It seems a lot, if not most, of how we think has a foundation of “we’re entities in a universe”… it also seems that all of our sensations are highly processed by the time we’re conscious of them and that our senses are not windows unto the world.
So, before talking about any objects in the universe, it seems the primary question is, What makes us so sure that a universe exists, anyways?
I assume philosophers have talked about this, so my question is, what’s the fallback proof or assumption that is necessary before making any claims about this supposed universe?
I’m not sure I can really answer-- but if I’ve opportunity at second post I’m gonna pounce.
I’m assuming you’re talking about Reality; what makes us think that there really is such a thing?
First of all, there’s the intuitive feeling that the world continues to exist and change even when we’re not there to observe it personally. When we sleep, for example, we wake up and things are different: the best explanation is that change happens independently of our perception of it.
We have also been “wrong” about our perception and assumptions about the universe, which ironically enough makes us ever more certain that we’re correct right now- we don’t believe that the world was flat when people thought it was, but that something intrinsic and external to our cognitions makes objects have the properties they do, and that we can misperceive or make wrong assumptions without that changing the outside world. There is that biological sense of Otherness that lets the world persist, for lack of a better word, outside us.
Also there’s the problem of where the perceptions come from, if not from an Other; the assumption is that they must come from SOMEWHERE. If they don’t, how is it that our responses to mere illusions have enabled us to survive and coexist as well as we have?
One might as well assume that there is an external universe, as either way you will be obliged to deal with the sensory information that you are receiving …
Except, if we could somehow prove that reality is subjective (whatever that may mean), then it could probably follow that there would be a way for us to transcend it, which might be worth looking into.
Despite the attempts of Kant as well as the Absolute Idealists such as Hegel and Schopenhauer, the biggest proof I can see (that we have at this time) is:
We cannot prove the existence of an external world reasonably, but neither can we disprove it.
Junkanoo - this is my standard test. Grab ahold of a largish television set or similar item. Drop it on your unshod foot and then immediately post as to why the phenomenal world does not exist.
i have to admit that made me laugh… but i think his original post was all together misinterpreted.
in response to the original post, i’m assuming you’re asking what makes us so sure that A. we exist in only this universe and B, that there really is a “universe” and we are not just beings of electricity flowing in a big nothingness…
maybe you saw it as we are like beings traveling through time on a set course through frame like universes?
well the truth is this type of metaphysical theory is yet unprovable… most of us will say we are simply pragmatists in defense (like Fausts comedy), but in truth we are interested in stuff which affects us.
my fall nack assumpion is that the matter is of profound indifference. we percieve what we percieve how we can percieve it and thats what affects us. thats all we are, what we are, and evidently who we are. it matters not that we know how we are, all that matters is that we know what we are.
here is a perfect example. lets imagine a rat… lets imagine this rat running through a sheer paradise… he is content and lives a happy life to the end of his days.
in truth the rat was in a science lab on top of a big rolling drum that just rotated to keep him on top of it… allowing him to roam freely over the paradise like surface of the drum until the end of his days.
this example may bear a chilling resemblance to our current situation, and for good reason… like the rat we are finite beings of pain pleasure lust hate and a great many other things which we seem to prefer satisfied…
so instead of asking how it is possible that we are happy, we just try to be happy… call it blissful ignorance or lazy comfort.
if you would like crazy hypothesis’s look into string theory and the 12 dimensions… here is a nice video
Wonderer - while I intended to be humorous, my response was also meant to be an answer to the OP. I believe it to be just that. It’s as far as I go with epistemology, because anything further is epistemology, which i regard as metaphysics.
As have many (as has been pointed out already), one may rely upon metaphysics. But i believe that it is likely that philosophy did not spring from philosophy, but from much more mundane considerations.
If our sense are not windows to the world, then either we have no window, or that window is something else. That “something else” is usually a god, or some form of rationalism. Take your pick. Or do as Descartes and others have done, and choose both.
I of course mispoke in my previous post. I am suffering a vicious toothache and am not thinking too clearly. My statement is as far as i go towards epistemology - I belive it is not quite an epistemic statement itself.
Okay, Wonderer. As a perspectivist, i am interested only in pshycological “truths”. Which may provide some context for my initial comments. It also explains the Will to God, to me.
