rationalskepticism.org

hackenslash wrote:On this proxy argument, which nicely highlights the problem with arguing by proxy:

if you’re going to drag physics in here you need to show the math.

Math? I ain’t got no math! I don’t need no math! I don’t got to show you any stinkin’ math!

I’m dealing with the philosophy of physics which requires no math, I’m not running a supercollider looking for subatomic particles, dealing with eigenvectors, statistics, or spectral areas.

The random internet wibbler who posted this may not need to 'show any stinkin' math', you certainly do. I'd have to assess his argument more completely to determine if he's made the same fatal error you have, to whit:

Frozenworld wrote:Even modern physics points to solipsism:

If modern physics points to solipsism, then the calculations have been done, because that's how modern physics points to anything.

In fact, your internet rando, simply by alluding to Planck's purported thoughts on consciousness and by advertising his credential, not only commits an argumentum ad verecundiam, he obviates the need to demonstrate that Planck's credential has relevance. Since Planck's credential is in modern physics, he's implicitly stating the equivalent to your statement, namely that Planck's authority applies here, so I want to see what the Hamiltonian of consciousness is, thank you very much. Then you can show me the four-vector for solipsism.

It's perfectly clear to all onlookers that you haven't mastered the rudiments of first order linear logic yet, so it's unsurprising that you can't grasp even the most obvious implications of your position, let alone the more subtle but necessary inferences in higher orders or off down the chain of inference.

And that's entirely the problem with argument by proxy. You go and find whatever sounds good to you or like it supports your position without even the most basic tools necessary to assess it, and you end up with a disparate collection of unconnected assertions and contradictory inferences and no means by which to analyse them for consistency.

So far science hasn’t show aspects of existence to be mind dependent. Everything seems to function independently of the mind.

Got QM?

If you’re gonna cite physics you need math. Otherwise there is no reason to take you seriously. Even philosophers know that the interpretations mean little unless you understand the math behind them.

You need math, apparently you identify and feel safe with quantification. I don’t need no stinkin’ math. Philosophers don’t need math either and their interpretations aren’t necessarily conducive to numbers.

Superposition does not apply at all to what you are saying. It’s just addition of two states that yield another state. It has no application whatsoever to solipsism.

You clearly have no clue about superposition or solipsism despite your baseless assertions

All you do is bark assertions without evidence or explanation and when questioned say folks “don’t understand”. There is little value in talking to you because you clearly dont know what you’re talking about or even citing.

See — you are projecting your perceptions . It’s you who clearly don’t know what you are talking about although you believe you do. Why do you want to talk to someone anyway if you can eke no value from them.

The definition of solipsism directly conflicts with your “Thesis” (such as it is). You are asserting other minds, therefor it isn’t solipsism.

Your definition claims to conflict with mine. I posit other minds in superposition which are mind dependent. It doesn’t contradict solipsism at all.

It is true, indeed it is tautologous, to say that all I know falls ... within my experience; that all I know is only known to me as object of my intelligence. But this only means that I can only know it in so far as I subject it to forms projected by my intelligence. It does not mean that its existence depends on my intelligence. Its existence, its givenness, is always there, staring me in the face, pressing in upon me. My very body; my impulses, my cravings, my pangs and my exhilarations; the whole of my being in so far as it is in any way objective, is given, and the function of my intelligence is to redeem that givenness by conferring upon it forms that transform it into intelligible experience indissolubly bound up with the subject: to redeem it, I say, not to negate it.