On Tuesday, February 5, 2013 6:00:17 PM UTC-5, telmo_menezes wrote: > > > > > On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 7:49 PM, John Clark <[email protected]<javascript:> > > wrote: > >> On Sat, Feb 2, 2013 Telmo Menezes <[email protected] >> <javascript:>>wrote: >> >> > I'm not claiming that intelligence == mind. >>> >> >> Do you believe that your fellow human beings have minds? If so why? >> > > Yes (weakly). Occam's razor. If I'm the only human being with a mind, > then, for some mysterious reason, there are two types of human beings: me > (with a mind) and the others (zombies). So heuristically I'm inclined to > believe that all human beings have a mind, although I know I will never be > able to prove it. >
I question whether it is possible to ask whether your fellow human beings have minds without resorting to sophistry. I say that not because I am incapable of questioning naive reasoning, but because it does not accurately represent the reality of the situation. Just as our 'belief' in our own mind is an a prori ontological condition which cannot be questioned without incurring a paradox (whatever disbelieves in its own mind is by definition a mind), the belief that our fellow human beings have minds does not necessarily require a logical analysis to arrive at. We know that we have access to information beyond what we can consciously understand, and part of that may very well include a capacity to sense, on some level, the authenticity of another mind, barring any prejudices which might interfere. Craig > > >> >> John K Clark >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Everything List" group. >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an >> email to [email protected] <javascript:>. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]<javascript:> >> . >> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. >> >> >> > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
