Our empirical senses cannot be relied...

>our empirical senses cannot be relied, this entire existence you call reality might all just be an illusion you created for yourself
>therefore, the only thing that can indeed be said to exist is the precursor of these thoughts, ergo, your mind
How does one refute this?
It makes absolute perfect sense.

Even if the entirety of existence is merely an illusion conjured up by your own mind you can exert no real conscious control over it.
You will never be able to know if any possible brain in a jar scenario is true or false as the concept is pretty much unfalsifiable.
It offers no useful predictions and all other theories are still capable of making useful predictions that line up with this imaginary world.

You ultimately can't refute it but you can still choose to not care about its' possibility.

Also, God.
If a benevolent God exists, like that of Christianity, then reality as a whole also exists. It's the only way to escape Descartes' nightmare.

Both of the above replies.
/thread

How does one give a fuck about this rambling nonsense?

>my mind is the only think I'm sure exists

How does that help you in any way? How is that information useful? Why is that relevant? He's babbling about nothing. Fucking philosophy and theology are USELESS.

>If a benevolent God exists, like that of Christianity
That seems kind of arbitrary.

>How does one refute this?

What would refute it, in your opinion?

it isnt if you keep reading descartes. its pretty funny how much of his thinking is used by materialists with complete disregard for everything he said about god.

Even an illusion is something.

Plebian here
Same way like i got over my existentional crisis. All we got is this world, and what we see around us, it makes everything that matters to us. We will die in few years and in a century nobody will even remember us. We got the cards and its up to us what we want to do with them. No point crying about now knowing what package they came from or about the room we are sitting in, our world is only those cards.

Th-thanks for the utilitarian dogma

>therefore, the only thing that can indeed be said to exist is the precursor of these thoughts, ergo, your mind

How do you prove these exist? If you think you can merely rationalise it, how do you know you're not wrong?

Can't kno nuffin

Because if you take that logic, you can't even say that your mind exists, only that the one specific thought occurring at any one instant does. There doesn't need to actually be anything actually experiencing or producing the thought.

It's not a useful way to operate, so instead of refuting it you just acknowledge it and move onto learning more about the "simulation", which is much more interesting.

>"proving" shit with riddles and word games

Philosophy everybody.

>your mind proves it exists by thinking so

>schitzophrenics thinking 3 men with baseball bats standing outside their bedroom door exists

it must exist then

Fuck off Locke

Maybe because the only reason for him to put God in the middle is avoiding the inquisition's butthurted rants

t. Locke

>logic is riddles and word games
I understand that autism makes grasping concepts like these hard, but you could at least try

It proves it exists by thinking period.

If our senses cannot be relied upon because the brain (?) might 'fake' sensations, why couldn't it 'fake' the mind as well?

Why does thinking necessitate existence?

>the only thing that can indeed be said to exist is the precursor of these thoughts
Nah, I have no memory of a time before things other than myself didn't exist. I can't say that my mind is a precursor to anything.

Thinking requires mind? Can you substantiate your claim?

Anyway, I advance another claim: mind requires a material brain. I'm taking this as an axiom for my system of belief, without further evidence. The difference between my materialism (suppose dualism could work as well) and your idealism is that I can actually get something useful from my system: new drugs, artificial neural networks, diagnoses, etc.

What about the precursors to the mind.

Evolution is true.

Humans have only existed for a short time on the universal scale.

Therefore humans minds have not always existed.

And this would imply that the mind is dynamic rather than static (on this scale at least).

You take the "I" for granted. There are no grounds for this presupposition if we are truly to doubt everything. All that can be said is "There are thoughts". HA!

There's an above I. The part that is aware of its own awareness. The part when we look at ourselves and say, 'why do I want this,' and 'why am I this way?'.

Many misunderstand Descartes logic. It is:
1. I doubt my existence.
2. To doubt I have to think.
3. There must be someone there to do the thinking, else 1 and 2 would not apply.
4. I have to first exist in order to think.
5. I think, therefore, I am.

The definition of human has also changed, and continues to change, gradually. So yes, I agree.

>"mind requires a material brain."
At the moment, yes, although I speculate as to whether it will be possible to simulate a machine to the point of simulating a physical brain. Imagine, for a moment, a computer program containing and replicating a brain, in electronic format. The idea of millions of minds in a computer is frightening. Although I recognize this pertains more to simulation theory/quantum computing.

>I think therefore I am
>I think
>I

found your problem, kiddo.

In all seriousness, some people with ASDs have an entirely different neural framework. Thoughts, for instance, might take a different route through the brain than ordinarily. This gives many an unusual or unique perspective. Furthermore some have exceptional logic.

I have Aspergers and majored in philosophy, and yes, that will be of some use (looking at law and writing).

You've just expanded "ITTIA" without proving anything. You begin with doubt implies think, so effectively begin with "I think". Then you argue that since "I think", there must be an "I" thinking. There must be an "I" thinking in "I think" because the statement "I think" is true. This is surely circular logic? it's a mess anyhow.

G O D

>possible to simulate a machine to the point of simulating a physical brain
Then it would be a mechanical or electronic brain. By physical I meant something made of matter, not necessarily something fleshy. Distribution of electrons across a silicone chip is still a physical thing, whatever.

That wasn't related to my central point at all, but never-mind this if you just felt like talking about that.

Yea pretty much

actually this idea first comes from Augustine.

go home Poopper pls

Because your mind might also be an illusion from an external source. You can't rely on your own thoughts to be independent much the same as your senses cannot be relied on.