People do not exist

Post Reply New Topic

What a load of crap. By this argument, anything with emergent properties does not exist. So apparently, water does not exist.

I am not a person, I am a number - number 6...

Water doesn't exist. Atoms also don't exist. Nothing exists but matter. And the divisions in matter(such as atoms, molecules, people, chariots, etc) are man-made. I don't see the inconsistency in such a metaphysical position, so where does the "load of crap" part come in?

I believe there is a distinction between atoms-molecules and people, which the latter can be said to be physical divisions of physical things with phyisical properties while the former an immaterial concept, and I don't see how atoms and molecules cannot possibly exist and be man-made concepts only, unless we are denying physics and our interpretation of reality as a whole, from a strong philosophical skeptic or nihilist standpoint, it may seem. (I do know that labels and concepts such as "atoms", "molecules", "matter", "laws" are human constructs which are part of our language system that we use to make abstractions of our interpretation of reality but they seem close enough to actually deny them, funny thing, sometimes with an apparent level of certainty and I tend to see a problem there)


well, I really don't know where is that, but there is the issue that "crap" may still be "crap" regardless if there is consistency of the propositions and analysis in favor of that "crap", because consistency does not seem to necessarily equals truth or factual, it just seems to mean that an idea is consistent and I believe that a consistent idea can still be "crap".


Regarding the issue of concepts such as people (personhood) and similar, there is also the issue of the existence of more than just one standpoint in philosophy to that issue and I currently tend to see a problem when it comes to favor a prefered one among several.

So it's consistent crap. It's still crap. An obviously absurd position can be rejected as such. A carbon atom is clearly a distinct entity that is different from its protons, neutrons, and electrons. Benzene rings and buckyballs are also clear, well-defined entities that are quite plainly different from carbon atoms. All you've shown in this thread is that a handful of rare cases can lead to ambiguities in one of our least specific definitions. To go from this to "Nothing exists but matter" would be like criticizing Cantor's notion of sets (his definition led to contradictions) and then asserting that sets do not exist, and further, numbers do not exist.

I'm often accused of not seeing the forest for the trees. Sometimes I feel like I'm even missing the trees for the leaves. You've gone down to subatomic particles and failed to see a chlorophyll molecule.

Don't worry 'bout that! Come to Quark's! We have lot's of equipment for imaging, and even holodecks! Come to Quark's!

Well, the issue is deciding which lines to divide by and which lines are essential. I thought about changing my post after the fact to address how atoms which are less variant than other physical items could exist while bigger things wouldn't, but since I was tired, I decided not to.


You are right, something can be crap regardless of consistency issues, but consistency issues are a major contributor to crappiness.


Ok, yes, many atoms and molecules can actually be defined in a mathematical manner, which reduces any sort of ambiguities, thus there is less of an issue regarding an essence to their existence. Still, I would argue that the divisions are arbitrary, I mean, can you define an atom or element without appealing to pre-existing linguistic definitions? That seems difficult, but also necessary in order to show that atoms aren't a figure in narrative, but rather can analytically exist. I mean, we would have to define the nature of all of the component thing-stuffs, and then define all of this in relationship to other bundles of thing-stuff, and even then I doubt we would have captured the essence, as even if we have the cleanest and clearest definition of an atom, or proton, or electron, is something deeply like an atom, or proton, or electron logically possible while differing with that definition? Unless we reduce all judgments to analytical judgments, there is ground to deny the existence of any particular class of things, as only analytical judgments are definite to have essence, but only class judgments match our language. Thus, our language does not match an external reality, thus meaning that our names and labels aren't for things that objectively exist, but rather things that we find categorizing as separate to be useful.

I don't think that this is a matter of "rare cases" though, given that it seems to apply to people, carriages, and the entire city of London. I do think the debate has gone past the original argument to some extent, which was specific to people, and wasn't as focused upon nominalism, however, nothing wrong with the direction it went.

Well, of course, I failed to see a chlorophyll molecule. Those don't exist. There is just thing-stuff, and nothing that says that one bundle of thing stuff is truly different than another bundle. (so, basically nominalist monism, words have no objective meaning, and there is only one substance that reality is made of)

In terms of the act of appellation and categorization, would taxonomy hold any bearing to this discussion?

It could, the real issue is whether language represents human divisions, or actual divisions in reality. If taxonomy can give some insight into the nature of our language, particularly nouns or descriptions, then it can hold some bearing.

Also Orwell, there is not a single red object in existence, only things that reflect or give off electromagnetic waves under certain circumstances that we later label red upon perceiving them. Just a little FYI.

If you cannot prove it, you cannot say it as truth. You may think everything is only a figment of your imagination, but how do you 100% exactly know it is? If people don't exist, then how do you exist? So many questions followed by many vague answers that ultimately explain nothing.

If you cannot prove people exist, you also cannot prove they don't exist. Reality itself is far too unimaginably weird for us humans to even begin to understand.

Our language attempts to approximate an external reality. It does not achieve a perfect matching, but that is still not sufficient to conclude trees do not exist.


Your "people do not exist" argument rested on cases that are either rare enough to be medical curiosities (chimeras) or just outlandish hypotheticals (brain in a jar). Saying, for example, that London does not exist just seems like an abuse of language more than anything else to me.


Words are ultimately arbitrary, but that is irrelevant. As long as words have clearly-defined, agreed-upon meanings, there is no problem.

Water does not exist in the sense that it is just a name for an arrangement of atoms and not a physical object.

No one of the atoms atoms is 'water' and all the atoms spread out individual are not 'water'.

Water is the name for the atoms together in a specific arrangement at specific temperatures.
Because arrangement, temperature etc. are not physical objects, but are essential for something to be 'water', 'water can not possibly be a physical object.

If you only wish to believe in a physical world, then 'water', 'chariots' and 'persons' are not part of it. They are just names for arrangements.
There is no doubt that arrangements exist, but it is only human choice which arrangements we chose to name and define as separate from other arrangements.
In a universe free from human interpretation, matter still exists, but atoms, chariots and other arrangements we have decided to define, do not.

There is no objective reason to call any particular arrangement a 'person'.
Your can if you want, but that would be arbitrary and meaningless from an objective point of view.

Well, trees don't exist. Trees are at best a model for conceptual data, but a model for conceptual data doesn't exist in reality, but rather is subjective. Trees subjectively exist. (I think there is less disagreement here than you think there is)


Actually, my "people do not exist" argument rested upon a definition of personhood that I gave that I considered to capture the essence of personhood, and arguing that people miss the mark on both essential qualities.

My rebuttal to your definition rested on medical curiosities and hypotheticals, but the hypotheticals weren't small things. Brain death and missing body parts aren't so extremely uncommon that they should be ignored. And chimeras alone require a rejection of the core of your foundations.

That being said, I just think your definition of personhood completely misses the point, as "person" is not necessarily the same as "human", as I may call a Terry Shiavo human, but she wasn't a person as persons have more activity. Not only that, but in science fiction, we see many beings that are in a sense "persons" but they aren't human. This might be silly, but it seems somewhat relevant, particularly if we were thinking about the possibility of a working AI, or a genetically engineered being, hurdles we haven't reached yet, but not irrelevant for human thought.

Well, I think part of the issue between us is terminology, as I would also say "London is a socio-cultural representation to help us understand the existence of a grouping of humans in a certain basic geographic location" while also saying "London does not exist". And what I mean when I say "London does not exist" is that London lacks an objective existence. Not that when we say "London" we aren't referring to anything.


Well, chloroplasts and mitochondria are both made out of stuff. Qualitative and quantitative differences don't exist without you presupposing that they exist, and your presupposition isn't a matter of reality, but rather a matter of mental categorization.


Well, it actually does matter, because knowing how the words relate to their reality will also impact how we relate to the words. If words are arbitrary human inventions, then many of the uses of words and intuitions in words might also be dismissed as arbitrary. If words all have substantive ties to reality, then piling on words will really matter.

In any case, I think Letum is a *lot* more on topic and better at conveying these ideas than I am.

Well, the starting point was a conception of personhood that I considered to validly get the essence of what we mean when we say "person", then I argued that this didn't exist.

Who says that I am a person? By my argument, I also am not a person. I am a human, but I lack the qualities that are necessary to give a being a special status of "personhood".

Well, the issue isn't an absolute proof but rather proof that nobody else at this point could identify a person. To a certain extent, I began on this road because of iamnotaparakeet's threat "Parakeets do not exist", which was attacking extreme skepticism.

Iv'e actually seen heaps of humans before don't know about you guys but I actually think they really do exist.

Good job reading the thread before posting.



Anyway, the main problem that I see here is with the definition resulting from a narrow observation.
People are people. See that? That's actually the best way to phrase that! "Humans are people." just doesn't sound as good.