Why the sudden appearance of Solipsism?

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In the time I have been posting on C.A. there has never been any mention of Solipsism. Yet in the past month or so there have suddenly appeared half a dozen of adament defenders of Solipsism. Can anyone explain the sudden appearance of this heresy? Why is in now suddenly appearing? Is this something new that has appeared in university courses? Has some Guru of Solipsism suddenly appeared on the lecture circuit on Youtube, etc.

Pax
Linus2nd
 
Linusthe2nd said:
In the time I have been posting on C.A. there has never been any mention of Solipsism. Yet in the past month or so there have suddenly appeared half a dozen of adament defenders of Solipsism. Can anyone explain the sudden appearance of this heresy? Why is in now suddenly appearing? Is this something new that has appeared in university courses? Has some Guru of Solipsism suddenly appeared on the lecture circuit on Youtube, etc.

Pax
Linus2nd
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Solipsism, at least soft solipsism, is NOT a heresy. It’s perfectly consistent with the idea of God. It simply admits that are things that we as conscious beings cannot be certain of. It doesn’t make irrational claims about what’s true, it only makes claims about what’s knowable.

You’re perfectly free to be both a solipsist and a Catholic, they’re not mutually exclusive. One is born of reason, the other is born of faith.
 
Partinobodycula said:
Solipsism, at least soft solipsism, is NOT a heresy. It’s perfectly consistent with the idea of God. It simply admits that are things that we as conscious beings cannot be certain of. It doesn’t make irrational claims about what’s true, it only makes claims about what’s knowable.

You’re perfectly free to be both a solipsist and a Catholic, they’re not mutually exclusive. One is born of reason, the other is born of faith.
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Yes. If I decided now to not be a solipsist and believe to myself that I know that the external world certainly existed, I would be deceiving myself.
 
blase6 said:
Yes. If I decided now to not be a solipsist and believe to myself that I know that the external world certainly existed, I would be deceiving myself.
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Uh?

If tempted before, the Incarnation makes us certain of the external world, confirming reason. There is also eh fact that God created heaven and earth, the existence of the Church, the Eucharist, that every sacrament consists of something material, etc etc.
 
We don’t know for 100% certain God exists, we don’t know for 100% certain that our memories are of real events. We can’t be certain of anything other than that our own minds are real. The rest could be an illusion for all we know.

That said, I know nothing about Solipsism(other than the first sentence of its wikipedia article) and I do think that the world around me is real and that my memories are mostly of things that happened(mostly because obviously details have changed over the years)
 
I agree with CrossofChrist and Linusthe2nd. It is my understanding that we can know that things other than ourselves exist with just as much certainty as we can know that we ourselves exist.
 
dmar198 said:
I agree with CrossofChrist and Linusthe2nd. It is my understanding that we can know that things other than ourselves exist with just as much certainty as we can know that we ourselves exist.
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Can you define by certainty what “I” is?
 
CrossofChrist said:
how can you say you don’t know for certain if the external world exists? Christ became man.
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That Christ became man is something that I do not directly perceive, and I have to go off of the statements and writings of other people. I do not know for certain that the external world exists because I cannot leave my own perception to “test” its objective reality.
 
Bahman said:
Can you define by certainty what “I” is?
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“I”: the 9th letter in the alphabet.
😉

Seriously though, I’ll answer the question.

“I” am a man. Which means I am composed of body and soul, and am meant to live for the glory of God.

Solipsism fails because it assumes the validity of Descartes’ cogito ergo sum. His own “proof” presupposes both the rationality of reality and the fact of existence.
 
dmar198 said:
I agree with CrossofChrist and Linusthe2nd. It is my understanding that we can know that things other than ourselves exist with just as much certainty as we can know that we ourselves exist.
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That is simply wrong epistemologically speaking. It is logically possible that the information you are receiving does not represent the real objective nature of things as they exist right now, and what you are really seeing is just information.

The fact that you exist is not logically possible to deny, because you cannot think and not exist at the same time. I think therefore i am.
 
Here is an excellent treatment of solipsism, including its repudiation .

iep.utm.edu/solipsis/#H7

I tend to agree with those who say that solipsism is illogical and self defeating. It is near allied to relativism and the subjective epistemologies, and for that reason is egocentric.
But Christ wants us to live for others, so we have to acknowledge that others exist and there are ways we can attach ourselves to their lives with body and spirit.
 
CrossofChrist said:
“I”: the 9th letter in the alphabet.
😉

Seriously though, I’ll answer the question.

“I” am a man. Which means I am composed of body and soul, and am meant to live for the glory of God.

Solipsism fails because it assumes the validity of Descartes’ cogito ergo sum. His own “proof” presupposes both the rationality of reality and the fact of existence.
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“I” is consciousness. You don’t need a body to be but you need it to exist. Hence Descartes was wrong on saying that I think then I am. The correct deduction is that I think then I exist. We can however say I am consciousness then I am.
 
blase6 said:
That Christ became man is something that I do not directly perceive, and I have to go off of the statements and writings of other people. I do not know for certain that the external world exists because I cannot leave my own perception to “test” its objective reality.
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One problem (among others) with this is that it denies the certainty faith gives.

CCC 157: Faith is certain. It is more certain than all human knowledge because it is founded on the very word of God who cannot lie. To be sure, revealed truths can seem obscure to human reason and experience, but "the certainty that the divine light gives is greater than that which the light of natural reason gives."31 "Ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt."32
 
Bahman said:
“I” is consciousness. You don’t need a body to be but you need it to exist. Hence Descartes was wrong on saying that I think then I am. The correct deduction is that I think then I exist. We can however say I am consciousness then I am.
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No, it makes no sense to say “I am conscious”, and then conclude you exist, as if that constituted a proof. Your existence is already assumed to be true when you say “I”.

Existence is presupposed as true before all else.
 
CrossofChrist said:
One problem (among others) with this is that it denies the certainty faith gives.

CCC 157: Faith is certain. It is more certain than all human knowledge because it is founded on the very word of God who cannot lie. To be sure, revealed truths can seem obscure to human reason and experience, but "the certainty that the divine light gives is greater than that which the light of natural reason gives."31 "Ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt."32
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I do not know for sure if what I believe is really the “word of God”. I do not think I am capable of knowing that for certain, but I do think that the Catholic Church is, due to reason, more probably correct than any other religion. I don’t know what the CCC means by “certain”, but it is definitely not the “certain” I understand within myself.

“Faith is certain” is a bizarre claim. If one is certain of a truth, it is not faith, it is knowledge. For that which is not certain, faith is necessary.
 
ChainBreaker said:
It is logically possible that the information you are receiving does not represent the real objective nature of things as they exist right now, and what you are really seeing is just information.
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It seems to me that, even if I granted that assertion, I could still know that things other than myself exist. This article from Catholic Answers appears to prove this point, and I’d love to know your thoughts on it.
The fact that you exist is not logically possible to deny, because you cannot think and not exist at the same time. I think therefore i am.
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That seems reasonable enough to me. But I think you’ve given up the grounds of solipsism by admitting that. You have used reason to make a conclusion. You started with a major premise: I cannot think and not exist at the same time. Then you added a minor premise: I think. And you assumed the laws of logic to draw the inference: Therefore I exist.

I think there are other premises just as sound as the major premise above that you can also know by reason alone. For example, I can only exist if I am caused or if I am eternal. But I exist. Therefore, I am either caused or eternal.

I think you can know by reason alone that eternal things can’t change.

I think you can use your simple observation about your own thinking to prove that you change.

I think you can combine those two facts to determine that you are not eternal.

You can then conclude that you are caused, and not by yourself. And by this point you are well on your way to proving that at least one thing other than yourself must of necessity exist.

Anyway I’d love to know what you think of those points. Because I think they help disprove solipsism.
 
ChainBreaker said:
The fact that you exist is not logically possible to deny, because you cannot think and not exist at the same time. I think therefore i am.
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Cogito; ergo sum.

This is Descartes, but Descartes is wrong.

CrossofChrist is right.

The correct formulation is:

I exist; therefore I think.

We have a sensation of existing before we have any thought we can have about existing.

Catholic philosophers Jacques Maritain and Etienne Gilson 50 years ago cited and repudiated Descartes’ error.
 
blase6 said:
Yes. If I decided now to not be a solipsist and believe to myself that I know that the external world certainly existed, I would be deceiving myself.
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The problem is that the external world DOES exist in an undeniable way. The chair in front of me is not me. I am certain of that. What you seem to be doing is claiming that you cannot know for certain that the chair is NOT part of you because it is held within your conscious awareness.

It seems to me that you have to be engaging in self-deception merely by assuming that because it is in your conscious awareness it must, therefore, be merely an aspect of that awareness.

It is one thing to be left in a state of wonder in terms of how consciousness of something can be indicative of the actual existence of the thing. It is, however, entirely another to insist that consciousness of something must therefore reduce to the presumption that the thing has no existence in itself.
 
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