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Shop: Kraken Kratom Red Vein Kratom   Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order

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Invisibleit stars saddam
Satan

Registered: 05/19/05
Posts: 15,571
Loc: Spahn Ranch
Solipsism
    #4553714 - 08/18/05 10:11 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

An interesting philosophy indeed.

I've noticed a few different instances on S&P when someone would propose an idea with solipsistic overtones, and people will blow it off saying something like "this sounds like solipsism" as if solipsism were just some ridiculous theory with no place in reality.

But really, is there truly anyway to disprove the ideas put forth by solipsism? Why is it that people are so quick to discard this philosophy?

Btw, I dont post on this board much, but I spend quite a bit of time lurking around here. Ive been interested in solipsism lately and am curious to hear what the S&P crew has to say about it.

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InvisibleMushmanTheManic
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Re: Solipsism [Re: it stars saddam]
    #4553856 - 08/18/05 10:49 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Well... you always have to wonder if this is completely a construction of your mind, and nothing more. But, since I can never know, I wander through life behaving like its not.

I've heard an arguement that it doesn't matter either way, but I forgot what rationale he used to support this idea. :shrug:

Edited by MushmanTheManic (08/18/05 10:52 PM)

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InvisibleRavus
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Re: Solipsism [Re: it stars saddam]
    #4553877 - 08/18/05 10:54 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Solipsism is interesting in many ways, and I too find it annoying when people blow things off because they "sound like solipsism".

The main interesting point of solipsism is that there's no way to know if it's true; in fact, were you to strictly (and I mean very strictly) follow Occam's razor, I believe solipsism would be your final result. All your perception and reality exists within your subjective reality; outside of this subjective reality, there is no possible way to verify existence, because you can only verify the existence within your reality.

However, the main problem with solipsism is that, in my experience with it, it will get you nowhere. All solipsism does is fill you with doubt, but it doesn't really contribute anything, so in the interest of progress, solipsism is usually abandoned and adopted again only as "uncertainty", which means, for all relevant purposes, that it's a major problem but people don't want to deal with it.

Of course, how do I know these people exist at all? How do I know I'm not just talking to myself? :shiftyeyes:

Realistically, assuming external reality does exist during our waking life, the best example of solipsism comes from dreams. We see these people in dreams as separate, having their own words and personalities and mannerisms; then we wake up and find they were in our minds all along. How do we know it's not the same right now?


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So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.

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Invisibleit stars saddam
Satan

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Posts: 15,571
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Re: Solipsism [Re: Ravus]
    #4553925 - 08/18/05 11:07 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

"The distinction between the realist universe and the unconscious universe collapses when one notes that external and unconscious are simply two different words used to describe the same events occurring outside of conscious control. This leads to the conclusion that the unconscious is, for all practical purposes, someone else."

I thought this was one of the most interesting ideas in the whole article.

The unconscious mind is always talked about as being totally separate from our external reality (the ego and the id). Okay, but if I take a moment and totally stop acknowledging myself and my ego, I've broken free and entered the unconscious, but I'm still there, "I" as in the body that I normally inhabit and do stuff with. This is very hard for me to try and explain what I am trying to say with words, but the above quote explains it pretty well.

If my personal experience is the totality of all of my mental processes, where is my unconscious mind functioning at? Or am I someone else completely?

Also, I have had intensely solipsistic thoughts while on psychedelics, and this was before I ever really knew about the theory at all. Anyone else make this connection?

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InvisibleRavus
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Re: Solipsism [Re: it stars saddam]
    #4553938 - 08/18/05 11:13 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Or you could reduce it even further and say the unconscious doesn't exist. The only way you exist is as your ego; if you can't experience your unconscious mind, then how do you even know it's there?

Our experience is so constricted, it's almost boggling to think about it. We make so many leaps of faith to even believe that there's something besides us (the ego) out there.


--------------------
So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.

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Invisibleit stars saddam
Satan

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Re: Solipsism [Re: Ravus]
    #4554002 - 08/18/05 11:31 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Quote:

Ravus said:
The only way you exist is as your ego




Well, I believe you can temporarily transcend the ego chemically (though Im sure most of the people on this board are aware of that).

This leads to another paradox. Lets say Im trippin on 10g dry and I've entered a state of "ego loss." At this time I am having a profound transcendental experience, but if my trip sitter or anyone else in the room observes me, they'll see the same guy they've always known. So if I'm chillin in a chair during a level 5 trip, I may be transcending space and time, but I am still sitting in that chair, which means even beyond my ego I am still somehow rooted in this external reality.

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InvisibleMushmanTheManic
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Re: Solipsism [Re: it stars saddam]
    #4554054 - 08/18/05 11:47 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

If I cannot even have certianty about my daily reality, how can I have certianty about anything else? Solipsism lead me right into a 'semi-mystical' nihilism.
I'm on a long, strange journey to an unknown destination and everything seems utterly confusing.

"For a warrior, the world is weird because it is stupendous, awesome, mysterious, unfathomable. A warrior must assume responsibility for being here, in this marvelous world, in this marvelous time." - Don Juan Matus

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InvisibleRavus
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Re: Solipsism [Re: it stars saddam]
    #4554106 - 08/19/05 12:03 AM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Quote:

itstarssaddam said:
Quote:

Ravus said:
The only way you exist is as your ego




Well, I believe you can temporarily transcend the ego chemically (though Im sure most of the people on this board are aware of that).

This leads to another paradox. Lets say Im trippin on 10g dry and I've entered a state of "ego loss." At this time I am having a profound transcendental experience, but if my trip sitter or anyone else in the room observes me, they'll see the same guy they've always known. So if I'm chillin in a chair during a level 5 trip, I may be transcending space and time, but I am still sitting in that chair, which means even beyond my ego I am still somehow rooted in this external reality.




What external reality? If you were dreaming, those people would tell you they saw you there, but they would be a creation from your mind along with the rest of your external reality. Then you would wake up and realize those people didn't tell you any truth; they didn't even exist.


--------------------
So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.

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Invisibleit stars saddam
Satan

Registered: 05/19/05
Posts: 15,571
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Re: Solipsism [Re: Ravus]
    #4554152 - 08/19/05 12:21 AM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Quote:

Ravus said:
What external reality? If you were dreaming, those people would tell you they saw you there, but they would be a creation from your mind along with the rest of your external reality. Then you would wake up and realize those people didn't tell you any truth; they didn't even exist.




That's a very good point. Well, let me try to reword one of the ideas I mentioned before.

Once again, consider a state of ego loss from a psychedelic chemical, or any kind of ego transcendence, while sitting in a chair. You are experiencing this state as part of your reality, but your reality is the creation of your brain. Your brain is contained within the body that is sitting in the chair, so the experience stems from this point...?

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InvisibleRavus
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Re: Solipsism [Re: it stars saddam]
    #4554183 - 08/19/05 12:34 AM (18 years, 7 months ago)

All that exists is the camera. For a few seconds, you put the lens on. It records nothing, and can't see itself. You take the lens back off. It sees itself again.

Your body doesn't necessarily exist either; only your ego. In solipsism, you only exist as far as your experience extends, so if you were in a chemical-induced haze, you would only exist there. Your body would disappear for all you know. But this happens during sleep also.


--------------------
So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.

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Invisibleit stars saddam
Satan

Registered: 05/19/05
Posts: 15,571
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Re: Solipsism [Re: Ravus]
    #4554224 - 08/19/05 12:47 AM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Right on man. I see what you're saying.

Another thing, from a solipsist standpoint I dont even have concrete proof that my brain exists. The only evidence I have is taking examples from other creatures like myself that have been dissected, and perhaps even these are a creation of the mind.

Since it is impossible to pinpoint the source of consciousness, you cant necessarily prove that it all stems from the brain.

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InvisibleRavus
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Re: Solipsism [Re: it stars saddam]
    #4554294 - 08/19/05 01:09 AM (18 years, 7 months ago)

True, and even these dissections are just in your perception; you could be on datura viewing skewered diagrams for all you know.

I don't believe in solipsism; it is too simple, too constricting, and you'll never really get far as a solipsist. Solipsism's main statement is that everything is uncertain; you can't actually know anything because it only exists to you. Everything you see could be a delusion, or a dream, or simply a lie. I agree that everything is an uncertainty, but if you want to get anywhere you simply have to accept this and move on, absorbing knowledge as best you can even with this unsettling realization.


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So long as you are praised think only that you are not yet on your own path but on that of another.

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InvisibleIcelander
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Re: Solipsism [Re: Ravus]
    #4554637 - 08/19/05 06:59 AM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Great post Ravus.
Quote:

The main interesting point of solipsism is that there's no way to know if it's true; in fact, were you to strictly (and I mean very strictly) follow Occam's razor, I believe solipsism would be your final result. All your perception and reality exists within your subjective reality; outside of this subjective reality, there is no possible way to verify existence, because you can only verify the existence within your reality.




I believe this. Maybe I'm a solipsist? :grin: I think it is freeing. It reminds me of Taoism as I see it. If I cannot know for sure, then I am free to choose, to follow a path with heart. As Don Juan said. "A path is only a path. They lead into the bush, and back out again, and in the end, they all meet. And all that is important is, does this path have a heart." This sums up my life philosophy. I believe you could have called Don Juan a Taoist without conflict. I think of Taoism as the path with heart.


--------------------
"Don't believe everything you think". -Anom.

" All that lives was born to die"-Anom.

With much wisdom comes much sorrow,
The more knowledge, the more grief.
Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC

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Invisiblemecreateme
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Re: Solipsism [Re: Icelander]
    #4555295 - 08/19/05 12:08 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Definitely, there will always be people on either side. It is only when people crucify things with labels that are rigid and do not change that they see only one side of that label. I think as Alan Watts named the title of a great book: "Wisdom of Insecurity." To grasp and try to label up and dissect all the world for you to understand is missing the point: To live it up and experience it all as well as you can, as great as possible!

To long for order is not to accept the serpentine nature of Nature. To desire security is to lose it. To desire anything is to recognize that you yourself are not whole enough to fill yourself. :sun:

Wanting is denying your true nature.

Solipsism can be liberating or cage making. The true observer can move between and see both, it just takes a little faith to find wisdom in insecurity/chaos. I find no problem with it.

I'm right up there with you, Icelander. I have even been called a Solipsist on these boards before. As if labeling something allows people to file it away under not to think about.


--------------------
No ONE wants to know the ultimate TRUTH, as soon as YOU find IT out, YOU want to forget IT.

You are everything's way of feeling itself.

Happy Schwag, everygodly!

Edited by mecreateme (08/19/05 12:12 PM)

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InvisibleIcelander
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Re: Solipsism [Re: mecreateme]
    #4555346 - 08/19/05 12:23 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Quote:

I'm right up there with you, Icelander. I have even been called a Solipsist on these boards before. As if labeling something allows people to file it away under not to think about.




:thumbup:I like the quality of the company. :mushroom2:


--------------------
"Don't believe everything you think". -Anom.

" All that lives was born to die"-Anom.

With much wisdom comes much sorrow,
The more knowledge, the more grief.
Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC

Edited by Icelander (08/19/05 12:23 PM)

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Offlineleery11
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Re: Solipsism [Re: Icelander]
    #4555765 - 08/19/05 03:01 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Well here's my take on "Solipsism" (i never knew the term for it directly until now but it's a line of thinking i'm familiar with)

first of all, there are two perceptual realities that occur as complete polar opposites of each other (to me at least)

The dream world and the waking world.

The waking world creates the dream world as you begin to conceptualize your interactions with reality, and subsequently the dream world shapes your conceptualizations of reality in non-conscious ways.... because nothing you encounter in your dreams *should* be foreign to you, the dreams are an accurate reflection of what YOUR position in reality is, what YOU know, what you identify with, what is significant to you.

Because of this, it seems safe to say that the waking reality is a more objective and founded reality. Whether others are real doesn't seem to matter so much, but I think we can scertain that it is not even REMOTELY as easy to alter the waking reality as it is the dream reality.

In fact though, the only sensible "reality" that seems to exist may lie between the "twilight zone" of waking and sleeping.... where you temporarily are non-existant (unless you're very good at meditation/yoga nidra). I think it is in this void of non-existance that all things share common ground... and that the death process is similar to the sleeping process.

So you could say that first of all, "you" don't exist, because in the scheme of things you are largely impermanent, and you could say that the only thing that exists is you, because you have no way of telling if other people are "real." However the logical conclusion would be that, much like in your dream, things, people, etc, "exist" they just do not exist in a solid or othwerise tangibly measured form.

In other words, they exist because they ARE form, and forms exist because you perceive them. I think solipsism arises from the inability to recognize the inherent similarities that all humans have, and erroneously assumes that YOU even EXIST in the first place, when really "you" are just inhabiting a temporary vessel through which to perceive and be.

I think some of the thinking blinds us from the (personal)fact that we are all connected through the inner void of nothingness that lies at the end of the universe that is human consciousness. Objects in your dreams, for example, certainly exist, for they are merely aspects of you and your own thought patterns, if you touch them they will eventually melt away into you.

Human beings are the same, as in, ultimately they are connected to you through your perception of them, and likewise vice versa, you exist because they perceive you. But we all are nothing on the inside.

This comes from me from loosely studying taoism, buddhism, tibettan buddhism, lucid dreaming, psychedelics, and new aged thinking. Hopefully it makes sense. My basic principle for thinking about things right now is that paradoxes DO usually ultimately make sense, that both "nothing" and "everything" exist at the same time. Duality.

Basically you would need to ascertain that YOU are real before you can figure out whether other people are. Most people think they are real... but when you realize how subjective and narrow your perceptions of reality are... and how much differently the world could be colored through different eyes. It makes you wonder. It's safe to say that anything you encounter has some sort of significance that is proportional to your own, since you are in fact perceiving it, and perception is the only way to understand "reality" or "existence" in the first place.


--------------------
I am the MacDaddy of Heimlich County, I play it Straight Up Yo!

....I embrace my desire to feel the rhythm, to feel connected enough to step aside and weep like a widow, to feel inspired, to fathom the power, to witness the beauty, to bathe in the fountain, to swing on the spiral of our divinity and still be a human......
Om Namah Shivaya, I tell you What!

Edited by leery11 (08/19/05 03:07 PM)

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InvisibleIcelander
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Re: Solipsism [Re: leery11]
    #4555873 - 08/19/05 03:35 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

Very cool lerry11, I understand you and it makes sense to me. :thumbup: I once had an experience on Salvia where I was watching myself watching a very strange scene unfold. This awareness was more real to me than the me I usually perceive myself as. Yet it had no emotion or feeling I was familiar with. It/I just watched.


--------------------
"Don't believe everything you think". -Anom.

" All that lives was born to die"-Anom.

With much wisdom comes much sorrow,
The more knowledge, the more grief.
Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC

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OfflineSerioOria
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Re: Solipsism [Re: Icelander]
    #4556449 - 08/19/05 06:49 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

i think that is actually much more likely, but i feel crazy talking about it with other 'people' and so i try to leave it out of discussion whenever i can, although i know it is a possibility its not something that makes sense to others


think about it when you say it to someone else how egocentrical it must sound to them, likewise if you hear them tell you that

or if someone tells you that they always think their gona wake up in 10 years in some mental institution a 100 year old and their whole life that they have known was just a dream, or alter reality


--------------------
Live every day like it is your first
or
Live every day like it is your last
My ArT!!

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Invisiblemecreateme
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Re: Solipsism [Re: leery11]
    #4556667 - 08/19/05 08:05 PM (18 years, 7 months ago)

I think it is correct to say this world has cause and effect linked to such a degree that it is useful to take those connections as mostly real. It helps when thinking about things. However, sometimes things are just dropped in your lap in the real world i.e. winning lottery. Desire seems to be a two edged sword. To begin to want is to grab it.

Great thinking and post! You put duality nicely. Nothing is the real everything because out of that anything can come about. This world is rooted in paradox and it is a thought I come to time and again while tripping. We are an entire universe in each of our own minds. And yet we can never really get into that other's mind, as in real hard data. Seeing the thinking mechanism of another at work displaying words they think as if typed on a computer. Of course, that I think is a delusional thought, akin to looking for the bearded old man, God. It just seems like such a waste to have so much going on in each head of every person and none of us can ever truly know what the universe is turning in another's head.


--------------------
No ONE wants to know the ultimate TRUTH, as soon as YOU find IT out, YOU want to forget IT.

You are everything's way of feeling itself.

Happy Schwag, everygodly!

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InvisiblePenelope_Tree
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Re: Solipsism [Re: mecreateme]
    #17249178 - 11/19/12 08:56 PM (11 years, 4 months ago)

This is a favorite philosophical topic for me.


--------------------
full blown human

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