>If he were right, then reacting hydrogen with oxygen may produce heat and water; alternatively it may produce a chocolate cake with orange candles and a golf ball in the middle. Because the laws of science would exist only in our minds and wouldn't be about reality, we'd have no way of knowing: one prediction would be as rational, or irrational, as the other.
Everything we know is through the observation and mental formulation of our mind. This is just an unavoidable fact.
We make proofs of physical phenomena entirely through observation with our sensory receptors. Whatever scientific experiment you have, whether its watching a plant grow in a certain way or particle collision in the Hydron collider, is through the beliefs of an observer.
The question in my view, is how universal these mental conceptions are. After all, we all similarly agree on some basic observations. There is a ball here. The ball blew up, this detector turned on and off at these times, etc.
If however, there were hypothetically some other observer that did not agree with you on these basic beliefs, such that they said that the detector turned on at time 2 and not 1, then what is the reality? What method do you have to confirm what is reality when two observers disagree on what was observed?
It is easy to throw this thought to the wind and say, there can be other perception of reality possible, but that to me seems faith, not logic.
Clearly, we know reality through our senses and our ideas. That is uncontroversial. The problem is when one says (as I think you are) that our sensual perceptions and ideas are all we know, and that we can reasonably doubt that they ever refer to reality.
We know reality by means of our senses and ideas. We don't know our senses and ideas as such.
To repeat myself: if your claim is true, then the person who says "reacting hydrogen and oxygen will produce water and heat" can be no more, and no less, correct than the person who says "reacting hydrogen and oxygen will produce jello in the shape of George Washington's nose". Because if, as I think you claim, we know nothing but the "mental formulation of our mind", then our thoughts don't point to reality; and if this is true, we can't predict anything about reality. And therefore each of these two claims about chemistry is as valid as the other. Do you agree with this?
> If however, there were hypothetically some other observer that did not agree with you on these basic beliefs, such that they said that the detector turned on at time 2 and not 1, then what is the reality? What method do you have to confirm what is reality when two observers disagree on what was observed?
This is a red herring. We may never know who is right; that is different from saying that there is no reality to know.
>Clearly, we know reality through our senses and our ideas. That is uncontroversial. The problem is when one says (as I think you are) that our sensual perceptions and ideas are all we know, and that we can reasonably doubt that they ever refer to reality.
We know reality by means of our senses and ideas. We don't know our senses and ideas as such.
I am failing to see the distinction here. If your only conception of "reality" is through your sensual perceptions, how can you know anything beyond that? How does reality then differ from mental conception of your sensual receptors? To me this is equivalent to saying, "there is a spiritual world that doesn't interact with anything and we cant prove it but it exists". The only thing I can think of is that reality is shared among several observers, who all agree on it.
This is why I brought up the hypothetical scenario of two scientists who disagreed on whether the detector turned on at t=1 or t=2.
If you were the only being on this planet so that no one could disagree with you, and you for some reason were high on LSD for the entirely of your life and saw flying rocks, would that not be your reality? Every scientific test you do would fit your findings, as perceived and evaluated by you. If there was a community of such people who never saw a rock standing still, what would be the real truth?
And if you say "but there is still a reality, none of those people would just know it", then I can ask, how do you know we don't fit that same bill, where some other observer could look at us and say "those guys are all seeing an illusion, its actually this way"
>This is a red herring. We may never know who is right; that is different from saying that there is no reality to know.
But what determines who is right? That is my question. What answer can you give me besides "a conscious observer?", or "a collection of conscious observers who all agree".
And if you can't determine who is right, what meaning is there to it being reality? Why is one conscious experience any more correct than the other?
1. Do you agree that it is rational to think that burning hydrogen in oxygen will produce water and heat (prediction A), and irrational to think that it will produce a juicy stake that can play tennis (prediction B)?
2. If yes to 1, do you agree that A is correct (or at least closer to being correct), and B is incorrect (or at least further from being correct)?
3. If yes to 2, do you agree that there must be something against which A and B are both measured that makes one right and the other wrong?
4. If yes to 3, do you agree that the thing against which A and B are measured must be independent of them both?
5. If yes to 4, do you agree that there is a reality independent of our observations, and which our observations presuppose and are caused by?
I think you're saying that we can reasonably think that our sensual perceptions and ideas are all we know, and that we can reasonably doubt that they ever refer to reality, but I want to confirm this.
> And if you say "but there is still a reality, none of those people would just know it", then I can ask, how do you know we don't fit that same bill, where some other observer could look at us and say "those guys are all seeing an illusion, its actually this way"
See point 1, above. I suggest that nobody really systematically doubts their observations. But if you honestly disagree with point 1 then let me know.
> But what determines who is right? That is my question.
Obviously that is sometimes impossible to answer, depending on the situation. But sometimes (more often) it's not. Again, do you disagree with point 1 above?
>who disagreed on whether the detector turned on at t=1 or t=2
This is an already answered question by relativity and causality.
Since light has a constant speed and also a propagation speed there are operations that observers will not agree on the order of... but they will always agree on the order of causality. The cup will always get pushed off the table first before it's broken on the ground.
Everything we know is through the observation and mental formulation of our mind. This is just an unavoidable fact. We make proofs of physical phenomena entirely through observation with our sensory receptors. Whatever scientific experiment you have, whether its watching a plant grow in a certain way or particle collision in the Hydron collider, is through the beliefs of an observer.
The question in my view, is how universal these mental conceptions are. After all, we all similarly agree on some basic observations. There is a ball here. The ball blew up, this detector turned on and off at these times, etc.
If however, there were hypothetically some other observer that did not agree with you on these basic beliefs, such that they said that the detector turned on at time 2 and not 1, then what is the reality? What method do you have to confirm what is reality when two observers disagree on what was observed?
It is easy to throw this thought to the wind and say, there can be other perception of reality possible, but that to me seems faith, not logic.