Solipsism?

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http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/s/solipsis.htm

Hmm. After reading a little about solipsism, it occurs to me that this is quite similar to the way I perceive things. Now, keep in mind I have read very little about it, and may be misinterpreting it, but what are your opinions?

Do you think this might be a particularly AS way to see things?

Regardless, I certainly found it fairly interesting to read about.

yep. classic autism, too. also interesting is the connexion with the Fair Witnesses, in heinlen's "Stranger in a strange land"...

I agree...

A lot of autistics run the risk of solipsism...

It's very philosophical when you think about it... when your own dreams seem more real than the world around you... what are you supposed to think?

Ever watched The Matrix? The sequels sucked...

I don't know what I think. Other people think I'm insane.

I've been there Namiko...

Really good noodles...

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Last edited by Ante on 09 Nov 2005, 5:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I haven't heard of this- is it a book? Worth reading?

Well, not believe god as a good enough authority and not believing anyone as a good enough authority compared to the own authority of my judgement, it is only possible for me to say certainly that i am the only mind that exists. And to say that any other mind than me exists is to make a leap of faith. However i have always been comfortable playing around with the world with the idea that other minds exist to be explored and understood. And since working with life in the way that people who are convinced other minds dont exist usually results in incarceration and such, i think assuming that other minds MAY exist, or pretending like they do is a better way to go.

it is indeed a book. and it's worth reading if you haven't already, although i find heinlein a bit sexist and racist (albeit subtlely/unconsciously) for my liking. but then, he is a product of his generation.

It is a good book, though I don't care for Heinlin's relativist philosophies. I thught "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" was better.

I'm a fan of Heinlein! What does relativist mean?

Seeing the world from a Solipsistic viewpoint is indeed very common to those on the Autistic Spectrum. Whilst I don't think that the majority of Aspies believe that theirs is the only mind in existance, many of us tend to act as though we are the only feeling, sentient beings in the world. This I think stems largely from a Solipsistic inability to relate to other people possessing thoughts and feelings. I think Aspies and high functiong Auties are aware that there are other people around them, and can believe that these people also have feelings if it is pointed out to them, but perhaps this concept and consideration of other people and their needs comes less naturally. For those with lower funtioning Autism, the difficulty or inability to percieve other people's existance can be quite pronounced. I have a little Autie friend who is four years old. Whilst she can recognise and name people she knows well, such as family, she has a tendancy to treat them as objects rather than people! If you are sitting between her and her juice, she will make a beeline for the juice and will climb over you rather than walking around. Although she is young, this is markedly different from other kids.

In other words, yes!

Out of interest, is it that you believe that yours is the only mind in existance, or is it just that by default, you tend not to take into account other people's consciousness?

I believe i am silopsistic too.

Ever see any Spike Jones movies?

It is very natural for someone with AS to be solipsistic. Although I believe that we forget the fact that our tendancy towards solipsism is based largely in part of the recognition of other minds. We feel so alone because we acknowledge our inability to relate to other people, which of course entails the recognition of other minds.

actually, no individual can in any way be not solipsistic at heart (as operating system, so to say), as or nt. thats the most basic dictum drawn from epistemology. i am the only i there is. even if i believe that humans i see in the world are the same as me, this is a belief that is built onto the basis that i am the only person i see from the inside.

i quite often argue on this subject with people - that the gap between an "ego" (the probably most fitting term would be heideggers "dasein") and the world it perceives is unsurmountable, even if one believes that other people are "egos", too.
its such basic logic that i feel there is no denying it - and therefore, i get mad when people dont get it or mean to get it and need to correct me. a friend of mine (even with quite an academic background and a very good level of knowledge, usually) usually brushes it off as "the typical point of view of a five-year-old" - not understanding that the classification he pulled this from is the average development of socialization (the bane of brain, that is). so, the most one could draw from it is that five-year-olds have understood the "only i am i"-part but have not been made to believe that other peolpe are the same, yet. that, however, is mainly a cultural thing, not the apriorical truth i talked about. gah... people. if they just opened their eyes and saw for themselves in what form their being really takes place.

so yeah, a solipsistic basis is the hand-in-hand counterpart of the whole concept of self-being. its also one of the reasons why socialism wont ever work on a scale worth mentioning.

I agree with gekitsu in that solipsism is the most basic way that we perceive the world. Also, it is not logically inconsistent, at least in a deductive sense. There is no way to strictly disprove solipsism.

However, if I look at the similarities in the behaviors of others in comparison with my own behaviors and the internal thoughts/emotions that go with these behaviors, I can see that solipsism violates the principle of “Occam’s Razor”. To claim that my mind exists yet other minds do not doesn’t make a lot of sense in terms of consistency. The only simple possibilites are that either 1.) other minds exist or 2.) no minds exist (including my own). I’ve dabbled with the second possibility, i.e. consciousness is an illusion, but found it extremely hard to accept in practice. I also find the concept of free-will somewhat paradoxical but that’s whole other topic.

Anyways, I think most people reject solipsism as a practical matter rather than through the use of logical arguments. They believe other minds exist because they feel the need for other minds to exist. To believe otherwise would be disconcerting to most people because most people expect reciprocity when they deal others. People come to expect others to react to their actions in the same way they would react to others’ actions. I think in the end the motivation to reject solipsism is a selfish one as it is done to satisfy an emotional need.

I think the developmental differences between people with autism and NTs regarding solipsism is that people with autism end up rejecting solipsism through the sense described in the second paragraph, while NTs tend to do it as a matter of practicality because they have a stronger emotional need for social reciprocity. This developmental “delay” can be explained by the fact that the emotional need for social reciprocity typically comes much earlier in life (at least in NTs) than the ability to form beliefs through reasoning.