Do i exist?

[daddy1gringo]

I agree with Woody 100%, but I can't seem to escape worrying about things like this. Hopefully it'll just change as I get older.

(I heard the same thing Woody's saying once on a Christian radio station as I was flipping through the stations. Worrying about stuff PERIOD brings nothing but uneeded stress. If you have the ability to do something about something, then do it and don't sit there "worrying" about how it's going to turn out. If you can't change anything, then just find something else to do)

Reminds me of "The prayer of St. Francis":
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.

[edit] I double-posted, and the first post, which deals more with the subject of the thread, ended page 3.

[PLAYER57832]

how do i know I'm not a bad ass artificial intelligence that thinks she is living in the "real world"? how do i know this "world" is not fake?

how do i prove to myself that i really am

You think you are not artificial?

CRAZY!

[alex951]

Well that's the point of the "I think, therefore I am" thing. I may be deceived, but if that is true, then there must be an "I" to be deceived. I may be perceiving incorrectly, but that means that there must be an "I" that is perceiving.

I may be a computer program, or an elephant seal, or a mote of dust floating in an updraft, or a disembodied spirit, or something that I have never conceived of, but there must be something which I can refer to as "I". Well, arguably, whatever "I" am must have a consciousness to be perceiving, or "think"ing.

That is how you can know that you exist, according to Descartes anyway. Then you use that as a launch pad to figure out what else you can know for sure.

The only hole I can see in it is this: It's based on laws of causality: "IF THIS is true, THEN it logically follows that THAT is also true." But if you are assuming that you could be deceived about ANYTHING, then how do you know that THAT logically follows, and you are not deceived about the laws of causality too?

But like Woodruff said, if we are that far gone, there is no point in trying to think about anything anyway, so do the best you can with reality as you perceive it. Actually, he never said that, I was interpolating and extrapolating from what he did say. Sorry if I misrepresented your thoughts, W.

thank you!

[Woodruff]

But like Woodruff said, if we are that far gone, there is no point in trying to think about anything anyway, so do the best you can with reality as you perceive it. Actually, he never said that, I was interpolating and extrapolating from what he did say. Sorry if I misrepresented your thoughts, W.

Nope, you nailed it.

[saxitoxin]

But like Woodruff said, if we are that far gone, there is no point in trying to think about anything anyway, so do the best you can with reality as you perceive it. Actually, he never said that, I was interpolating and extrapolating from what he did say. Sorry if I misrepresented your thoughts, W.

Nope, you nailed it.

Woodruff doesn't exist.

See:

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=116286

[Woodruff]

But like Woodruff said, if we are that far gone, there is no point in trying to think about anything anyway, so do the best you can with reality as you perceive it. Actually, he never said that, I was interpolating and extrapolating from what he did say. Sorry if I misrepresented your thoughts, W.

Nope, you nailed it.

Woodruff doesn't exist.

See:

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=116286

You failed to use your own reporting form.

[nietzsche]

Well that's the point of the "I think, therefore I am" thing. I may be deceived, but if that is true, then there must be an "I" to be deceived. I may be perceiving incorrectly, but that means that there must be an "I" that is perceiving.

I may be a computer program, or an elephant seal, or a mote of dust floating in an updraft, or a disembodied spirit, or something that I have never conceived of, but there must be something which I can refer to as "I". Well, arguably, whatever "I" am must have a consciousness to be perceiving, or "think"ing.

That is how you can know that you exist, according to Descartes anyway. Then you use that as a launch pad to figure out what else you can know for sure.

The only hole I can see in it is this: It's based on laws of causality: "IF THIS is true, THEN it logically follows that THAT is also true." But if you are assuming that you could be deceived about ANYTHING, then how do you know that THAT logically follows, and you are not deceived about the laws of causality too?

But like Woodruff said, if we are that far gone, there is no point in trying to think about anything anyway, so do the best you can with reality as you perceive it. Actually, he never said that, I was interpolating and extrapolating from what he did say. Sorry if I misrepresented your thoughts, W.

thank you!

ey! I said basically the same thing and didn't get any claps

[saxitoxin]

But like Woodruff said, if we are that far gone, there is no point in trying to think about anything anyway, so do the best you can with reality as you perceive it. Actually, he never said that, I was interpolating and extrapolating from what he did say. Sorry if I misrepresented your thoughts, W.

Nope, you nailed it.

Woodruff doesn't exist.

See:

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=116286

You failed to use your own reporting form.

O/T - you need to raise this issue in the Alternative Dispute Resolution Forum, in C&A, or not at all.

[Minister Masket]

Reality is reality. But it can be bent with imagination.

[hecter]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWaeTA1UNO0

[Woodruff]

But like Woodruff said, if we are that far gone, there is no point in trying to think about anything anyway, so do the best you can with reality as you perceive it. Actually, he never said that, I was interpolating and extrapolating from what he did say. Sorry if I misrepresented your thoughts, W.

Nope, you nailed it.

Woodruff doesn't exist.

See:

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=116286

You failed to use your own reporting form.

O/T - you need to raise this issue in the Alternative Dispute Resolution Forum, in C&A, or not at all.

No.