Biggest world where that’s the case for me is some form of the malicious demon argument.
I can make mistakes when doing things like adding 297 + 972, and forget to carry a one.
Could there be a malicious demon that always makes me make the same mistakes? So I really believe the logical answer is 1296, because every time I check using different procedures, I get the same answer?
Could the same malicious demon then make me make a separate mistake, so I believed that 2+2 =5? It just has to be a bigger mistake that I make every time, doesn’t seem different in kind than the previous thought.
Logically, my experience exists because that’s a priori the definition of existence. But couldn’t the same malicious demon make me believe that was logically sound, while actually there’s some error that I was making every time to draw that conclusion? Again, that doesn’t seem very different in kind than believing 2+2=5.
In the space of all possible minds, is it possible there are some that have a malicious demon baked in. If mine was one, how would I know?
Yes the malicious demon was also the model that sprung to my mind. To answer your question; there are certainly possible minds that have “demons” (or faulty algorithms) that make finding their internal mistakes impossible (but my current model thinks that evolution wouldn’t allow those minds to live for very long). Although this argument has the same feature as the simulation argument in that any counterargument can be countered with “But what if the simulation/demon wants you to think that?”. I don’t have any real solution for this except to say that it doesn’t really matter for our everyday life and we shouldn’t put too much energy in trying to counter the uncounterable (but that feels kinda lame tbh).
I don’t have any real solution for this except to say that it doesn’t really matter for our everyday life and we shouldn’t put too much energy in trying to counter the uncounterable (but that feels kinda lame tbh).
I think this is true in every day life, but not true when you’re doing philosophy of mind like in the above post. I don’t think any of your argument is wrong, I just think you should include the possibility that your observations don’t exist in your reasoning.
Well to be fair this was just a short argument against subjective idealism with three pictures to briefly illustrate the point and this was not (nor did it claim to be) a comprehensive list of all the possible models in the field of philosophy of mind (otherwise I would also have to include pictures with the perception being red and the outside being green, or half being green no matter where they are, or everything being red, or everything being green etc)
Biggest world where that’s the case for me is some form of the malicious demon argument.
I can make mistakes when doing things like adding 297 + 972, and forget to carry a one.
Could there be a malicious demon that always makes me make the same mistakes? So I really believe the logical answer is 1296, because every time I check using different procedures, I get the same answer?
Could the same malicious demon then make me make a separate mistake, so I believed that 2+2 =5? It just has to be a bigger mistake that I make every time, doesn’t seem different in kind than the previous thought.
Logically, my experience exists because that’s a priori the definition of existence. But couldn’t the same malicious demon make me believe that was logically sound, while actually there’s some error that I was making every time to draw that conclusion? Again, that doesn’t seem very different in kind than believing 2+2=5.
In the space of all possible minds, is it possible there are some that have a malicious demon baked in. If mine was one, how would I know?
Yes the malicious demon was also the model that sprung to my mind. To answer your question; there are certainly possible minds that have “demons” (or faulty algorithms) that make finding their internal mistakes impossible (but my current model thinks that evolution wouldn’t allow those minds to live for very long). Although this argument has the same feature as the simulation argument in that any counterargument can be countered with “But what if the simulation/demon wants you to think that?”. I don’t have any real solution for this except to say that it doesn’t really matter for our everyday life and we shouldn’t put too much energy in trying to counter the uncounterable (but that feels kinda lame tbh).
I think this is true in every day life, but not true when you’re doing philosophy of mind like in the above post. I don’t think any of your argument is wrong, I just think you should include the possibility that your observations don’t exist in your reasoning.
Well to be fair this was just a short argument against subjective idealism with three pictures to briefly illustrate the point and this was not (nor did it claim to be) a comprehensive list of all the possible models in the field of philosophy of mind (otherwise I would also have to include pictures with the perception being red and the outside being green, or half being green no matter where they are, or everything being red, or everything being green etc)
Yes, that’s fair. This was definitely a nitpicky request.