Every idea is your own idea to someone.
Why trust someone else’s idea? Because you can analyse it for consistency with other ideas, internal coherency and accord with evidence.
When can you trust your ideas? When you’ve submitted them to the same level of sceptical analysis as you would other ideas.
How can you know for sure that they do not need anymore analysis? I am sure we all know that feeling where we thought we discovered something, analyze it ourselves and believe we understand it, then introduce or try to explain it, then have it get crushed.
It reminds me of what science does where if the experiment fails even once it is no good, so consistency does play a huge role, this I understand, but when it comes to the mind, psychology or some aspects of living we cannot apply a physical experiment then what can be done?
Don’t the people here have the hunger for knowing like I do? I don’t believe Socrates would have claimed to know nothing if it weren’t true, and then he attaches knowing nothing to wisdom, well I guess rather his understanding that he knows nothing.
Yes, but I think his point is that your ideas about your ability to skepically analyze ( in the specific, in general)
your ideas about what constitutes proper analysis
your memory of that analysis
your intuitions about your own thoroughness this time
your estimations of how affected you may be consciously or unconsciously (on the specific issue)
and other relevent judgments, ideas and intuitions
are ones you must trust to draw any conclusions from that analysis.
I looked at my own ideas and found them sound is something we all know even very smart people can say and be completely incorrect, at least on occasion.
There is the ‘I am looking objectively at my own process’ quale.
Well, yes good question, but further I think it is also confused. What possible answer would cover very stupid people and very smart people, or very introspective people and people who are not, people who repress emotions and people who accept them…and so on adding in other qualities that affect accuracy in estimations of what might be wrong in a given instance.
Then you know for sure that “introducing and trying to explain it” is a necessary step.
If your question is “how can we be 100% sure and certain of anything?”, the answer is you can’t. And you don’t need to be. Far, far more intelligent people than us have been far wronger about things than we have and still lived long and happy lives.
If the question is “how can we be sure we’re not privileging our whims over other’s (better) ideas?”, then the answer is honesty and fairness. Be as critical of your own ideas as you would of anyone else’s; be as charitable towards others’ ideas as you would be to your own; have the courage and insight to discard what’s clearly wrong.
If the question then mutates to “how can I know I’m being courageous and insightful?” and from there to “how can I be sure of [whatever the answer to your last question was]?” - let it go. You can always throw another layer of doubt on, and it’s exactly the same process as the toddler asking “… but WHY?” to every answer. Anything you can be certain of, you can also doubt. At a certain point you have to live, and when you start doing that, you get to the useful side of philosophy.
Also: don’t fall into the trap of exceptionalism. It’s heady stuff, and only makes your honesty and fairness that much harder to find.
That is true about other much more intelligent people being incorrect. I was just thinking about how a long time ago the majority of people believed that the world was flat or the center of the universe, so a lot of people could not rely on criticism, and other people’s analyzing due to the fact that they were all wrong. So the same thing regarding back then could be happening again right now correct? I mean we can see it by Science not criticizing itself enough and having followers who believe on word.
Artimas,
lol That was so cute, Artimas, it made me laugh. 
Think “individual”! Think “the flow of time”. Think the changing of the guard (mind). Think “Life changes on a dime”! – among other things.
By not figuring it out – by being the skeptic, agnostic…
“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”
I love that quote. It helps one to realize that there are possibilities which we absolutely know nothing about but at the same time, it can keep one grounded to an extent.
Well it’s true, it isn’t a complicated answer either, it’s based off what you can observe through nature, the world and perhaps the universe, depending on what we actually do know.
Artimas,
So, what is the answer then? What is the purpose of existence? 
I don’t think this is the question. How can we even come down on a probability? We will always be a factor. It is not as if our ideas can be determined to be probable because in the abstract, let’s say, scientific research can lead one to work out probabilities (let’s grant this for a moment), but rather that even if it can in the abstract, we still wake up in bed, with memories of what we can trust and learned and interpreted, including our estimations of science, scientists, how paradigms may be skewing things, the fallibility of our memories and so on. In situ it is not that we can say oh, we can’t be 100percent sure, but rather that we cannot give is a percentage number even with some standard or non-standard deviation around it. We can think that if we look back such and such process and conclusions seemed to have done well, in our sense, looking out, in situ, from our little life and our little experiences and perception. That’s where we are, not in a Platonic scientific realm.
(not that you said we were, just using it as a default model)
The lack of sureness goes much deeper than ‘not 100%’ which sounds really too comforting and without foundation.
Experiencing, which is why everyone has a unique one, even plants and other animals are experiencing their own realities or experiences.
Well then the purpose is achieved without doing anything.
Moving on.
Simply existing is doing something. Also the purpose relies on people’s doing… Doing = more experiences that keep going on and on.
Were you expecting such a simple answer? Humans tend to over complicate simple things because they think it makes them more intelligent or feel more powerful. Simply put, ego.
From my perspective so far of what I can see of the worldly and universal cycles there is not a question that exists without a real answer, whether we find the answer is unknown but a question cannot exist without an answer for it, the universe/world deals in balances. Just from what I have seen so far.
You were asked "what is the purpose of existence? ".
By simply existing you will be experiencing. As long as you are alive, you experience. So to achieve that “purpose of existence” you don’t have to do anything special.
In other words, I think that your answer is trivial.
Wow, you actually got it right! 
Exactly!
When people ask “what is the purpose of existence?”, they generally want an answer which gives direction.
I can do this or that… which option is better aligned with the purpose of existence?
They want a way to answer the question ‘correctly’.
Artimas,
This is the answer which you gave.
Experiencing, which is why everyone has a unique one, even plants and other animals are experiencing their own realities or experiences
It’s true. Sometimes we do over-complicate matters but at the same time it’s important to shed more light on things. I know you would agree with this.
Well, you could say that that is ONE purpose of existence. We’ve evolved in such a way (senses) that we are able to sensate things and interpret them to our liking, according to our perception. We all have our own answers basically, Artimas, to that question just as you gave yours. But there is more to it, isn’t there?
They do come about as a result of our own personal history, our brain patterns - I’d even say as a result of the chemical in our brain lol, which definitely influence our thoughts and behaviors. As ideas go though, they’re really not my own except insofar as I just thought of them or better still, was reminded of them. I think possibly that there have been very few people who have had their own [original] ideas but I may be wrong them. Some scientists and philosophers.
I may be wrong here, but I think that another way to answer the question would depend on whether one believes in a designing god. If one does, then one can see existence as coming about because of some “real” purpose that was in the mind of this god.
But we apply purpose after the fact, I think, when we’ve achieved something or decide to achieve something, if that made sense.
If we look at evolution in general it’s almost impossible to think that the universe and everything in it could have evolved randomly and without some purpose and design though I suppose that is just because of how I view things but I may be wrong.
These are just my musings and they’re not set in stone…they’re in a crystal ball with an opening in the bottom.
When people ask “What’s at the end of the rainbow”, they generally want the answer: a pot of gold.
Besides, the notion that one need not do anything to fulfill their life’s purpose can be a comfort if their worried about failing at it.