The "brain in a vat" thought experiment, a version of which is the premise for The Matrix films, tends to be employed to tell us something about our knowledge of the world.

It asks us to imagine that a brain has been detached from a person's body, place into a vat of fluid, and then connected to a device that entirely replicates the electrical impulses that normally come in from the outside world.

The ideas is that this will produce an experience of a virtual reality that is indistinguishable from the real world. This introduces the problem of radical skepticism.

Specifically, it seems possible that we are living in a virtual world, but do not know it. This, in turn, would mean that all our beliefs about the world - for example, that I am currently typing this text on a word processor - are false.

If we accept this is possible, then seemingly we must concede that we cannot know that what we take to be true about the world is, in fact, true.

In other words, if it is possible that something like the scenario portrayed in The Matrix is true, then we have to accept that thee is no secure foundation for our knowledge of the world.

So do you think you are actually reading sentences on a Mingle2 thread, yet you're a brain in a vat, being fed electrical impulses by a supercomputer located in Boston created by a Alien race?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

Smiless, this is a great thought experiment.



There are many directions to take this thought experiment, and solipsism is one of them. Literally, the thought experiment itself is predicated on the idea that a material reality actually exists, we are just unable to perceive it (in the thought experiment).

Thank you for sharing this. Very interesting

I don't know anything about solipsism, but I find it very interesting that in my dreams, I really feel like I am in the "imaginary place" created in my dream. And, I feel things in my dream, like feeling myself get hit and then have it hurt. So, was I really there? So, was I really hurt? It sure felt real while I was dreaming, so was my dream reality? Does this "place" really exist? I don't know if this is the same as solipsism or not, but they have an interesting point: if my dream was created in my head (and how did I come up with this "imaginary place" that I have never seen before?), and the reality of my dream felt real while I was dreaming, are the things that I am experiencing right now real? I dunno...

Well brain in a vat is the concept that we cannot know if what we perceive as real is really real.

If there are real things outside then we cannot tell.

The result of which is in being unable to know the existence of anything outside of cogito ergo sum . . I think therefore I am.

This is equivalent to solipsism in every way. That does not mean that the personae, or supposed personae in the vat need be a solipsist.

Originally Solipsism only says that other minds may not exist . . .its was an epistemological enterprise, an attempt to base reason on more then the sensory modalities.

The solipsist however may believe additionally that nothing outside of his mind exists absolutely, or that he is indeed living in the matrix(brain in a vat), or that a demon or trickster is feeding information that makes it seen real experience inside of a universe exists but only the trickster and your mind exist.



Accepting that we could indeed be brains in vats, or the dream or dreamers tosses out objective knowledge and is equivalent to solipsism.

Until we accept that there is an objective reality we can learn nothing, we can know nothing. This is why science is based on methodological naturalism.

Now I think I know where you are going with brain in a vat. The person in the vat does not have to believe that there is no outside world, or that other minds do not really exist. After all the matrix . . .

However let me paint a little story to gain some perspective.


Neo finds out that what he thinks is the real world is actually the matrix ok . . . so a few years go by and Neo frees many many people from the matrix, then he stumbles upon the fact that the matrix has layers, and he frees himself from the vat within the vat. Well now Neo is faced with a conundrum. If a matrix can exist inside a matrix then maybe he is still inside another matrix after all this theory is turtles all the way down. Maybe no matrix exists at all and neo is merely dreaming . . . Can you see how the phenomena of brain in a vat is equivalent and leads inexorably to solipsism>?

Do you think Neo is a solipsist?

What can solipsism and brain in a vat tell us about knowledge?

Do you think Neo would have ever learned about being in the matrix if he had been a solipsist?

if it is or if it isn't...what is the importance of knowing?


If we cannot do anything about being in the vat the knowledge of it would be useless to us, no?

and IF we knew we were a brain in a vat, then we would also know that there was a deviant who fed that thought into our brain in a vat...because we cannot have "thought" without someone creating the stimulus for that thought if our brain is in a vat.

How could you tell from the inside? That is the real question.

You could be a brain in a vat, or you could be dreaming. Or you might not exist at all, and might be an elaborate personae in someone's dream . . . or a recording, or as JB likes to say a vibration of god.

The real distinction to make is whether objective knowledge can be had, if there exists a reality separate from us, then we believe that objective knowledge can be had and we are not solipsist even if we are wrong.



I would love everyone to take crack at these.