Philosophy Asked by user35400 on January 17, 2021
Lately I’ve been listening to lots discussions with conspiracy theorists and science-deniers, and I’ve noticed that, when their position is challenged with evidence, their responses generally fall into two broad classes:
1) They respond by modifying their original position to acommodate the new piece of evidence, which introduces additional assumptions/complexity. For example, when the existence of time zones is pointed out to flat-earthers, the typical response involves the Sun being a “spotlight” with a complex lampshade that reproduces the pattern of day and night we observe. When it is pointed out that a lampshade cannot reproduce the ring of perpetual sunlight needed in the Antarctic ring during the Southern-Hemisphere summer, they propose that the Sun is also shining through a dome made of refractive material of just the right shape, and so on and so on. For other conspiracy theories, this usually takes the form of adding more and more agents to the conspiracy.
Eventually the explanation they create is much more convoluted, and requires many more assumptions, than the widely-accepted explanation. Ordinarily, this is where Occam’s Razor would come into play in advocating for the simpler explanation, but this doesn’t usually seem to matter to people who advocate these kinds of ideas, which indicates that they deny that Occam’s razor selects the best explanation. Without the constraints imposed by Occam’s razor, they are free to make their theory as convoluted as necessary, and they have no reason to believe a simpler one. Given that discussions take place in a finite amount of time, and only a finite amount of evidence can be presented, their theory is always defensible by applying a finite number of complexity-increasing “patches.”
2) They assert that the evidence is fake, and was either fabricated by authorities with an agenda, or was put there by some supernatural being to serve as a test for mankind (this latter assumption is quite common among young-Earth creationists). As the argument progresses, more and more of the features of the natural world are denied (fossils were put there as a test, video footage of the planes was manipulated, photos of space are all CGI, editors for science journals were paid off, etc.). In the extreme, this argument collapses into solipsism, basically arguing that the whole world is an illusion, so they can ignore all evidence, no matter how much is presented.
I have seen philosophical justifications of Occam’s Razor and arguments against solipsism before, but the issue is that these responses are made with the understanding that the reader is aware of some philosophy in the first place. Typically, that assumption doesn’t hold in these discussions, and so these arguments are typically not helpful. Therefore, the question is:
Is there a way to prevent the discussion from proceeding along either of these tracks, assuming that the other party has essentially no knowledge of philosophy?
In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Harry asks: "Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?" Dumbledore replies: "Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”
You don't need to know where your sensations originally come from to know that they are real in your head. Solipsism is partly true in the sense that many of them (colour, false memories etc) do not represent reality exactly.
The method used by Descartes was to imagine a perfect being, an un-stop-able being (not stopped by any kind of argument). You can be sure that your idea of this being exists inside your head. But because it is unstoppable, it must also exist in reality.
Answered by Tim Crinion on January 17, 2021
My favorite argument against solipsism is the following:
You punch your interlocutor right in the face. Following this, you ask if you exist.
If the answer is "no, I still hold to solipsism" you punch him or her again. Repeat as necessary.
(I don't suggest that you really punch people in the face, but merely to suggest that you could if he or she insisted upon solipsism, thereby granting consent to you for whatever violence is caused by him- or herself.)
EDIT:
I think it would be much more powerful, instead of threatening the solipsist, to show genuine care for the solipsist, and not to leave the solipsist alone until he or she feels cared-for. Of course, if the solipsist never arrives at "feeling cared-for", then the question would change into "are you just trying to get me to do stuff for you?" instead of "do you really believe that I don't exist?"
Answered by elliot svensson on January 17, 2021
Note that solipsism is a logical and metaphisical position that is quite coherent and open to defense. It is not falsifiable per se though. I am not sure it is a position worth pursuing or that it can bring anything interesting about life, evolution and society on the table (which is a different debate altogether).
Solipsism, as I see it, is the case where you should go against Occam's razor and claim that even though an explanation coming from an external world is more complex and elaborate, it is preferable on different accounts. If one is a big fan of Occam's razor, she should invoke God as the ultimate Occam mega-blade, offering a simple explanation of anything. Yet many (most?) philosophers would be non-occamists in this sense.
Answered by Alex on January 17, 2021
Here is the question:
Is there a way to prevent the discussion from proceeding along either of these tracks, assuming that the other party has essentially no knowledge of philosophy?
The two tracks are the following:
For the first track, consider that this might be what the opponents should be doing if they are following the scientific method and they wish to maintain their theory.
Here is Wikipedia's description of Karl Popper's falsifiability:
A statement, hypothesis, or theory has falsifiability (or is falsifiable) if it is contradicted by a basic statement, which, in an eventual successful or failed falsification must respectively correspond to a true or hypothetical observation. For example, the claim "all swans are white" is falsifiable since it is contradicted by this basic statement: "In 1697, during the Dutch explorer Willem de Vlamingh expedition, there were black swans on the shore of the Swan River in Australia", which in this case is a true observation. The concept is also known by the terms refutable and refutability.
Prior to Vlamingh finding black swans in 1697, the theory about swans was simpler than it was before the discovery. The theory could simply claim that all swans are white. After the black swans were found did that mean that one should abandon the entire theory of swans or modify it to include black swans? The easiest position was to keep the parts of the theory of swans that still worked, say that they are birds, but modify the part of the theory to accommodate the new evidence.
The theory of swans was strengthen by this new evidence even though it now was more complex than it was before. Now it had to include black swans.
For the second track the OP mentions:
They assert that the evidence is fake, and was either fabricated by authorities with an agenda, or was put there by some supernatural being to serve as a test for mankind (this latter assumption is quite common among young-Earth creationists).
The mention of "young-Earth creationists" should also include people who believe that we are part of a simulation. See Nick Bostrom's view that under certain assumptions we are more likely to be a part of a simulation than not. The "supernatural being" in this scenario would be the race of "posthumans" who generate us as a simulation. They are "supernatural" because they themselves are not in the simulation.
Note if the simulation theory is true, evolution is false. It is not how we came to be here. We came to be here, based on that simulation hypothesis, by some superhuman turning on a computer.
Consider also the empirical evidence for "supernormal", "psi" or other such phenomenon that Dean Radin has made available.
Could the people who reject this scientifically obtained evidence be labeled "science-deniers" as well?
Given the above it would be hard to find a way to prevent either of these tracks from becoming part of an argument, whether someone knows philosophy or not.
Both sides of an argument would be tempted to do the same thing given the circumstances and in the case of the first track modifying a theory after getting new evidence is what one should do.
Reference
Select Psi Research Publications http://deanradin.com/evidence/evidence.htm
The Simulation Argument https://www.simulation-argument.com/
Wikipedia, "Falsifiability" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability
Answered by Frank Hubeny on January 17, 2021
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