Nor am I saying that you presume solipsism, but that it is a consequence of the presumed primacy of experience. — Banno

I would argue otherwise. Solipsism is a massive leap of faith more than realism and violates Occam's Razor.

When you take first-person phenomena - observation - as your starting point, including others becomes problematic, as it seems you have found.

But instead, if one starts with the world as a collaborative construction from its contents, that there are other folk is not problematic.

So i'm suggesting that a reliance on phenomenology leads to solipsism. — Banno

Again you misunderstand just like with the Wigner's friend experiment.

I'm not saying I start from solipsism because I don't believe in it. Solipsism is pure belief, not fact. Starting from first-person phenomenon doesn't make including others problematic. Quite the opposite in fact as it's a more expedient explanation than why everything is the way it is and why others like you are around, etc etc. In short NO, starting from a first person perspective including others doesn't become problematic, and no I didn't find that. Where did I ever say that?

But like I said that's not my starting point, I'm just about about what the guy I linked to's logic leads to.

Still supports my original point of view as what he is arguing for is still essentially solipsism.

Even arguing that your phenomena are noumena is just wrong. All you have is sense experience with no way to truly verify it thus making the external world (or the lack of one) belief only. It's the one thing I despise about it.

But again it's still just more misunderstandings about quantum physics and in the end trying to cop out of solipsism which his words support with an argument that is just wrong.

So no, his words still back that he is suggesting others aren't real. If you read through it all you'll see he doesn't really say otherwise, just mentions "under this view X would be wrong" but that doesn't make the view true nor does that invalidate his previous points or post.

You say I lack subtlety but I think at this point you're just digging and running into the same issues of trying to get him to say other that what he is clearly implying. Sometimes things just are what they appear.

I don't start at solipsism, I don't believe it. I'm just saying what words like that lead to.

A simulation isn't reality so if everything is a simulation then it therefor would not be real and by extension not matter.

It's why I dont get why folks would refer to others as a useful ficiton.

I don't lack subtlety but there is nothing in his quote to imply what you're suggesting. How can referring to other people as a useful fiction for purposes of navigation mean anything other than implying that they aren't real. When you call something a fiction you either imply it's not real or are pretending as such for some other purpose. But in either instance it's acknowledging that it isn't real hence calling it fiction.

By no definition of the word fiction is your interpretation supported. It's tacking on too many things that aren't supported by it.

Yes. We are all in this story together. — T Clark

Not according to him.

Except he is imputing reality or existence to such things by suggesting them to be a useful fiction, your interpretation doesn't follow from his words. The only conclusion he is getting at is others aren't real hence why regarding their existence is a useful fiction. You're reading what isn't there into his words.

Then there is stuff on quantum monism that he clearly doesn't understand (in fact I don't think he even understands it at all) since quantum monism is a form of quantum realism not either or. Though thats all I understood from the bottom link.

https://platofootnote.wordpress.com/2016/10/11/the-problem-of-wave-function-ontology/#:~:text=There%20are%20two%20types%20of,level%20is%20a%20field%20in

It should also be noted that the many worlds view of QM he seems to be favoring is a minority view.

You're making it more complex than it needs to be. To refer to something as fiction is by definition to say it's not real. So when he's saying that the notion of other people is a useful fiction is implying that they aren't real. Read what he said.

https://qr.ae/pvepjo

Yes because saying other people being a convenient fiction is saying they don't exist which is what the guy in the thing was saying when I copied the link,

To say that other people is a useful fiction is not to say others or the self (since we are all in that fictive sense other people) are not real, and is no different than saying the self or any identity is a useful fiction; so what's the problem? — Janus

It is EXACTLY saying that others are not real by suggesting they are a fiction in the first place.

No not at all. It's just regarding other people as not real rubs me the wrong way.

No the link shows he did mean it

What I don't get is how someone can refer to other people as a useful fiction?

https://qr.ae/pvepjo

From the scientists who do this "real and not real" shows a misunderstanding of QM. It doesn't say nothing is real.

There is no way to dumb it down any more.

A quick google search literally shows you wrong.

Same page as the first guy though I think his was taken down.

So quantum tunnelling ain't quantum physics. You learn something new everyday. :roll: — apokrisis

Biological processes take place at a level above that which quantum physics operates hence quantum physics has nothing to offer in the realm of biology. Even googling biophysics shows it doesn't deal with quantum physics.

Also that paper you cited doesn't mention tunneling. It just thinks there is evidence for it but doesn't prove it.

Like I said, not sure what you're smoking.

... and yet still agreeing that if they swapped places then they would also swap observations. The one would see the spoon, the other the fork.

Ok, you missed the point. Not my problem. — Banno

Again, no. that's not what's being said here. You're just not getting it. We are TALKING ABOUT a SPOON being seen by one person while ANOTHER PERSON is looking at the same object but seeing a FORK and BOTH being RIGHT. That's the analogy. You're making this harder than it has to be.

More what if nonsense.

Quantum physics says something more, that the real-unreal dichotomy is old, outdated, and useless. — Agent Smith

Not really.

I think you might agree with this take I found:

No, it hasn’t proven that, and even when it’s talked about you have to twist your use of the word “reality.” What is reality? I think it’s the sum total of all of our collective conscious experiences. No more and no less. How that reality is “implemented” is really of little consequence.

In the movie The Matrix Neo points out a Asian restaurant inside the Matrix that he’d previously patronized, noted that they had great noodles, and said “I have all these memories. They never happened.” I completely disagree. He had those experiences, and furthermore he shared them with other living thinking human beings (who were also in the Matrix, but that’s not the point). He didn’t dream them in isolation from other humans. So they happened. If a man and woman fell in love in the Matrix, would they be less in love because of meeting inside a simulation? I don’t think so at all.

Physicists say the universe is comprised of quantum fields, among which quanta of energy move back and forth. But they don’t say, or even try to say, what a quantum field is. They just presume such fields exist and describe their interactions. They’ve built a model that we can use to make predictions, which in many cases can be extremely accurate. But there is absolutely no way to know what that model actually is or how it works.

A big debate along these lines today (which I don’t think is even a scientific debate, because science can’t actually answer the question) is whether reality is “materialist” (i.e., made of physical matter and energy from which our minds arise via the laws of physics) or “idealist” (our minds are fundamental and our interactions create our perception of physical things). Does it even matter? The point is that you and I are self-aware and we consciously experience events and interactions with one another (well, not you and me specifically, but you know what I mean).

Usually when someone says there is no objective reality they are professing a position of idealism, the second of the two positions I outlined above. But as I said, I think it’s an empty claim. Reality is what we experience.

Stay safe and well!

Kip

Though I don't get this one:

[Subjective reality is a local perspective adapting to context. This is complementarity in QM. Each causal relation resulting in a contextual interaction is objective. This is a condition to be a valid complement in QM. The generalization of all local positions and contexts is also objective. The shift from local subjective to general objective is split by uncertainty principle.

When you understand Copenhagen Interpretation correctly, questions like this do not occur. They become the play things of those who haven't graduated from philosophy to empirical reality./quote]

Yeah, it is. One fork. Left, right.

You haven't made a case for a difference, which leaves the suspicion that you only wish to hide your views behind QM verbosity. — Banno

Again, no. This isn't difference. It's the same object. I explained what I meant with my example. In this case it would be like two people observing and one saying they see a fork and another a spoon. It's not just a simple position change but something entirely different.

Get it through your head.

Not sure what you're smoking but those studies don't prove your claim, especially the second one.

To reiterate, it's not quantum physics. Again Biophysics isn't quantum physics.

What? They are how we can even derive counterfactuals to test. They are the axiomatic basis of truth claims. — apokrisis

Uhh no they aren't. Metaphysical claims don't have truth values, they are all unfalsifiable and have no impact on reality.

Have you studied biophysics? — apokrisis

A little, but again that's not quantum physics. Doesn't apply here.

Again, no not even close. Your case isn't different responses to the same thing. I'm talking about seeing a spoon where you see a fork.

Like I said not even close.

If by "real" you are referring to counterfactual definiteness then Bell's theorem says that either counterfactual definiteness or locality (no "spooky action at a distance") are false.

The Nobel Prize in Physics is being awarded this year to three scientists who have shown locality to be false.

I don't yet know of any experiments that have shown counterfactual definiteness to be false. — Michael

What does any of that mean?

But your body and brain depend on being able to harness quantum chemistry. Life and mind start at the quasi-classical nanoscale of molecular machines where proteins can beat the classical odds by employing quantum tricks.

So without the ability to harness things like quantum tunneling, enzymes and respiratory chains wouldn’t work. Photosynthesis wouldn’t exist. Sensory receptors would be impossible.

I think you are just too dismissive of the quantum realm. It is how there could even be the classical realm as its “other”.

It is crazy that nature even exists in one form. It is doubly crazy that a second form hatches emergently from that. It is triply crazy that even the quantum form has to be emergent - or at least that is an implication of the success of quantum field theory.

So stand back and marvel of all that we have discovered - some of it only very recently. — apokrisis

Don't think that's how it works. None of that is crazy and it sounds like you're misrepresenting quantum mechanics. The stuff that's crazy only applies at that level. It doesn't apply to our level, hence why it's crazy.

Why?

Sitting opposite each other at table, you see the fork on the left, I see it on the right.

Are you saying that because we see it differently, there is no "objective" statement as to the position of the fork?

But that's not right. — Banno

That's not what it means. The point is that we are both seeing the fork and can confer it objectively exists. That's what it means to be objective, no matter what side you're sitting on. What you are referring to isn't even in the ballpark of what I mean as it is still objective.

The point of the Wigner's Friend is that both can see the different responses to the same thing and be right, meaning we aren't seeing the same thing yet aren't wrong, at least on the quantum stage not the macro stage.

Your example doesn't come close.

Actually it does require we all see the same thing hence why Wigner's Friend threatens objectivity.

Who?

I'm just going by what the links say. At some point it seems like QM drifts into philosophy with how weird stuff gets after a certain level, as shown in this experiment.

https://qr.ae/pveiQl

Though to be fair the post also says it says nothing new about QM and in the previous experiments like it (and including this one) we can't draw any hard conclusions. But that won't stop sensationalist titles from emerging.

Actually they are when it comes to quantum physics.

Not anymore, not with the Wigner's friend experiment evidently. Now science and philosophy are becoming one and the same or at least blending.

Did you read what he said about the experiment and how it invites questions about our reality.

Not really. Kastrup is very clear it is not solipsism and it certainly doesn't read this way to me. But you need to read the full account. I know some people share your view, but I don't see solipsism at all - just as others can't see anything but solipsism.

The clue is in the notion of universal mind. All of reality is held by this mind and you and all beings are 'dissociated alters' of this one great cosmic consciousness. Solipsism by contrast is the argument that only you exist. For Kastrup and perhaps Schopenhauer, it would be closer to say you don't really exist, so solipsism isn't even on the table. — Tom Storm

I'm aware of his argument. I join the forum that was linked from his website, but when I started arguing how their line of reasoning inevitably leads to solipsism none of them could give a good argument as to why it's not. IMO the guy is too stupid to really understand the conclusions his view leads to.

Kastrup just speculates something he cannot validate, a universal mind. Not to mention badly butchering quantum mechanics by thinking consciousness is involved at all.

Idealism inevitably leads to solipsism. Berkley couldn't escape it and neither did Kastrup.

So what about the Wigner's friend experiment.

https://qr.ae/pveiQl

I read through his stuff and all his thoughts inevitably lead to solipsism the same way that idealism does. Like you have to have MAJOR cognitive dissonance to say idealism doesn't lead to solipsism.

You don't just have my word, you have my argument, which I've made over my past posts on this thread. The heart of that argument is that the question of what reality is and whether or not objective reality exists is not a scientific question, it is a metaphysical, i.e. a philosophical, one. The answer to the question is in philosophy, not science. Scientists are not generally very good metaphysicians.

There's not much more I can say. If you don't get it or you disagree, there's no place else for this conversation to go.

Also - note the poster in the second Quora link you provided agrees with my position, although Quora is not generally considered an authoritative source. You'll find all sorts of inconsistencies and disagreements there. — T Clark

Which link was that one?

Are you serious or sarcastic right now? I think solipsism being true would be the end of any sort of science.