(Part 2 of 2) You need to work from a starting point of absolute certainty. It's popular to say that certainty is relative. This presents a logical anomaly though. The statement, "truth is relative", cannot be true. Computers hang when a logical anomaly occurs. Are we at a similar point in intellectual history? I don't know but enjoy exploring this inquiry like you and many of your commentors. Keep exploring. As for me, I am currently of the belief that certainty can be discovered once again.
(Part 1 of 2) You are using the brain in the vat as a mental exercise to demonstrate the skeptical method of thought. Yes, if that is the process you are using then ,you cannot refute the uncertainty of your existence. It is pointless to establish your method of argument on a hypthothetical. You have to work from irrefutable position. Descartes refuted everything but one. He knew he was a thinking being. From there he helped establish the modern intellectual tradition.
Brain in a Vat eh? Okay then who created the Super computer?
there's 2 awnsers, there's an endless line of super computers made one after another. (infinite regression) or there was one perfect entity that created it all to start the endless line of super computer engineers, either way brain in a vat is an allegory, and the chances of a literal old mad scientists who hooked you the the matrix is low, but where did he get that knowledge from?
whether it's true or not, it doesn't matter. like most philosophical problems, it doesn't really matter what you believe. life would still go on the way it does, whether it's actually a computer simulation, subjective or objective, it doesn't matter. someone who believes in free will, could act in the same way as someone who believes in determinism, and have the same lifestyle, none of these questions are practical, can't improve our understanding of the universe, nor can they make us happier.
I'm confused! If we subscribe to the brain in a vat scenario doesn't that imply the presence of a higher intelligence than ourselves? The one who designed the super computer? and doesn't this then imply a creator? The one who creates the brains that go in the vat? Sorry if these questions are stupid it's the first time I've heard anything like this!
this was a very good video. But i highly doubt we are a a brain
in a vatt. and if we were who would be in controll? Although we cannot proove anything, the one thing i do believe is that we do exist, wether we are dreaming or not, human beings are capable of thinking, therefore we exixt.
Everyone who is reading this comment, please click on my username for my videos I made about the The Truth of the World. I have found out what the truth of life is, the truth of the world, and the truth of God. Please, I really want people to watch and listen what I have to say. No more living in false reality, no more living in illusions, no more thinking there is no way out......its time to lead your life into The Truth of the World!!!!!!!!!
Its funny you say that " your pissed so of wasting so much of your time", then tell me why you seem to be responding to just about every comment left on his video? Are you his bitch or some frustrated little douche who can never keep nothing to himself?
imagine "god" however you wish to picture "it" did exist, now even god would ask him/her self these questions, god would question who it is, what it is, where it is, when it is, and why it is, also how it was created, which doesnt mean it ever was created. Its curious how "we" ask ourselves these same questions, and maybe these questions have and will never be answered. awsome vid.
This ghoulish dude--with a most unfortunate beard--recommending invocation of the brain in a vat skeptical hypothesis to "refute" any argument is fucking retarded. If anyone does this to you, take a slugger and refute their existence with the bat-in-a-brain hypothesis. And no, you cannot "prove that we can't know for certain whether or not we exist." Even if you were a brain in a vat, you are still a thinking thing and thus you, as a thinking thing, exist.
@CavalierBizarre, like the typical youtube troll - you missed the point. I'm quite aware that it would be silly and pointless to try and use the "brain-in-a-vat" experiment for refuting various philosophical positions. Who said that? You did, not me. I stated that it was a thought experiment, like watching the matrix. That's it. No one said it should be taken seriously. I love when people base their entire judgments on something I never said. Now wander back to your cave, troll.
@CavalierBizarre, "I ask the viewers to indulge in a philosophical mind-experiment; known as the "brain-in-a-vat."
From the intro. Learn to read. Surely, most people who have ANY familiarity with philosophy will already have heard this argument before. I wasn't imagining that I was covering some new, foreign, philosophical landscape. It's a rehash, of rather old crap, for people who aren't that familiar with philosophical skepticism.
I like this video, but would like to suggest that the brain in the vat scenario has a lot of problems when one considers ethical or moral situations. How, for example, should one respond to such challenges as disease or climate change, terrorism, corruption or when trying to gain evidence to prove/falsify relativity or evolution. Should we act (with our allegedly real bodies) as though these things exist or are true?
Can a brain in a vat suffer a stroke or senility? Is it made of cells?
Thanks for the comment. All very good questions. But I wasn't really supposing that such a scenario (brain in vat) is actually true; it was a mere exercise in skepticism. I wouldn't suggest that people take such a worldview seriously; like you said, that could lead to nihilism, or insanity. I just try to point out the frail state of "knowledge." Whether or not life is "real" is rather irrelevant, actually - because we experience as if it is real; and that alone is reason enough to act, I think.
I think when anyone says that something can't be refuted, that's too rigid. Well, give me the benefit of the doubt and see if I can refute it or not. Pride and control has a way of creeping in and preventing breathing room for both people.
Well, I never said we should care, but if you want to learn and grow, you need caring to do it. If you want a better world you need to care. Caring is not a thing one demands, but caring is still essential. And remember to keep skepticism on a leash.
We can be aware of what we think. After all, thought is always old, always the past. Thought is always the "known" So, we can be fully aware of everything we think of. The only thing we really can be certain of as being truth, is the truth in our practical knowledge as far as learning a language, making a chair, etc. Other than that, what do we know psychologically? I think life becomes meaningful when we're not searching for the meaning.
@wonderwhaz797, I wouldn't say that I "think that way" all the time or anything. It's merely an exercise in skepticism. It works, and it can't be refuted. Why care about anything at all? I don't know, who ever said we should? Life is what it is, I'm just dissecting and analyzing it to the best of my ability. Who promised that life has to be "meaningful?" Truth isn't always pretty.
I think that Descartes managed to overcome what he called the 'dreaming' argument for scepticism, at least in terms of proving that something exists (i.e. my brain, at this very moment). However, he failed to get past that, as do any pure rationalist arguments- which is why philosophers such as Hume are so important. Descartes also really fucked himself with the 'evil demon' argument.
Descartes didn't overcome anything. His attempt at epistemological foundationalism could only refute the earlier laid out Cartesian skepticism by allegedly proving the existence of God, and, more specifically, using medieval notions of God. Of course, this is impossible, and Descartes finds himself the father of a proof laden with wacky, medieval deity behaviorisms and also a nasty circularity with regards to his idea of "clear and distinct perceptions."
I really think this question will be with us for eternity. We cannot answer it and I really doubt the science will arrive at a point that it could. I also don't believe that religion has or will discover the mysteries of it all. I think it's nice this way though... we need these challenges, at least I believe so. Having all the answers would be no fun.
Even if we would only be brains connected to a computer, how could the person that connected the brain to the computer be sure that he too is not just a brain connected to a coputer and so on and on and on......
lol... I suppose he couldn't, thus an ancient Taoist philosopher once compared life to a "dream within a dream within a dream." You awake from one dream only to be living in another..., it could go on forever, technically, hah.
Believe it or not, there are major world religions that are loosely based around this "brain-in-a-vat" type idea; Buddhism and Hinduism both assert that "reality" is essentially an illusion, and we need to wake up from it if we are to be "enlightened." Strange.
It does not really matter if you are just a brain connected to a computer or really exist. What matters is the so called "reality" that you live in, because that is the "truth" of your life. If you hurt yourself you will feel pain. The information of pain is unplesant no matter if you are just a brain or a real person.
You're right, I agree there. It doesn't matter. We experience what we experience regardless of whether it's real or not. My only point is that, given the brain-in-a-vat scenario, we shouldn't take our beliefs that seriously. Human beings have a great capacity for tricking themselves into believing that they can know a lot more than they actually can. This video is an argument in support of skepticism, agnosticism, intellectual humility.
have you ever seen the Truman show. Your life could also be a TV show and you don't even know it.
southpark123secret 10 months ago
Seriously??? A guy dressed in black with a small, scraggly beard?? Could you be in more stereotypical?? ...
PS: are you SURE we don't know anything....? Absolute skepticism is self-refuting
proffromgview 1 year ago
Also: my memories aren't mine :D I'm 2 hours old and everything before that has just been placed inside my mind.
Happypast 1 year ago
(Part 2 of 2) You need to work from a starting point of absolute certainty. It's popular to say that certainty is relative. This presents a logical anomaly though. The statement, "truth is relative", cannot be true. Computers hang when a logical anomaly occurs. Are we at a similar point in intellectual history? I don't know but enjoy exploring this inquiry like you and many of your commentors. Keep exploring. As for me, I am currently of the belief that certainty can be discovered once again.
ddowney157 1 year ago
Comment removed
ddowney157 1 year ago
(Part 1 of 2) You are using the brain in the vat as a mental exercise to demonstrate the skeptical method of thought. Yes, if that is the process you are using then ,you cannot refute the uncertainty of your existence. It is pointless to establish your method of argument on a hypthothetical. You have to work from irrefutable position. Descartes refuted everything but one. He knew he was a thinking being. From there he helped establish the modern intellectual tradition.
ddowney157 1 year ago
Brain in a Vat eh? Okay then who created the Super computer?
there's 2 awnsers, there's an endless line of super computers made one after another. (infinite regression) or there was one perfect entity that created it all to start the endless line of super computer engineers, either way brain in a vat is an allegory, and the chances of a literal old mad scientists who hooked you the the matrix is low, but where did he get that knowledge from?
BeamSurfer 1 year ago
whether it's true or not, it doesn't matter. like most philosophical problems, it doesn't really matter what you believe. life would still go on the way it does, whether it's actually a computer simulation, subjective or objective, it doesn't matter. someone who believes in free will, could act in the same way as someone who believes in determinism, and have the same lifestyle, none of these questions are practical, can't improve our understanding of the universe, nor can they make us happier.
occultologist 1 year ago
Omg I luv it! I learned that in a Semantics class its so interesting...I agree w u we just accept that we dont know. :-)
jenmarii 1 year ago
I'm confused! If we subscribe to the brain in a vat scenario doesn't that imply the presence of a higher intelligence than ourselves? The one who designed the super computer? and doesn't this then imply a creator? The one who creates the brains that go in the vat? Sorry if these questions are stupid it's the first time I've heard anything like this!
Emeeno 1 year ago
@Emeeno your thinking in too literal terms.
MGX890 1 year ago
The brain in a vat is nonsensical... but an interesting philosophical conundrum.
You say one cannot prove they are "not a brain in a vat". Well, that's true but its also true one cannot prove the non existence of anything.
If you continue down the road of the 'brain in a vat' type thinking, soon you will arrive at the door of, 'nothing exists'. (where the buddha arrived)
axel1million 1 year ago
this was a very good video. But i highly doubt we are a a brain
in a vatt. and if we were who would be in controll? Although we cannot proove anything, the one thing i do believe is that we do exist, wether we are dreaming or not, human beings are capable of thinking, therefore we exixt.
PAESRA 1 year ago
Hello Youtube,
Everyone who is reading this comment, please click on my username for my videos I made about the The Truth of the World. I have found out what the truth of life is, the truth of the world, and the truth of God. Please, I really want people to watch and listen what I have to say. No more living in false reality, no more living in illusions, no more thinking there is no way out......its time to lead your life into The Truth of the World!!!!!!!!!
I love our Lord!!! God bless!!
theseeker2k5 1 year ago
OMG at around 6:20 the douche shows he is smoking. He is such a phony, and I am pissed I wasted so much time on his shit.
bostongary 1 year ago
@bostongary
Its funny you say that " your pissed so of wasting so much of your time", then tell me why you seem to be responding to just about every comment left on his video? Are you his bitch or some frustrated little douche who can never keep nothing to himself?
detriplea 1 year ago
@detriplea I am your father Luke.
bostongary 1 year ago
How much weed did you smoke before the video you homo?
bostongary 1 year ago
I like the comments. Next time don't do it in the dark with a black shirt on your stupid cunt.
bostongary 1 year ago
imagine "god" however you wish to picture "it" did exist, now even god would ask him/her self these questions, god would question who it is, what it is, where it is, when it is, and why it is, also how it was created, which doesnt mean it ever was created. Its curious how "we" ask ourselves these same questions, and maybe these questions have and will never be answered. awsome vid.
aARIESsSs 1 year ago
So your conclusion is: The only absolute is that there is no absolute?
detriplea 2 years ago
@detriplea Wow. You are so very deep.
bostongary 1 year ago
This ghoulish dude--with a most unfortunate beard--recommending invocation of the brain in a vat skeptical hypothesis to "refute" any argument is fucking retarded. If anyone does this to you, take a slugger and refute their existence with the bat-in-a-brain hypothesis. And no, you cannot "prove that we can't know for certain whether or not we exist." Even if you were a brain in a vat, you are still a thinking thing and thus you, as a thinking thing, exist.
CavalierBizarre 2 years ago
@CavalierBizarre, like the typical youtube troll - you missed the point. I'm quite aware that it would be silly and pointless to try and use the "brain-in-a-vat" experiment for refuting various philosophical positions. Who said that? You did, not me. I stated that it was a thought experiment, like watching the matrix. That's it. No one said it should be taken seriously. I love when people base their entire judgments on something I never said. Now wander back to your cave, troll.
xx13moons 2 years ago
@CavalierBizarre, "I ask the viewers to indulge in a philosophical mind-experiment; known as the "brain-in-a-vat."
From the intro. Learn to read. Surely, most people who have ANY familiarity with philosophy will already have heard this argument before. I wasn't imagining that I was covering some new, foreign, philosophical landscape. It's a rehash, of rather old crap, for people who aren't that familiar with philosophical skepticism.
xx13moons 2 years ago
Hilary Putnam: "I am a brain in a vat."="I am actually having thoughts that are different from my thoughts"="Reality is actually not reality"
These are all self-refuting.
WSidis 2 years ago
I like this video, but would like to suggest that the brain in the vat scenario has a lot of problems when one considers ethical or moral situations. How, for example, should one respond to such challenges as disease or climate change, terrorism, corruption or when trying to gain evidence to prove/falsify relativity or evolution. Should we act (with our allegedly real bodies) as though these things exist or are true?
Can a brain in a vat suffer a stroke or senility? Is it made of cells?
mottiain 2 years ago
Thanks for the comment. All very good questions. But I wasn't really supposing that such a scenario (brain in vat) is actually true; it was a mere exercise in skepticism. I wouldn't suggest that people take such a worldview seriously; like you said, that could lead to nihilism, or insanity. I just try to point out the frail state of "knowledge." Whether or not life is "real" is rather irrelevant, actually - because we experience as if it is real; and that alone is reason enough to act, I think.
xx13moons 2 years ago
I think when anyone says that something can't be refuted, that's too rigid. Well, give me the benefit of the doubt and see if I can refute it or not. Pride and control has a way of creeping in and preventing breathing room for both people.
Well, I never said we should care, but if you want to learn and grow, you need caring to do it. If you want a better world you need to care. Caring is not a thing one demands, but caring is still essential. And remember to keep skepticism on a leash.
wonderwhaz797 2 years ago
We can be aware of what we think. After all, thought is always old, always the past. Thought is always the "known" So, we can be fully aware of everything we think of. The only thing we really can be certain of as being truth, is the truth in our practical knowledge as far as learning a language, making a chair, etc. Other than that, what do we know psychologically? I think life becomes meaningful when we're not searching for the meaning.
wonderwhaz797 2 years ago
I'm skeptical of the brain in the vat idea. If you think that way, then why care about anything at all? Kind of a strange video.
wonderwhaz797 2 years ago
@wonderwhaz797, I wouldn't say that I "think that way" all the time or anything. It's merely an exercise in skepticism. It works, and it can't be refuted. Why care about anything at all? I don't know, who ever said we should? Life is what it is, I'm just dissecting and analyzing it to the best of my ability. Who promised that life has to be "meaningful?" Truth isn't always pretty.
xx13moons 2 years ago
I think that Descartes managed to overcome what he called the 'dreaming' argument for scepticism, at least in terms of proving that something exists (i.e. my brain, at this very moment). However, he failed to get past that, as do any pure rationalist arguments- which is why philosophers such as Hume are so important. Descartes also really fucked himself with the 'evil demon' argument.
cubanoafuego 2 years ago
Descartes didn't overcome anything. His attempt at epistemological foundationalism could only refute the earlier laid out Cartesian skepticism by allegedly proving the existence of God, and, more specifically, using medieval notions of God. Of course, this is impossible, and Descartes finds himself the father of a proof laden with wacky, medieval deity behaviorisms and also a nasty circularity with regards to his idea of "clear and distinct perceptions."
CavalierBizarre 2 years ago
I loved the state of the art graphics ;)
I really think this question will be with us for eternity. We cannot answer it and I really doubt the science will arrive at a point that it could. I also don't believe that religion has or will discover the mysteries of it all. I think it's nice this way though... we need these challenges, at least I believe so. Having all the answers would be no fun.
tattooskin72 2 years ago
i'm fairly sure we exist, but i totally agree that we don't really know shit about anything. it's somewhat frightening at times.
holdenbane 2 years ago
I really liked your last bit about the consistency of science, whether or not we're brainz in teh vat
chessdawgz 2 years ago
......hmmmm
Even if we would only be brains connected to a computer, how could the person that connected the brain to the computer be sure that he too is not just a brain connected to a coputer and so on and on and on......
ferechi 2 years ago
lol... I suppose he couldn't, thus an ancient Taoist philosopher once compared life to a "dream within a dream within a dream." You awake from one dream only to be living in another..., it could go on forever, technically, hah.
xx13moons 2 years ago
Believe it or not, there are major world religions that are loosely based around this "brain-in-a-vat" type idea; Buddhism and Hinduism both assert that "reality" is essentially an illusion, and we need to wake up from it if we are to be "enlightened." Strange.
xx13moons 2 years ago
Hi xx13moons
It does not really matter if you are just a brain connected to a computer or really exist. What matters is the so called "reality" that you live in, because that is the "truth" of your life. If you hurt yourself you will feel pain. The information of pain is unplesant no matter if you are just a brain or a real person.
ferechi 2 years ago
You're right, I agree there. It doesn't matter. We experience what we experience regardless of whether it's real or not. My only point is that, given the brain-in-a-vat scenario, we shouldn't take our beliefs that seriously. Human beings have a great capacity for tricking themselves into believing that they can know a lot more than they actually can. This video is an argument in support of skepticism, agnosticism, intellectual humility.
xx13moons 2 years ago