is 'how do you know?' Well, you know that you have experiences, but as long as it is possible that you are dreaming, hallucinating or any other possibility, you don't know that you're not.

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 7:24 pm...and most likely it was intuitively obvious to your 5 year old self. Only when you heard of the emperor's new clothes did you say "Yeah, that's right. He has clothes."

Challenging the "obvious" is exactly what I was taught to do as a philosophy undergraduate. There are people who think it is obvious that there is a god, that there are absolute moral standards, that free market capitalism is fair, that the meaning of words is defined by dictionaries. It is those people who proclaim they are wearing magnificent clothes and since the days of Socrates, it has been philosophers that have pointed to their nakedness.

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 7:24 pmBesides the reason you are "in the barrel" is to think there is a reality. So, get with the program and BELIEVE that here is a reality.

Of course there is a reality. I don't have to "BELIEVE" it; I cannot think there is nothing without it being necessarily false. That's the point of 'I think, therefore I am'.

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 7:24 pmOr not. But you will never outsmart the barrel master because he doesn't exist (or he is too well hidden).

So who, or what, is "the barrel master"?

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 7:35 pm

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 6:32 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 6:10 pmYou can't be my barometer because you way out there.

It's bog standard epistemology. How you know you are not dreaming?

I know it's your mind game and since it's your game, you think you are winning. But in reality your not.

As the great Bill Murray said, "It’s hard to win an argument with a smart person, but it’s damn near impossible to win an argument with a stupid person."

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:10 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 7:35 pm

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 6:32 pm It's bog standard epistemology. How you know you are not dreaming?

I know it's your mind game and since it's your game, you think you are winning. But in reality your not.

As the great Bill Murray said, "It’s hard to win an argument with a smart person, but it’s damn near impossible to win an argument with a stupid person."

Are you sure you want to say that?

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:20 pm

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:10 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 7:35 pm

I know it's your mind game and since it's your game, you think you are winning. But in reality your not.

As the great Bill Murray said, "It’s hard to win an argument with a smart person, but it’s damn near impossible to win an argument with a stupid person."

Only a loser uses insult as an argument.
Are you sure you want to say that?

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:22 pmOnly a loser uses insult as an argument.
Are you sure you want to say that?

Well, to be honest, I lost interest in this exchange when you accused me of mind games. I'm quite happy for you to prove me wrong.

There SEEMS to be a reality because there actually is a reality or because the "pseudo" reality makes it seem like an actual reality.

PROVE which is the case.

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:35 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:22 pmOnly a loser uses insult as an argument.
Are you sure you want to say that?

Well, to be honest, I lost interest in this exchange when you accused me of mind games. I'm quite happy for you to prove me wrong.

You are big on telling people to prove something.
But all along you have been telling me how to think as if I can't think for myself.

Don't say you haven't been insulting.

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:35 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:22 pmOnly a loser uses insult as an argument.
Are you sure you want to say that?

Well, to be honest, I lost interest in this exchange when you accused me of mind games. I'm quite happy for you to prove me wrong.

If it isn't something purely in your mind, tell me how you will put your "idea" to use.

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:49 pm

uwot wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:35 pm

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:22 pmOnly a loser uses insult as an argument.
Are you sure you want to say that?

Well, to be honest, I lost interest in this exchange when you accused me of mind games. I'm quite happy for you to prove me wrong.

I didn't "accuse" you of mind games. I stated that you were playing mind games. I didn't intend to insult you. I intended to specify what you were doing. If that's insulting, how should I have put it?

jayjacobus wrote: ↑Thu Apr 26, 2018 8:41 pm There SEEMS to be a reality because there actually is a reality or because the "pseudo" reality makes it seem like an actual reality.

PROVE which is the case.

It depends on what you mean by 'reality'. There is no doubt that there is something that is 'true' about the phenomena that give the impression that there is a 'real' world. I don't doubt that these phenomena are actually caused by a real world, which, as you correctly suggest, is pretty much what I thought was obvious when I was 5 years old. But in the context of this thread, I can't prove it; no one can. In that sense I 'know' there is some reality responsible for the phenomena, but I don't know what it is.
There is a famous story about Samuel Johnson; he was the first person to compile an English dictionary, which he did by travelling the whole country to find out how people actually used words. Anyway, he was discussing the idealism of George Berkeley who claimed that reality was an idea in the mind of God. His biographer, James Boswell, agreed that it was a crazy idea, but asked how Johnson could refute it. "I refute it thus!" said Johnson, kicking a stone. That doesn't prove that the stone wasn't an idea in the mind of God, but the fact that you can't disprove something is no reason to believe it.

a Draw?

You can have it.