Cogito Ergo Sum, said Renee Descartes. This thought, this revelation, was momentous in his explorations of Philosophy, his investigations of meaning, consciousness, and reality; it was a turning point in modern Philosophical thought. The other day, standing in line at a Circle K a mile south of my house, I stood behind a tawny, dark-haired young woman on whose neck was tattooed the simple statement, "I do perceive." In a brief moment of solipsism, I wonder if I had invented her, and that moment, standing in line, right where I could see those words.
At the same time, I felt a resonance; I am here, I am aware; and that simple statement made me feel a kind of kinship with this stranger.
Some philosophers argue that from this concept, one can surmise that all of reality exists the moment the individual perceives it, or that the only reality is ones consciousness, and that all of perception is but a dream occurring in the consciousness of the individual. In this theory, the only thing that exists is the individual, the self, who is dreaming life, the world, and all other beings. Therefore, the only being who truly exists, who is actually real, the only being who possesses agency. is the self. All other elements of reality, including other people and creatures, who appear within the dream of perception to be "conscious," are just figments of the dream, being perceived by the dreamer, who only exist on any level the moment the self perceives them, and to a lesser extent, when they are thought of by the self in their "absence."
These concepts, ethically challenging and outrageous as they might be, are all consequences of accepting the idea of solipsism. Solipsism is the name for the philosophical theory that, summed up in a blurb brought up by a quick word search on Google, "the self is all that can be known to exist;" or, as Wikepedia puts it, "the philosophical idea that only one's own mind is sure to exist[; as an epistemological positions, it] holds that knowledge outside of one's own mind is unsure; the external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist outside [of one's] mind. As a metaphysical position, solipsism goes further to the conclusion that the world and other minds do not exist."
There are a multitude of potential challenges to this theory. Imperative to exploration of the internal cognitive subjective existence versus the external world of theoretically objective reality is consideration of the numerous cognitive processes necessary to our awareness of both subjective and objective being. In the very process of analyzing and weighing the gap between these concepts of reality subjective cognitive processes are necessary to development of questions, justifications, rationalizations, data collection, asserting positions or opinions, and drawing conclusions based on that rigorous contemplative process. Because all elements of the thought process are necessary in initiating the conceptual dissection of this idea, I consider even my emotive reactions relevant.
When I consider the idea that I am alone, that all of the seemingly external components of reality are a fantasy, that every person I know, every bird I watched take flight, every sensation of warm, wet, cold, hard, crunchy, and the rest, are all inventions of my mind, my first sensations are of shock and incredulity. I don't believe it, it feels like it doesn't make sense.
I know that it is a concept that has been thought out, considered, justified, rationalized, chosen, concluded, by various thinkers in slightly different ways; I understand it as a concept, how much effort has bee put into the generation of its various iterations, I comprehend the rational being employed to support it. Yet despite all this, it feels like nonsense, it feels like a jest, it seems as if it stands in defiance of the very nature of reality and existence, and it feels absurd. When I seriously consider it, and let wash over my whole self the belief that only I exist, and all of this, and all of you, dear readers, and all of the people you talk to about this, every one you know, every one you love, every one you have heard of, everything you have ever done, every home, block, town, state or territory, country you lived in, was merely a dream I dreamt; is all a mere extension of myself, of my mind, in that it only exists because of me, and only exists within my mind.
At the same time, I felt a resonance; I am here, I am aware; and that simple statement made me feel a kind of kinship with this stranger.
Some philosophers argue that from this concept, one can surmise that all of reality exists the moment the individual perceives it, or that the only reality is ones consciousness, and that all of perception is but a dream occurring in the consciousness of the individual. In this theory, the only thing that exists is the individual, the self, who is dreaming life, the world, and all other beings. Therefore, the only being who truly exists, who is actually real, the only being who possesses agency. is the self. All other elements of reality, including other people and creatures, who appear within the dream of perception to be "conscious," are just figments of the dream, being perceived by the dreamer, who only exist on any level the moment the self perceives them, and to a lesser extent, when they are thought of by the self in their "absence."
These concepts, ethically challenging and outrageous as they might be, are all consequences of accepting the idea of solipsism. Solipsism is the name for the philosophical theory that, summed up in a blurb brought up by a quick word search on Google, "the self is all that can be known to exist;" or, as Wikepedia puts it, "the philosophical idea that only one's own mind is sure to exist[; as an epistemological positions, it] holds that knowledge outside of one's own mind is unsure; the external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist outside [of one's] mind. As a metaphysical position, solipsism goes further to the conclusion that the world and other minds do not exist."
There are a multitude of potential challenges to this theory. Imperative to exploration of the internal cognitive subjective existence versus the external world of theoretically objective reality is consideration of the numerous cognitive processes necessary to our awareness of both subjective and objective being. In the very process of analyzing and weighing the gap between these concepts of reality subjective cognitive processes are necessary to development of questions, justifications, rationalizations, data collection, asserting positions or opinions, and drawing conclusions based on that rigorous contemplative process. Because all elements of the thought process are necessary in initiating the conceptual dissection of this idea, I consider even my emotive reactions relevant.
When I consider the idea that I am alone, that all of the seemingly external components of reality are a fantasy, that every person I know, every bird I watched take flight, every sensation of warm, wet, cold, hard, crunchy, and the rest, are all inventions of my mind, my first sensations are of shock and incredulity. I don't believe it, it feels like it doesn't make sense.
I know that it is a concept that has been thought out, considered, justified, rationalized, chosen, concluded, by various thinkers in slightly different ways; I understand it as a concept, how much effort has bee put into the generation of its various iterations, I comprehend the rational being employed to support it. Yet despite all this, it feels like nonsense, it feels like a jest, it seems as if it stands in defiance of the very nature of reality and existence, and it feels absurd. When I seriously consider it, and let wash over my whole self the belief that only I exist, and all of this, and all of you, dear readers, and all of the people you talk to about this, every one you know, every one you love, every one you have heard of, everything you have ever done, every home, block, town, state or territory, country you lived in, was merely a dream I dreamt; is all a mere extension of myself, of my mind, in that it only exists because of me, and only exists within my mind.
But why am I not aware of myself outside of the dream? Why, as I dream, do I only exist as a tiny being within the dream? Am I asleep, in some vast, strange, cosmic sense? If I am all that exists, and all of this "reality" is my fantasy, then I was not created by the fusion of my father's sperm and my mother's egg because those people, that time and place, did not actually exist. Which means that, if my self, my consciousness exists, that this body, this form, and it's interaction on every level with my fantasy, is a part of the fantasy, as was my creation and development resulting from my parents reproductive cells, and the growth and development I underwent as a fetus inside my mother's reproductive organs, and my birth, and my growth as a child. I am not a human being, because those creatures are a creation of my imagination.It follows from this theory the this self that is being claimed is in itself is a fantasy. Why should we rely on our own subjective consciousness alone? If it only exists in the fantasy, it is in truth, only another facet of the fantasy.
Further more, if this were the case, how can autonomy be possible? If all of experienced reality is a fantasy, it is merely an elaborate game, and no true choice exists, because there will never be a truly external force to act in relation to.
That name, all those features and characteristics, all that history, are inventions of my fantasy. So I am some other kind of being, with some other kind of energy composition, some other kind of body than the one I am dreaming I have. Because, since all my bodily functions, and all the habits I employ to care for it's needs, such as eating, defecating, washing, dressing, sleeping, using sanitation in various forms, first aid, medicine, and the rest, are all figments.
Further more, if this were the case, how can autonomy be possible? If all of experienced reality is a fantasy, it is merely an elaborate game, and no true choice exists, because there will never be a truly external force to act in relation to.
That name, all those features and characteristics, all that history, are inventions of my fantasy. So I am some other kind of being, with some other kind of energy composition, some other kind of body than the one I am dreaming I have. Because, since all my bodily functions, and all the habits I employ to care for it's needs, such as eating, defecating, washing, dressing, sleeping, using sanitation in various forms, first aid, medicine, and the rest, are all figments.
They must not exist in the reality which contains this consciousness, what ever reality it is that exists when, or if, I stop existing.
If my consciousness were the only remotely real thing, then that is no reality at all. I have no opportunity to excersize true autonomy, and no ability to garner anything meaningful about knowledge or reality, because I would be fixed in a reality which, though created by me (somehow) is ultimately beyond my control, and simultaneously due to it's fragmentary nature, ultimately, irrelevant.
The only choice left to me is to affirm, regardless of my ability to verify it, that external reality exists, though the nature of that reality may be far more obscure than one might imagine; and to thus within it, do my best to act autonomously, or at least, under my own moral dictate that I attempt to do so regardless of whether the the world is a mathematical certainty at the end of the day.
What philosophy gives me is a chance to evaluate the nature of reality, knowledge, and choice. At the end of the day all the questions I can ask, all the investigations I can I pursue (and so far, I intend to continue in that vein)come to one thing. I have to make my choices the best I know how.
If my consciousness were the only remotely real thing, then that is no reality at all. I have no opportunity to excersize true autonomy, and no ability to garner anything meaningful about knowledge or reality, because I would be fixed in a reality which, though created by me (somehow) is ultimately beyond my control, and simultaneously due to it's fragmentary nature, ultimately, irrelevant.
The only choice left to me is to affirm, regardless of my ability to verify it, that external reality exists, though the nature of that reality may be far more obscure than one might imagine; and to thus within it, do my best to act autonomously, or at least, under my own moral dictate that I attempt to do so regardless of whether the the world is a mathematical certainty at the end of the day.
What philosophy gives me is a chance to evaluate the nature of reality, knowledge, and choice. At the end of the day all the questions I can ask, all the investigations I can I pursue (and so far, I intend to continue in that vein)come to one thing. I have to make my choices the best I know how.
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