'I think, therefore I am'

[sofyst]

I have been in a discussion with an Atheist friend. And have boiled it down to a question that has plagued me for a while. If any here would be utterly truthful they would recognize that even their knowledge requires some amount of faith. I know that the word is so shunned among some and so despised by others based upon the evil religious connotations that it reeks of. Yet one must recognize that faith is simply belief, and believing is knowing.

What my question is, is this. I can see an object in front of me. Let us say this cup of chai. Now I can taste the chai, see the chai, touch the cup and smell the divine odor. I can sense all these things about the chai. Yet how do I know that I am not somehow being decieved? How do I know that although I feel the cup and see the liquid that it is not really something else that only tastes and smells like chai? And even then, how do I know that I am truly touching and seeing and that somehow my eyes and hands are not somehow being manipulated into these particular sensations?

I know it was Descartes who said 'I think therefore I am'. That is not my question. I understand that I think I see the chai, and I think I smell the chai therefore I really am in existance. I do not doubt that I exist, however I do doubt whether or not the existance which I 'believe' I am experiencing is what I truly am experiencing. How do I know I am not some brain within a jar somewhere that is being manipulated into thinking that these sensations are true? When in all reality the only sensation I should be feeling is none at all as I do not have the extremities to sense these sensations (eyes, hands, nose, ears).

I think this is a question that can plague both Christian and non-Christian alike. I do not think that being a Christian will help the matter any more. Because as a Christian I think I experience the moving of God. The question becomes even more complicated because now I must question whether in fact I really do feel the Spirit of God or whether I am being manipulated into sensing this.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[scorpia]

I'm afraid I don't know how to answer this question. Instead, if it okay, I'd like to ask my own questions with this subject;

If there's a brain in a jar that is being manipulated, why stop at decieving what you see? What if it's who you are that is being manipulated? 'I think therefore I am.' But what am I? Am I a soul? Am I an organic circuit and all my thoughts, everything that makes me me, simply nerve cells wired together? Considering the latter; If I were simply nerve cells, what if someone tweaked them to alter not my perception but who I was? What if someone had that power? I'd feel violated, but then again, I'd be tricked into believing that I wasn't violated, so I couldn't possibly feel that, so I'd feel okay.

And considering this, I begin to feel afraid. No-one of course has that power and I can believe it may be unlikely. But I'm afraid that's a power that people hunger for. I'm afraid no-one can accept who I am and would do all in their power to change me, my beliefs, my likes and dislikes, etc. until I am simply a duplicate of their thoughts. What if someone already did that?

Then again, what else would I be, other than my body and the memories I have collected during my lifetime? Take away the two of these and what is there left of me?

Sorry but this has bugged me somewhat maybe I should take this to 'Random ramblings?'

[sofyst]

I think that the question somewhat coincides with my questioning on the subject. I think there is an answer, yet I think we just have not found (we being Scorpia and I especially).

[bernee51]

I think that the question somewhat coincides with my questioning on the subject. I think there is an answer, yet I think we just have not found (we being Scorpia and I especially).

This idea of the self and what is it is discussed in depth in Vedantic Philosophy.

Are you aware of yourself at this moment?

If ask you..."Who am I?", you will most likely begin to describe yourself - I are a man, woman, friend, lover, etc. I can list likes and dislikes, what drives me, what upsets me and so on. I could list all the things I know about myself. All these things, however, are objects in my awareness - they parade past like images on a screen. These are things I know aboutmyself - not the real self. The really interesting question for me is "who is doing the describing?" Who is the Seer? Who or what is this observing self?

[ST88]

What my question is, is this. I can see an object in front of me. Let us say this cup of chai. Now I can taste the chai, see the chai, touch the cup and smell the divine odor. I can sense all these things about the chai. Yet how do I know that I am not somehow being decieved? How do I know that although I feel the cup and see the liquid that it is not really something else that only tastes and smells like chai? And even then, how do I know that I am truly touching and seeing and that somehow my eyes and hands are not somehow being manipulated into these particular sensations?

In a philosophical sense, if you have the ability to ask such questions, then you will never know the answers. In a practical sense, does it matter? Every time you are presented with the chai, assuming it is the same formula and you are in reasonably good health, it will appear almost exactly the same every time. Either your manipulator is exquisitely consistent or you are an actual physical perceptor of the universe. Even then, it is possible to be suspicious that you are not a brain in a jar because you realize that it is not completely the same every time -- sometimes the chai is too sweet, sometimes it is too hot, too spicy, etc. You make these judgments based on your perceptions and even ask other people if they find that the same thing is true.

But does it really matter if you are that brain in the jar? If you find this out somehow, on a practical level, what are you going to do about it? This illusion of a world we live in has its own punishments and rewards and we can experience it as if it were "real". What's the difference?

To take it a bit further, how do you know you're not dreaming right now?

[sofyst]

I know I am not dreaming right now because in a few minutes I will lie down in my bed and dream. And given the very idea of dreaming I do not think it possible to dream while in a dream. Yet I must roll this thought around within my mind a little more to see if it is true. If it is, I may be able to take these question and use it to answer my other...

I undestand your distinction between what is practical and what is philosophical. I am not a very practical guy, very simple, very philosophical. I understand the practical nature of things, I understand that it matters not whether I can understand what exactly eternity is, yet I still want to know the answer.

Some people are gifted (cursed?) with the ability to simply forget about something if it is not practically significant. Others are cursed (gifted?) with the haunting plague of having to know the why's and how's, even if this knowledge will make absolutely no difference within their lives at all.

I must think more on your comments regarding the differences in the different cups of chai, given at different times. That is very interesting and I had never thought to consider that while considering the other things. Thank you.

[scorpia]

In a practical sense, does it matter? Every time you are presented with the chai, assuming it is the same formula and you are in reasonably good health, it will appear almost exactly the same every time. Either your manipulator is exquisitely consistent or you are an actual physical perceptor of the universe.

Perhaps, perhaps................

But then, if it doesn't matter whether or not you are brain in a jar where some other being is giving all these sensations, would that apply to other beings controlling you? If they were controlling you in a similar manner, would it matter?

The predestination argument pops up again and again because free will is apparently absent if another knows your fate. Now some other being is controlling what you feel, what you see, and what you will see tommorow, and you say 'does it matter?' Then again, it may or may not. You seem more experienced than I, but I didn't expect that.

Anyway, if it's 'does it matter' for knowing whether or not your world is real, what of yourself. Does it matter who you are?

Are you aware of yourself at this moment?

Not until you asked me

All these things, however, are objects in my awareness - they parade past like images on a screen. These are things I know aboutmyself - not the real self. The really interesting question for me is "who is doing the describing?" Who is the Seer? Who or what is this observing self?

That's what I'd like to know.

[bernee51]

All these things, however, are objects in my awareness - they parade past like images on a screen. These are things I know aboutmyself - not the real self. The really interesting question for me is "who is doing the describing?" Who is the Seer? Who or what is this observing self?

That's what I'd like to know.

Wouldn't we all...

Here is a little of what I understand (and it is very little )

This Witness to ourselves is something 'mystics' east and west have pondered for millennia. Thoughts on this go back to ancient Vedic texts.

Are you the same Scorpia you were yesterday? Last year? Ten years ago? I mean would you describe yourself as the same now? I would guess not - all of us change over time - physically, mentally, emotionally and so on. These descriptions also set up a duality, a subject/object relationship. i.e. I am a {insert descriptor}

However - the Witness to these changes, the One describing is said to be the same over time and space. It is not describable in and of itself because it is non-dual. It is eternal and unchanging. It exists in you and in me and every salient creature given to self enquiry. In ancient Vedic texts it is known as Brahman. The Void, the Cosmic Conciousness, the Godhead.

It, perhaps, is the source of all god myths. We (our ego, our concious interface with what we see as reality) sense there is something there and we call it 'god'. The whole idea of a Void, of Nothingness is a pretty scary idea - we fill that void with the mythologies of religion. It gives some permanance to an otherwise impermanent existence.

It is an intersting topic - one that has engaged many for entire life times.

A good place to start, from the perspective of eastern philosophy is with Sri Ramana Maharshi. In the west, in recent times, an American by the name of Ken Wilber has written extensively on the topic.

[Corvus]

In a practical sense, does it matter? Every time you are presented with the chai, assuming it is the same formula and you are in reasonably good health, it will appear almost exactly the same every time. Either your manipulator is exquisitely consistent or you are an actual physical perceptor of the universe.

Perhaps, perhaps................

But then, if it doesn't matter whether or not you are brain in a jar where some other being is giving all these sensations, would that apply to other beings controlling you? If they were controlling you in a similar manner, would it matter?

Whether things matter or not is something for sentient beings to decide. There is no property of objects that we can define as the state of "mattering" and "not mattering". As in ethics, which are important because they affect me as a human, and not because life is somehow sacred or humans somehow special, I can only say things matter because of my relation to those things. As a rosebush, I would be very concerned about humans snipping off my genitalia (flowers).

The predestination argument pops up again and again because free will is apparently absent if another knows your fate.

Free will is absent if a a fate exists at all.

Now some other being is controlling what you feel, what you see, and what you will see tommorow, and you say 'does it matter?' Then again, it may or may not. You seem more experienced than I, but I didn't expect that.

But think, any concern about your predetermined actions has already been given to you by this being. Either way, there is nothing that can be done. One can either enjoy one's externally controlled or self controlled life .. or decide to ponder such questions as "is it through my own volition that I am pondering such questions".

In reality, free will is never truly free. It is constrained by numerous factors, such as what situation is presented to me at a particular moment in time. Though I can behave in many ways at any moment in time, the way I behave is always informed by the structure of my brain and how I have been taught to behave, or been inspired to teach myself. My behaviour is also constrained by physics. I cannot fly to the moon, or travel through a door, and because of this, I can never do anything I want.

Anyway, if it's 'does it matter' for knowing whether or not your world is real, what of yourself. Does it matter who you are?

I am me. ST88 is ST88. I have never understood self-discovery. I am my self; what is there to discover?

*Edited horrible grammar

[Corvus]

What my question is, is this. I can see an object in front of me. Let us say this cup of chai. Now I can taste the chai, see the chai, touch the cup and smell the divine odor. I can sense all these things about the chai. Yet how do I know that I am not somehow being decieved? How do I know that although I feel the cup and see the liquid that it is not really something else that only tastes and smells like chai?

I do not know what chai is, so perhaps the chai does not exist. But I think this is a bad example. Chai is a label for something that looks, tastes and goes down like chai, probably made from something that in turn looks, feels and tastes like whatever that particular label looks feels or tastes like. Saying chai isn't chai is like making a chair, calling it a chair, then asking yourself how do you know it really is a chair.

I know it was Descartes who said 'I think therefore I am'. That is not my question. I understand that I think I see the chai, and I think I smell the chai therefore I really am in existance. I do not doubt that I exist, however I do doubt whether or not the existance which I 'believe' I am experiencing is what I truly am experiencing. How do I know I am not some brain within a jar somewhere that is being manipulated into thinking that these sensations are true? When in all reality the only sensation I should be feeling is none at all as I do not have the extremities to sense these sensations (eyes, hands, nose, ears).

A particular amusing anecdote from the Devil's Dictionary seems singularly apt here, and points somewhat to the absurdity I feel is a part of this and many other philosophical debates. No offense intended, as I do love participating in them:

"CARTESIAN, adj.
Relating to Descartes, a famous philosopher, author of the celebrated dictum, Cogito ergo sum -- whereby he was pleased to suppose he demonstrated the reality of human existence. The dictum might be improved, however, thus: Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum -- "I think that I think, therefore I think that I am;" as close an approach to certainty as any philosopher has yet made."

I think I feel this is mainly a problem about labels. If you Are Not, the chai is still chai, the chair is still a chair, the sensations are still the same sensations, because those words are just labels used to describe what recurringly happens, but "you" just "misunderstood" what was going on behind the scenes. But since the problem of "you" and "misunderstanding" does not really exist in the scenario, since "you" Are Not, and thought does not exist, then it's a pointless piece of pondering.