|
|
#51
03-29-2007, 03:23 PM
|
|||
|
|||
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
[ QUOTE ]
Characters in dreams can feel pain [/ QUOTE ] I don't think so. PairTheBoard 
|
|
#52
03-29-2007, 03:31 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] How about this? Because I experience my existence unlike I experience anything else, with what you might call a sixth sense, I believe I exist with a Quality of Certainty unlike any other. PairTheBoard [/ QUOTE ] If that were true, wouldn't it be the least robust theory not the highest quality one ( or did you mean the lowest quality)? luckyme [/ QUOTE ] I'm sort of searching for some statement that makes sense and says something significant. I'm using "belief" with a kind of "certainty" rather than "know" since "know" is such a tricky word. Now rather than describing the "certainty" according to some Sklansky-Probability-Meter type "degree" - which I've never really liked anyway - I'm testing the idea of describing it with the word "Quality". That's a new idea, for me anyway. Whether it has potential is open to question. PairTheBoard
|
|
#53
03-29-2007, 04:00 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] How about this? Because I experience my existence unlike I experience anything else, with what you might call a sixth sense, I believe I exist with a Quality of Certainty unlike any other. PairTheBoard [/ QUOTE ] Thats your personal experience, fine. But if I say mine isn't like that, you either have to revise your entire theory or call me a liar. Ditto with txag and his God. The problem is, although you may have a certainty like no other, certainty doesn't have a fantastic track record of correlation with accuracy. I have been certain of many things that were false, in my life, and some of those are the things I was MOST certain of. [/ QUOTE ] Maybe there's a better word than "certainty". "Certainty" seems to imply some guartantee of "accuracy" as to the "Absolute Truth" of the thing being believed. And even "strong certainty", or a "high degree of certainty" carries the implication of some background Sklansky-Probability-Meter type number that could be ascribed to the "probabilty" of the "Absolute Truth" of the thing being believed. This is all very problematic. So I'm trying to find some language that conveys something significant I think is here, in a way that's meaningful and pursuasive to reasonable people. I'm testing the word "quality" to see how well it works. Maybe instead of the word "certainty" I should use the word "conviction". The "sixth sense" thing was piers' idea which seemed like a good one to me. However, it may be problematic as well. How's this: Because I experience my existence unlike I experience anything else, with what you might call a sixth sense, I believe I exist with a Quality of Conviction unlike any other. PairTheBoard
|
|
#55
03-29-2007, 04:57 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] [ QUOTE ] Characters in dreams can feel pain [/ QUOTE ] I don't think so. PairTheBoard [/ QUOTE ] That would have to be one incredibly realistic dream. [/ QUOTE ] This is entirely off-topic, but for some reason it reminded me of something I saw on Colbert last night, which was absolutely hilarious. Colbert said he supports GMOs, and is "...on record as saying I want my corn on the cob to scream and bleed as I bite into it." Of course, IMO corn on the cob is way, way more likely to feel pain than my dream figures, but thats not the point.
|
|
#56
03-29-2007, 06:03 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] Characters in dreams can feel pain [/ QUOTE ] I don't think so. PairTheBoard [/ QUOTE ] How can you differentiate between the pain felt by a dream character and a real person? This is a topic of existential nature and the result inevitably defines perception as altering the information in one's environment in an irreducible way such that he cannot distinguish between real and unreal. ...which is why existential discussion is usually pointless and is filled with circular and unfalsifiable ideas [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img] Personally I believe dream characters don't feel pain. I also believe that other people exist. And I also believe the converse - to be certain that dream characters do not feel pain yet have any doubt about the reality of other people - is a logical contradiction.
|
|
#57
03-29-2007, 07:23 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
[ QUOTE ]
How can you differentiate between the pain felt by a dream character and a real person? [/ QUOTE ] I don't think the dream character feels pain. Therefore I don't have to differentiate it from what I feel. The dream character is like a projected image on a movie screen. It looks like a person. It appears to act like a person. But I don't think the image on the movie screen is experiencing anything, including pain. PairTheBoard
|
|
#58
03-29-2007, 07:45 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
This is interesting though as it goes back to the previous discussion and this statement I made a few posts back.
[ QUOTE ] Maybe I do know the pencil's existence just as certainly as I know mine. If my existence can be a thought in the mind of God, I suppose the pencil's existence can be a thought in my mind. However I still don't think I know it's existence in the same way I know mine. Not as intimately. [/ QUOTE ] So if I am dreaming up my whole like, and I can be a thought in God's mind, maybe I have the power in my dreaming to create other people who experience themselves in the same way I experience myself. Or maybe they are like the projected images on a movie screen which do not experince themselves. Funny, if I was informed that I actually was dreaming up my whole life, I would think the first case would be more likely (though still a longshot) than I think it is for the little dreams I have now when I sleep. I wonder why that is. Maybe the quality of my conviction on that point changes according to the vividness of the dream. PairTheBoard
|
|
#59
03-29-2007, 08:16 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
[ QUOTE ]
Maybe there's a better word than "certainty". "Certainty" seems to imply some guartantee of "accuracy" as to the "Absolute Truth" of the thing being believed. [/ QUOTE ] I use the word certainty to describe the feeling you have when you are sure something is true. Which is well defined and is actually what most people mean when they use the word, despite what they might claim. I would consider conviction to be a synonym of certainty. If you do find a word to mean what you are suggesting, I am not sure that it will have much application. [ QUOTE ] Because I experience my existence unlike I experience anything else, with what you might call a sixth sense, I believe I exist with a Quality of Conviction unlike any other. [/ QUOTE ] I was actually using the term sixth sense to stress the similarity between feelings of self and the other senses, but hey whatever goes.
|
|
#60
03-29-2007, 10:24 PM
|
|||
|
|||
|
Re: I Know I Exist but I\'m not so Sure about You
One of my favourite Taoist thoughts:
I dreamed I was a butterfly buffeted about my meadow with tired wings and memories of leaf-eating before wrapping myself in silk to sleep. I awoke as Chang-Tzu under silk sheets and ready for breakfast on my windvdriven mountain. but wait. Am I Chang-Tzu dreaming I am a butterfly or am I a butterfly dreaming I am Chang-Tzu?
|
 |
|
|
Linear Mode
