[acheron]

“We are all aware that the senses can be deceived, the eyes fooled. But how can we be sure our senses are not being deceived at any particular time, or even all the time? Might I just be a brain in a tank somewhere, tricked all my life into believing in the events of this world by some insane computer? And does my life gain or lose meaning based on my reaction to such solipsism?”

Project PYRRHO, Specimen 46, Vat 7 Activity recorded M.Y. 2302.22467 (TERMINATION OF SPECIMEN ADVISED)

[gavmor]

Give credit where credit is due: Descartes, Kant, Putnam, etc.

[dhosek]

Meditations on First Philosophy messed me up bad. All of Descartes’ reasoning about the inability to determine whether experience was real made complete sense to me. But when I got to where he started to try to build back reality, I didn’t buy it. I can only believe in reality by willfully forgetting Descartes.

[transitorykris]

It’s really a solipsistic philosophy. The awkwardness of it was the fact he had a king and the church to appease in his arguments. Willfully forgetting Descartes is one way of dealing with it! (..or plotting a path out of it by reading him as a proto-existentialist)

[willis936]

But take comfort in knowing you are not the void. Cogito ergo sum. It's the only true refute of solipsism.

[mattlondon]

Hmm pretty sure I saw this in the thought traces of Claude the other day...

[sodaplayer]

It'll be Brian Reynolds in this case. It's a quote from Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri.

[Gooblebrai]

Source: Bioenhancement Center (SMAC), Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri