Does reality really exist? Who wants to know?

[Speakpigeon]

The words from William Lane Craig quoted below by Lion IRC seem to mean something important.

But what exactly do you think?
EB

William Lane Craig Q&A page once recounted how questions about the nature of existence/reality can be dealt with.

Student : Does reality really exist?
WLC : Who wants to know?

 

[KeepTalking]

It would seem to be a basis for questioning objective reality.

I'm not sure how such debate tactics would help a Christian apologist. If the existence of reality is in question, then the same should go double for the Christian god.

 

[Bronzeage]

Without any more context that provided in the OP, every question comes with its own context. We can assume two things are possible. First, the questioner does not know the answer and is seeking information, or second, the questioner knows the answer and is testing our knowledge.

For myself, the proper context of all questions is, what difference does it make. In other words, what are you going to do with the information? My doctor asked me why I stopped checking my blood sugar every day. I told him, "It's an unpleasant experience and I'm not doing anything with the information." He accepted that. It seemed pointless to spend the money on testing supplies, just to satisfy my morbid curiosity.

So, who does want know? I imagine all of us would like to know if everything we sense is real, but suppose it's not. The only thing we could do is redefine reality, and we've already done that.

 

[fast]

The words from William Lane Craig quoted below by Lion IRC seem to mean something important.

But what exactly do you think?
EB

William Lane Craig Q&A page once recounted how questions about the nature of existence/reality can be dealt with.

Student : Does reality really exist?
WLC : Who wants to know?

The teacher is saying, "obviously."

 

[KeepTalking]

The words from William Lane Craig quoted below by Lion IRC seem to mean something important.

But what exactly do you think?
EB

William Lane Craig Q&A page once recounted how questions about the nature of existence/reality can be dealt with.

Student : Does reality really exist?
WLC : Who wants to know?

The teacher is saying, "obviously."

There seems to be a more obvious way of saying that.

 

[rousseau]

Without any more context that provided in the OP, every question comes with its own context. We can assume two things are possible. First, the questioner does not know the answer and is seeking information, or second, the questioner knows the answer and is testing our knowledge.

For myself, the proper context of all questions is, what difference does it make. In other words, what are you going to do with the information? My doctor asked me why I stopped checking my blood sugar every day. I told him, "It's an unpleasant experience and I'm not doing anything with the information." He accepted that. It seemed pointless to spend the money on testing supplies, just to satisfy my morbid curiosity.

So, who does want know? I imagine all of us would like to know if everything we sense is real, but suppose it's not. The only thing we could do is redefine reality, and we've already done that.

Yea.

The old 'does reality really exist' questions usually come down to a bunch of mental word play, definitions and context. If an answer is required a more specific question is needed.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Okay, let's have a bit of context.

Here's a more contextualised version:

A first-year philosophy student who has been reading Descartes, burst into his professor's office early one morning, bleary-eyed, unshaven—he has obviously been up all night. "Professor," he implores, "you have to tell me. Do I exist?" The professor looks at him a moment and says, "Who wants to know?"

This version is closer to that of William Lane Craig. The meaning I think is the same as his.

Does this change your initial interpretation?
EB

 

[fast]

Okay, let's have a bit of context.

Here's a more contextualised version:

A first-year philosophy student who has been reading Descartes, burst into his professor's office early one morning, bleary-eyed, unshaven—he has obviously been up all night. "Professor," he implores, "you have to tell me. Do I exist?" The professor looks at him a moment and says, "Who wants to know?"

This version is closer to that of William Lane Craig. The meaning I think is the same as his.

Does this change your initial interpretation?
EB

The student should immediately say, "I do" thereby coming to the realization that the answer is "yes." It's that obvious.

Do I exist?
Who wants to know?

I do.
There ya go; that's your answer. You exist.

 

[ruby sparks]

William Lane Craig Q&A page once recounted how questions about the nature of existence/reality can be dealt with.

Student : Does reality really exist?
WLC : Who wants to know?

My interpretation is that as presented, it's a bit imprecise, apart from anything else. The question 'does reality exist' is not the same as nor does it arguably say anything much about what the nature of reality is.

Also, it tends to add to my suspicion that WLC only does the relatively easy questions.

How about:

Student : What is reality?
WLC : {insert WLC's answer here}

 

[Juma]

Okay, let's have a bit of context.

Here's a more contextualised version:

A first-year philosophy student who has been reading Descartes, burst into his professor's office early one morning, bleary-eyed, unshaven—he has obviously been up all night. "Professor," he implores, "you have to tell me. Do I exist?" The professor looks at him a moment and says, "Who wants to know?"

This version is closer to that of William Lane Craig. The meaning I think is the same as his.

Does this change your initial interpretation?
EB

The student should immediately say, "I do" thereby coming to the realization that the answer is "yes." It's that obvious.

Do I exist?
Who wants to know?

I do.
There ya go; that's your answer. You exist.

No. That doesnt follow. Assume the same thing with the students line said by a voce generated from the text above. Does that suddenly make the student exist?

 

[ruby sparks]

Also, at the risk of being an annoying pedant, 'Do I exist' wasn't the question*.

'Why am I in this thread discussing this?' is, to me, almost as mysterious a question.


*Whoops, yes it was.

 

[Underseer]

No one can prove that reality is real.

Yes, solipsism is pretty pointless once you get past the age of 14, but technically, we can't conclusively prove that reality is real.

Christians believe that Renee Descartes solved this with his "I think, therefore I am" essay. Pardon my gross oversimplification, but his argument boils down to this:

• Everyone believes in god.
• Therefore, god is real.
• God would never lie to us.
• Therefore, reality is definitely, totally real

The others aren't any better.

William Lane Craig probably uses something similar, but his argument for the existence of god is much, much worse. His Kalam argument is so awful that he's been reduced to trying to disprove relativity with a syllogism. That is honestly one of the most eye-gougingly stupid arguments I've ever heard a theist make.

Even Ray "banana man" Comfort knows enough about why things are true in science to lie about the evidence, but only Craig is dumb enough to believe that the evidence doesn't matter.

Of course, he also has other proofs for God. Such as "Golly, I don't understand why some decisions are moral and others are immoral[ent]hellip[/ent] therefore magic!!!!!"

In this line of argument, he has been reduced to arguing that it is moral when god orders an entire city slaughtered[ent]mdash[/ent]even the babie[ent]mdash[/ent] but if you order the same thing, that would be highly immoral. By the way, his argument is that the existence of absolute morality proves god, yet in order to support his argument, he has to make an absolute mockery of absolute morality with the most extreme form of moral relativism I've ever heard of.

And yes, there are specific forms of solipsism such as the Holographic Principle from physics, or the suggestion that the universe is an elaborate computer simulation running on some alien computer. There are people who claim to be able to refute that, but even if they can, they only refute those specific versions of solipsism.

We can't say for certain whether reality is real.

Most of us operate under the assumption that reality is real.

The fact that we can't prove reality is real is one of the reasons we can't say we know anything for certain.

Other than that, who above the age of 14 gives a fuck about whether or not reality is real?

Even if this is all a simulation, I'm still stuck in this simulation and I'm stuck living by the rules of this simulated reality. I honestly couldn't give a flying fuck if reality is real or not.

 

[fast]

The student should immediately say, "I do" thereby coming to the realization that the answer is "yes." It's that obvious.

Do I exist?
Who wants to know?

I do.
There ya go; that's your answer. You exist.

No. That doesnt follow. Assume the same thing with the students line said by a voce generated from the text above. Does that suddenly make the student exist?

What? The student exists. That shouldn't even be a question, but it is, and it has a blindingly obvious answer: yes.

But, he read and read. Pondered and pondered. He began to question his existence. Shaken, he asks the question. The question with a blindingly obvious answer. The teacher stares for a moment and cleverly responds not with a direct answer but indirectly that causes the student to think straight.

If X didn't exist, X couldn't want to know.

 

[Juma]

The student should immediately say, "I do" thereby coming to the realization that the answer is "yes." It's that obvious.

Do I exist?
Who wants to know?

I do.
There ya go; that's your answer. You exist.

No. That doesnt follow. Assume the same thing with the students line said by a voce generated from the text above. Does that suddenly make the student exist?

What? The student exists. That shouldn't even be a question, but it is, and it has a blindingly obvious answer: yes.

But, he read and read. Pondered and pondered. He began to question his existence. Shaken, he asks the question. The question with a blindingly obvious answer. The teacher stares for a moment and cleverly responds not with a direct answer but indirectly that causes the student to think straight.

If X didn't exist, X couldn't want to know.

But that is your interpretation of what is happening. Not a proof that the entity that creates the sound of a student saying this is a person/student (or A specific student).

What exactly is it that you think exist?

 

[fast]

What? The student exists. That shouldn't even be a question, but it is, and it has a blindingly obvious answer: yes.

But, he read and read. Pondered and pondered. He began to question his existence. Shaken, he asks the question. The question with a blindingly obvious answer. The teacher stares for a moment and cleverly responds not with a direct answer but indirectly that causes the student to think straight.

If X didn't exist, X couldn't want to know.

But that is your interpretation of what is happening. Not a proof that the entity that creates the sound of a student saying this is a person/student (or A specific student).

What exactly is it that you think exist?

If you're entertaining the idea that the entity I think is a student isn't a person, then the idea being entertained has (in a sense) more to do with the subject matter that might cause such a question to be asked--and not the question itself.

I don't think the answer given, "who wants to know?" was intended to provide absolute proof to the idea you're entertaining. The idea behind the answer was to show good reasoning that one exists when one wants to know something, for there can be no entity wanting without an entity. Even if the utterance of the words was from a different source, there is still a source for the utterance, and if the utterance is an illusion created by some other means, there is something to create those means.

It just doesn't seem the quip was intended to do as much as you would like it to have. It answers the question indirectly and in such a way as to give good reason for thinking that one exists. There seems to be a focus on the "I" in the question "do I exist?", as the obvious answer to the question includes that very reference, as seen in "I do. I want to know."

 

[Juma]

What? The student exists. That shouldn't even be a question, but it is, and it has a blindingly obvious answer: yes.

But, he read and read. Pondered and pondered. He began to question his existence. Shaken, he asks the question. The question with a blindingly obvious answer. The teacher stares for a moment and cleverly responds not with a direct answer but indirectly that causes the student to think straight.

If X didn't exist, X couldn't want to know.

But that is your interpretation of what is happening. Not a proof that the entity that creates the sound of a student saying this is a person/student (or A specific student).

What exactly is it that you think exist?

If you're entertaining the idea that the entity I think is a student isn't a person, then the idea being entertained has (in a sense) more to do with the subject matter that might cause such a question to be asked--and not the question itself.

I don't think the answer given, "who wants to know?" was intended to provide absolute proof to the idea you're entertaining. The idea behind the answer was to show good reasoning that one exists when one wants to know something, for there can be no entity wanting without an entity. Even if the utterance of the words was from a different source, there is still a source for the utterance, and if the utterance is an illusion created by some other means, there is something to create those means.

It just doesn't seem the quip was intended to do as much as you would like it to have. It answers the question indirectly and in such a way as to give good reason for thinking that one exists. There seems to be a focus on the "I" in the question "do I exist?", as the obvious answer to the question includes that very reference, as seen in "I do. I want to know."

Then answer the question: what does ”I exist” really mean?

Do Fgygvns exists? Yes, if we can observe features of the reality, or deduce theese features, and it is reasonable to call them Fgygvns.
There isnt any metaphysical about that.
So if you can observe yourself then you exist.

You dont any sophistic teachers to realize that.

But that example with tr professor and student doeznt show shit.

 

[Speakpigeon]

William Lane Craig Q&A page once recounted how questions about the nature of existence/reality can be dealt with.

Student : Does reality really exist?
WLC : Who wants to know?

My interpretation is that as presented, it's a bit imprecise, apart from anything else. The question 'does reality exist' is not the same as nor does it arguably say anything much about what the nature of reality is.

Also, it tends to add to my suspicion that WLC only does the relatively easy questions.

How about:

Student : What is reality?
WLC : {insert WLC's answer here}

Student : What is reality?
WLC : What God makes it and, ultimately, God Himself.

Relatively easy too for Craig, I should think.

I guess he would make it more subtle and less "in your face". We don't all have his talent.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

The student should immediately say, "I do" thereby coming to the realization that the answer is "yes." It's that obvious.

Do I exist?
Who wants to know?

I do.
There ya go; that's your answer. You exist.

No. That doesnt follow. Assume the same thing with the students line said by a voce generated from the text above. Does that suddenly make the student exist?

Very good point!

I first thought about it as follows:

Meaning comes before logic. If we don't want to assume that the "I" in the question means what it usually does for all of us, then there's also no reason to take the question as a question at all, and then there's just no answer to be had. It's all meaningless babble.

However, if we now assume that the "I" in the question does mean what it usually does, then fast's analysis is correct, inasmuch as he is saying that the "I" therefore refers to whatever it is that is asking the question and that "you", in the answer, "You exist", also refers to it.

That being said, the thing asking the question may not be anything like a student. It may even be some kind of dumb contraption, or even just a freak natural event. Even then, the freak natural event would exist.
EB

But you observation shows that this needs amending.

If it is assumed to be a student, or any sentient being, asking the question "Do I exist", then the answer "Who wants to know" can be construed as pointing out to him that he, at least, knows he exists since he is asking the question. That was the sense of fast's initial interpretation.

If the thing asking the question isn't any sentient creature, then it may not be able to "know" anything at all. Then the question can only make sense to the guy listening to it, not to the thing apparently asking the question. And in this case, there's no use suggesting to this thing that it should know it exists at all. And then, the question of the existence of this thing is only meaningful to us and the guy listening to the (apparent) question. However, since the listener isn't the thing asking the question, the question of its existence can only be based on whatever empirical evidence is available to the listener, which is that there is the appearance of a world out there with something apparently asking if it exists. Thus, the listener, like us, has no real knowledge as to whether this thing really exists. There's only, in the mind of the listener, the appearance that some thing exists, and most likely the belief that it exists. So, in this case, there's no epistemological proof such as the one considered in Descartes' Cogito.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

No one can prove that reality is real.

Yes, solipsism is pretty pointless once you get past the age of 14, but technically, we can't conclusively prove that reality is real.

Christians believe that Renee Descartes solved this with his "I think, therefore I am" essay. Pardon my gross oversimplification, but his argument boils down to this:

• Everyone believes in god.
• Therefore, god is real.
• God would never lie to us.
• Therefore, reality is definitely, totally real

Yeah, it's definitely too gross an oversimplification.

First none of that is, or has anything to do with, the Cogito. Bad start!

Also, the first two lines are not Descartes' argument for the existence of God.

The Cogito itself doesn't address the question of the existence of God or of the material world, at all. The Cogito is entirely about the existence of the subjective "I". And that's its force because we can all make it our own, and think for ourselves, "I think, therefore I am". I certainly can.

Elsewhere, Descartes comes to the existence of the material world, and relies on the dubious argument that God wouldn't deceive us in making us believe there's a material world, so there has to be one.

However, even this argument is slightly better that it is usually credited for, because at least all those people who believe in the kind of God Descartes is talking about should also believe that the material world exists, too, at least for the reason he gives. Here again, it is for the listener to make up their own mind. But, non-believers will obviously think the argument is crap.

We can't say for certain whether reality is real.

Most of us operate under the assumption that reality is real.

The fact that we can't prove reality is real is one of the reasons we can't say we know anything for certain.

I assume you're using the word "reality" to mean the material world. But, usually, reality is thought of as including our own mind. And if Descartes's Cogito shows that you can be certain that you exist, then you can be certain that reality exists too. This is arguably the sense of the professor's answer "Who wants to know".

Other than that, who above the age of 14 gives a fuck about whether or not reality is real?

Even if this is all a simulation, I'm still stuck in this simulation and I'm stuck living by the rules of this simulated reality. I honestly couldn't give a flying fuck if reality is real or not.

That must be something for each of us to decide for ourselves.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

I don't think the answer given, "who wants to know?" was intended to provide absolute proof to the idea you're entertaining. The idea behind the answer was to show good reasoning that one exists when one wants to know something, for there can be no entity wanting without an entity.

Yes. Exactly.
EB