On 1/26/2013 11:18 PM, Jason Resch wrote:
On Sun, Jan 27, 2013 at 12:09 AM, meekerdb <meeke...@verizon.net
<mailto:meeke...@verizon.net>> wrote:
On 1/26/2013 9:53 PM, Jason Resch wrote:
I think what you are describing comes automatically with comp, as any
observer only
knows their direct observations, which could be created by any one of an
infinite
number of possible programs going through the same state. Any one of these
programs will have its own consistent history, but unless analyzed or
explored
further, that information is in a sense, undecided. It is like: "Before
you finish
reading the second half of this sentence, the color of your toothbrush
could have
been any possible color." However, now that you have finished reading it,
and
performed a memory look up you have changed the set of possible programs
manifest
your consciousness. It is almost scary to think, when you aren't looking
or or
imagining/recalling what your mother, your wife, your children, they could
look
like or be almost anything (within some constraints of what is compatible
with your
experience in the moment you are not thinking of them). And it is only
when we
"stop and think" we can for a time, lock down that possibility.
'You' are only a consistent history of experiences too, and so 'you' could
be almost
anything also. But this fails to explain the intersubjective agreement of
observers: That you AND your wife agree on what your children look like.
I don't see why it should fail to explain that agreement. Any fact you become conscious
of should be consistent with all the other current content of your mind and immediately
perceptible environment (which includes the apparent behavior of others).
But you've begged the question by saying its a *fact* you become conscious of. You have
conscious experiences, including inferences about the world, but the inferences don't
necessarily correspond to facts of the external reality. So our hypothesis about the
world and our relation to it must explain not only the consistency of intersubjective
agreement, but also the inconsistencies of our errors and illusions.
So unless you are a solipist, just dreaming your wife's agreement, an
external
reality becomes a good hypothesis.
I think there is an underlying reality which explains the consistency of experiences. I
don't see why anything I said above implies the absence of an external reality nor
solipsism.
No it doesn't. But the hypothetical external reality then obviates the worries you
expressed above about your wife being 'almost anything' when you aren't looking.
Brent
That external reality just happens to be so big and so varied that it is easy for
observers (or souls) to get lost in it.
Jason
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