Prove your existence.

[Callate]

I can correctly answer a captcha, therefore, I am.

 

[Realitycrash]

I have decided you are all fragments of my imagination. Prove to me that you aren't. Prove to me you exist.

These are two different questions.

I clearly exist. If you understand "I" in this context as being the indexical device that points to the origin of this particular statement, then in order for the statement to be meaningful, "I" must refer. You perfectly well understand the statement, because even if "I" is just the same as "you" in this post, it still has a direct referent. So "I" successfully refers, and hence "there exists x such that 'I' in the context of a post made under the user title "Indeterminacy" refers to x" is made true.

What your first question is asking, however, is about the identity conditions for being "me". And in fact, it is perfectly legitimate to think that the identity conditions for being "me" are identical to those of being anyone else, or could be identical with some fictional entity you've created to make sense of the data you encounter.

However, here is an argument to suggest that if this is what you think, you're necessarily equivocating:

Let us suppose that you are just a brain in a vat. You are fed sensory stimuli directly by an electrical connection to a computer simulation. Now, suppose this brain in a vat responds to an item of sensory stimulus by thinking the phrase "That is a tree".

Does "The Tree" really exist? Is "The Tree" merely the construct of a computer program? Well, let's ask something. What do you refer to when you say "that is a tree"? You clearly don't refer to actual trees, since you've never seen an actual tree. You also don't consciously refer to "a particular series of computer generated images fed directly into my brain", because actually, the computer doesn't feed to you the fact that you are just a brain in a vat.

Wrong. It doesn't matter if he has seen an "actual" tree or not, as long as he believes that the tree is real. You and I never see "actual" trees when we go outside. All we see is sensory-data interpreted as "this is a tree". What he sees and experiences in the vat is as a real as what we see and experience on the outside. So he is actually refering to "actual trees", in as much sense as you and I do it.
Whether this affects your conclusion or not..Eh, too tired of calculate on. Just thought I'd point it out.

 

[Spartan448]

Why don't you prove your existance to ME? For I am Q, Omnipotent. Able to bend reality to my very WILL! So why don't you tell my why you aren't a simple snow leopard?

(For those of you who dont know, Q, a character from Star Trek: TNG, and making a partial appearance in Voyager, was a member of an omnipotent race of beings who could bend the very fabric of reality to their will, often posing a huge obstacle for the crew of the Enterprise-D and the Voyager. He is also the most annoying being in the known and unknown universe. In Star Trek Online, occasionally his son will apear in the major faction HQs and quiz people, and if they get the questions right, they get epic loot, and if they get the questions wrong, they get turned into Targs that are still somehow able to use Phaser Rifles.)

 

[Guardian of Nekops]

Cogito ergo Sum doesn't necessarily prove that YOU exist, just that SOMEONE (something?) exists.
Nothing says that those thoughts in your head that you seem to controll doesn't belong to someone else, and you are just a part of this somoene/something.

Well, the idea is that if you have sufficient agency to think, then you do in fact exist. It doesn't say that what you consider to be you is all that there is to you, but provided there are actually thoughts in your head as opposed to actions with thoughts assumed to be there from the outside proves that something, at least part of which considers itself to be you, exists.

As opposed to, say, AI opponents from a game like Contra that might appear to have agency but in reality make no choices. They don't think they make choices, either, because they don't think. If you even believe you have choices, if you can even understand the idea of believing that you have choices, and debate with yourself about whether or not you do, then you exist to some degree.

It's still completely possible that everything you know is wrong and that you're actually just a bump on Cthulu's back, but congratulations! At least there is a 'you' to be wrong.

 

[Vykrel]

I think, therefore I am.

or something like that

 

[Realitycrash]

Cogito ergo Sum doesn't necessarily prove that YOU exist, just that SOMEONE (something?) exists.
Nothing says that those thoughts in your head that you seem to controll doesn't belong to someone else, and you are just a part of this somoene/something.

Well, the idea is that if you have sufficient agency to think, then you do in fact exist. It doesn't say that what you consider to be you is all that there is to you, but provided there are actually thoughts in your head as opposed to actions with thoughts assumed to be there from the outside proves that something, at least part of which considers itself to be you, exists.

As opposed to, say, AI opponents from a game like Contra that might appear to have agency but in reality make no choices. They don't think they make choices, either, because they don't think. If you even believe you have choices, if you can even understand the idea of believing that you have choices, and debate with yourself about whether or not you do, then you exist to some degree.

It's still completely possible that everything you know is wrong and that you're actually just a bump on Cthulu's back, but congratulations! At least there is a 'you' to be wrong.

Yeah, as in; Something is there. "I" might just be a subconciouse thought of the dreaming Cthulhu. To some degree, something exists. That wasn't what Descartes set out to prove, though..Nor does it prove to the OP that we aren't part of his fantasy.

 

[Indeterminacy]

... as long as he believes that the tree is real. ... What he sees and experiences in the vat is as a real as what we see and experience on the outside...

You're right that this is the way that most people reject the kind of reasoning I've just used.

I think this is because "Reality" is itself a notion that has no sensible interpretation outwith the illusion or simulation, but that people have rigged to try (and inevitably fail) to impart such an interpretation.

Asking "is it really there" is just asking "is it there" with either emphasis or to try to force someone else to adopt one's own metaphysics. It's a necessarily deceptive notion, and one that has no place in structured philosophy.

 

[Realitycrash]

... as long as he believes that the tree is real. ... What he sees and experiences in the vat is as a real as what we see and experience on the outside...

Asking "is it really there" is just asking "is it there" with either emphasis or to try to force someone else to adopt one's own metaphysics. It's a necessarily deceptive notion, and one that has no place in structured philosophy.

Funny, Immanuel Kant would disagree with out, and so would I. There's a whole branch of metaphysics dedicated to this sort of quandry, you know.
Still, it's beside the point, for the OP asked the question "prove that you are really there". And we chose to play along.

 

[CulixCupric]

     
"I dreamed I was a butterfly, flitting around in the sky; then I awoke. Now I wonder: Am I a man who dreamt of being a butterfly, or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man?" -Chuang tzu-

I have decided you are all fragments of my imagination. Prove to me that you aren't. Prove to me you exist. I am easily persuaded .

(i am not looking for pictures ,names , numbers or anything of the like. How does one prove their existance or the existance of others?)

so, you realize this is the basis of Scientology.

But Descartes: "I think therefore, i am."

I think. there's my proof.

 

[Screamarie]

I don't have to prove anything to a figment of MY imagination. You no longer exist if I say so, so nyahh

 

[Xanadu84]

Prove to ME. Me. The question itself assumes the existence of a you. Therefore, for the question to be asked in the first place, and not be a nonsensical jumble of words, there has to be a you. The form of that you could very well be a butterfly dreaming of being a man dreaming of being a monster truck, but there still is a< "You" in some form.

As for proving that there is a me, there are 2 answers, the philosophical and the real. The philosophical answer is that one can't prove that anything except the self exists. The real answer is that if you assume I don't exist, this conversation is going to be very shitty, and you in general will get bored of being the only thing that exists real quick.

 

[viking97]

i must exist because you are asking me a question. for me to answer a question i must think, and to think means at least my mind exists. if i am a figment of your imagination then i essentially am you, and you obviously exist because cogito ergo sum, therefore i still exist.

QED

 

[viking97]

I think and therefore I am.

You on the other hand are a bot.

Cogito ergo Sum doesn't necessarily prove that YOU exist, just that SOMEONE (something?) exists.
Nothing says that those thoughts in your head that you seem to controll doesn't belong to someone else, and you are just a part of this somoene/something.

for the purposes of cogito ergo sum, the person doing the thinking shall be referred to as I

 

[Realitycrash]

I think and therefore I am.

You on the other hand are a bot.

Cogito ergo Sum doesn't necessarily prove that YOU exist, just that SOMEONE (something?) exists.
Nothing says that those thoughts in your head that you seem to controll doesn't belong to someone else, and you are just a part of this somoene/something.

for the purposes of cogito ergo sum, the person doing the thinking shall be referred to as I

That person might as well be the emperor of Japan, Cthuhlu, or the solipcist that started this thread. Nothing says that it must be Ravensheart18.

 

[Realitycrash]

i must exist because you are asking me a question. for me to answer a question i must think, and to think means at least my mind exists. if i am a figment of your imagination then i essentially am you, and you obviously exist because cogito ergo sum, therefore i still exist.

QED

By your logic, all hallucinations that speak also think.

 

[viking97]

i must exist because you are asking me a question. for me to answer a question i must think, and to think means at least my mind exists. if i am a figment of your imagination then i essentially am you, and you obviously exist because cogito ergo sum, therefore i still exist.

QED

By your logic, all hallucinations that speak also think.

yes, i was thinking about this shortly after posting. i was hoping nobody would notice.

 

[viking97]

I think and therefore I am.

You on the other hand are a bot.

Cogito ergo Sum doesn't necessarily prove that YOU exist, just that SOMEONE (something?) exists.
Nothing says that those thoughts in your head that you seem to controll doesn't belong to someone else, and you are just a part of this somoene/something.

for the purposes of cogito ergo sum, the person doing the thinking shall be referred to as I

That person might as well be the emperor of Japan, Cthuhlu, or the solipcist that started this thread. Nothing says that it must be Ravensheart18.

In this we are in agreement, although we might differ on the significance of that fact.

 

[wolf92]

If I didn't exist, than how could I be drinking a two liter bottle of delicious cherry coke?

 

[Benny Blanco]

     
"I dreamed I was a butterfly, flitting around in the sky; then I awoke. Now I wonder: Am I a man who dreamt of being a butterfly, or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man?" -Chuang tzu-

I have decided you are all fragments of my imagination. Prove to me that you aren't. Prove to me you exist. I am easily persuaded .

(i am not looking for pictures ,names , numbers or anything of the like. How does one prove their existance or the existance of others?)

I got past this level of solipsistic bullcrap in high-school and have no wish to revisit it. I could perhaps prove my existence to you, but in order to do so I would have to do horrible and illegal things, things so unpleasant that you would be sure you weren't imagining them. Also not something I'm up for- I tend to follow a live-and-let-live ethos.

I think the most ridiculous deconstruction of this happened at a woods party I attended with some friends. We met some toolbox who claimed to be studying metaphysics from an interdimensional being called Zaktar. His conversation with my friend Jake went a little something like this-


Disciple of Zaktar: We all manifest our own reality.
Jake: What do you mean?
DoZ: I mean that our realities are manifestations of our own thoughts and desires.
(Jake pauses to consider this)
Jake: What about rape victims?
DoZ: What about them?
Jake: Do rape victims manifest their own reality?
DoZ: Yes. Everyone manifests their own reality.
Jake: OK. We're going over there now.
(Exeunt Jake, Chin & Benny)