Is it possible to know anything at all?

[Redblueflare]

Originally posted by Kaz: None of us can be SURE that were not in a dream imagined by a butterfly can we?(its extremely improbable but possible) Nor can we be sure that we ARE in a dream imagined by a butterfly. This is what i am trying to explain (failing miserably i think not your fault) Therefore, the only logical state of mind to be in is to be confused

Now you force me to get all scientific. None of us can be a dream of a butterfly. Butterflies have very short life spans, and don't even live an entire year. All of us here are much older than a single year. That butterfly would be long dead, and we all would've faded away into nothingness.
You don't feel pain in dreams. In any dream no matter how terrible, you feel no pain. If we were in a butterflies dream, or anythings for that matter, you wouldn't feel a thing if you fell down a hill.
I, all of us exist. I'll just leave it at that for now.


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Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, I just don't have to listen.

[Diogenes Of Pumpkintown]

[quote]Originally posted by Redblueflare:
[B]

You don't feel pain in dreams. In any dream no matter how terrible, you feel no pain. If we were in a butterflies dream, or anythings for that matter, you wouldn't feel a thing if you fell down a hill. I, all of us exist. I'll just leave it at that for now.

Sure one can feel pain in dreams.

Now don't reply with some bogus scientific argument about what pain is objectively, and therefore the sensation of pain in dreams is not "real" pain. That is missing the entire point.

The point is that the subjective experience, in a dream, of pain can seem completely real -- and thus it is possible that all of this "life" as we know it is but a dream.

As for Melusine's point about how real everything seems in this life and therefore it must be real, the answer is that I have had dreams that seemed completely real, and I only became aware that it was just a dream after I woke up and found myself lying in bed.

Subjective certainty is not proof. One can be subjectively certain even in a dream.

I don't exist, I am!

*chuckle*

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You know childhood is over when a puddle seems like an obstacle instead of an opportunity.

Is Too! Is Not! Is Too! Is Not!

[Melusine]

Originally posted by Diogenes Of Pumpkintown: As for Melusine's point about how real everything seems in this life and therefore it must be real, the answer is that I have had dreams that seemed completely real, and I only became aware that it was just a dream after I woke up and found myself lying in bed.

Sorry but I don't think you got my point or that you can compare a dream to life. I don't know what kind of dreams you have but while I have woken from dreams and thought "but it seemed so real", I don't think it can be in any way compared to the reality of life. Sheesh, I KNOW tanglible reality could be an illusion but yet I know it isn't. It's nice to think about it all for the sake of argument but in the end it does come down to what you really feel is real. And for me, I just know this life is real (like I said, we experience it so it is real), even though I like speculating about other theories. Just because in the end we are alone within our thoughts, they are our reality.



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Melusine, High Queen of Fluffies, Archbabe of the OHF, the LH,
the HADB and the SPAE(Society for the
Prevention of Acronym Extinction) &
Official Entertainer Elf of the BG2 Bar

Your voice is ambrosia
Amy Brown Fantasy Art

[Gabe]

Why does piloshpy(?) always come back to butterflys? Anyway we can be a butterflys dream as we all have a different persptive, which unless the butterfly has mupuilte personality disorder is impossible. Anyway why would butterflys cast humans as the main in it dreams but not butterflys.

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The angel's MIA.

[Kaz]

Hi guys im back!
I have been reading what I wrote last night with growing horror and disbelief (I must have gone temporarily insane to write all that) and now introduce a new aspect to the discussion: IF you manage to make yourself believe that you do not exist, you will probably have such depressions (but im only a poor little phenomenom that doesnt even exist bla bla bla) that you will eventually kill yourself. So it is natures insurance that we all believe that we exist - including me, ignoring evidence to the contary (see my previous posts). We all exist, otherwise wheres the point? Anyway you (whoever wrote that) is right that a butterfly dreaming all THIS must have SERIOUS multiple personlaity problems .

[Moridin]

Originally posted by Gabe: Why does piloshpy(?) always come back to butterflys? Anyway we can be a butterflys dream as we all have a different persptive, which unless the butterfly has mupuilte personality disorder is impossible. Anyway why would butterflys cast humans as the main in it dreams but not butterflys.

I cannot remember the philosopher, but at one time is was written "How do we know if we are a man dreaming we are a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming we are a man"

I think this is why we have the reference to butterflys



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Never try to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and it annoys the pig
I've got to admit it's getting better, it's getting better all the time

[Moridin]

Originally posted by Kaz: Hi guys im back! I have been reading what I wrote last night with growing horror and disbelief (I must have gone temporarily insane to write all that) and now introduce a new aspect to the discussion: IF you manage to make yourself believe that you do not exist, you will probably have such depressions (but im only a poor little phenomenom that doesnt even exist bla bla bla) that you will eventually kill yourself. So it is natures insurance that we all believe that we exist - including me, ignoring evidence to the contary (see my previous posts). We all exist, otherwise wheres the point? Anyway you (whoever wrote that) is right that a butterfly dreaming all THIS must have SERIOUS multiple personlaity problems .

Nature does not take out insurance policies...it knows better

We all (as you so gracefully put it) do not know if we exist. We can believe we exist, we can convince ourselves that we exist, but we do not know that we exist. Only speculation, as with many other things in life! That is why we have philosophy...to debate the things that science cannot prove.


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Never try to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and it annoys the pig
I've got to admit it's getting better, it's getting better all the time

[Gabe]

Originally posted by Moridin: I cannot remember the philosopher, but at one time is was written "How do we know if we are a man dreaming we are a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming we are a man" I think this is why we have the reference to butterflys

Oh, thanks.
I think the general ideal is that we exist and therefore, because we interact with it, the stuff around us exists but do the stuff outside of our current soroundings exist?

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The angel's MIA.

[Cloudbringer]

Originally posted by Yorick: Please don't try and tell me you can be aware and not exist. That is a contradiction. You cannot "do" "have" or "feel" anything if you are nothing, and I cannot believe I am writing this! AAAARRRRGGG!

I can...it's one reason I stay out of these circular discussions...one answer leads you round and round...and in the end...what has changed? LOL

Dio..you are a BAD boy...but you did get people arguing that they dont' exist..or wait, that they are brains under glass.. no.. that was...ARGH!

Cloudy, who read Descartes in college



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Raindancer of the Laughing Hyenas Clan
Storm-Queen
StormCloud of the Black Knight: Heart Mind Soul Forever
"To sleep, perchance to dream..."