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<blockquote data-quote="spiney" data-source="post: 109063" data-attributes="member: 192438">... &quot;I'm a hungry sole in an empty plaice, waiting for someone to fillet&quot; ....back to original subject....It's a question of Ontology, &quot;what really exists&quot;. Descartes tried to prove the reality of the external world, starting from &quot;I think therefore I am...&quot;. And failed. Berkeley thought matter didn't exist, and that everything is just a thought held in the mind of God (we're &quot;God's dream&quot;!). This is no different, in principle, from saying the world's a perfect computer simulation, it's the same idea expressed in a modern idiom.Obviously, there's no possible way to prove this idea false (how would you do it?).&quot;To be is to be perceived&quot;. Maybe. But the Anthropic Principle - the idea that the universe is &quot;made real&quot; only by being observed - in my opinion is complete drivel.I think Occam's Razor applies here, (entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily). What's the point of supposing that the world's &quot;really&quot; a simulation? Saying that gets you exactly nowhere.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="spiney, post: 109063, member: 192438"] ... "I'm a hungry sole in an empty plaice, waiting for someone to fillet" .... back to original subject.... It's a question of Ontology, "what really exists". Descartes tried to prove the reality of the external world, starting from "I think therefore I am...". And failed. Berkeley thought matter didn't exist, and that everything is just a thought held in the mind of God (we're "God's dream"!). This is no different, in principle, from saying the world's a perfect computer simulation, it's the same idea expressed in a modern idiom. Obviously, there's no possible way to prove this idea false (how would you do it?). "To be is to be perceived". Maybe. But the Anthropic Principle - the idea that the universe is "made real" only by being observed - in my opinion is complete drivel. I think Occam's Razor applies here, (entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily). What's the point of supposing that the world's "really" a simulation? Saying that gets you exactly nowhere. [/QUOTE]

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