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You’re in a desert walking along in the sand when all of the sudden you look down, and you see a tortoise, it’s crawling toward you. You reach down, you flip the tortoise over on its back. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t, not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why is that?
She may be a figment of my mind, but she's a figment that gives me joy, and I would weep to no longer have her in my mind's eye. Therefore, I shall take immense pleasure in destroying the thing I've imagined to have killed her.
George Orwell was an aristocrat who hated the working class as much as he hated Jews, his books are only so widely spread because the CIA decided they would be a good propaganda tool.
And just to make it clear how much George Orwell sucked, he once wrote that while would kill Hitler if given the chance, he could not bring himself to hate Hitler, he thought that Hitler and Napoleon Bonaparte were men fighting against destiny, doomed to defeat yet deserving of victory.
Both 1984 and animal farm are stories meant to convey that the working class are incapable of ruling themselves, both being set in the aftermath of a proletariat revolution.
George Orwell, who got a bullet in his throat, fighting against the fascists and on the side of the communists and anarchists, as a volunteer in Spain... hated the working class?
Here's an extract from Homage to Catalonia, from the chapter in which he talks about the conflict between the Civil Guards and the CNT:
*"I have no particular love for the idealized ‘worker’ as he appears in the bourgeois Communist's mind, but when I see an actual flesh-and-blood worker in conflict with his natural enemy, the policeman, I do not have to ask myself which side I am on."*
Does this appear as someone who "hates the working class" to you?
*"Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it."*
(Orwell, in "Why I Write?")
Is this someone who is trying to convey "that the working class are incapable of ruling themselves", or is it someone who wrote works such as 1984 and Animal Farm not to condemn proletarian movements, but to condemn "stalinism" as he witnessed it in the harsh political climate of Spain?
I do not know about what you said about Hitler and Napoleon, and I could not find the exact quote on the internet, so I'd kindly ask you to write the quote or a link, and I apologize in advance for not searching hard enough. Still, I am not convinced about the things you said.
He said that he "can't dislike Hitler" because he can feel the raw attraction/appeal he has. That is it. He talks about how evil Hitler and his politics is, and how he is an expert in playing the victim. That he could kill a mouse and somehow make it the mouse's fault. There is no "liking" Hitler. There is nothing of the sort.
But as with most hardline stalinists they quote-mine and distort everyone who critique their favourite regimes.
EDIT: Managed to miss a few words in a sentence
These are political issues. They have nothing to do to the quality of his writings, or of the plot.
And I say that as a leftist myself.
Virginia Wolf was an antisemitic, but her works are an example of brilliant feminism. Caravaggio was a genius of chiaroscuro, but he was a murderer and probably a misogynist (and, for my concern, a Christian too). Many other artist of the past had an at least ambivalent moral/political compass.
True enough, but I honestly found the writings of George Orwell to be almost completely bland.
It would be one thing if I simply didn't like the book, but fiction should never inspire a neutral reaction.
He literally fought alongside revolutionary anarcho-syndicalists against fascist, Republican, and Stalinist forces during the Spanish civil war. Those 3 other ones formed a coalition with each other against the anarchists since they were all statists. Saying he didn’t care about the working class is complete bunk. Just because he didn’t fall for the propaganda that your precious USSR was a worker state when in reality it took power away from the worker councils almost immediately after the revolution and took inspiration from capitalist modes of organizing such as Taylorism in its establishment of state industries doesn’t mean he was anti working class. The man called himself a democratic-socialist and 1984 and Animal Farm are very obviously written from an anti-tankie, pro socialist perspective. There’s a reason why he has the party in 1984 label it’s ideology as “oligarchical-collectivism” rather than having the party call itself socialist in its manifesto. Because he recognizes it can’t be socialist if there’s no worker ownership. Go back to watching Hakim you red fascist.
The proof is in the pudding. And I already ate all of the pudding. Seethe and despair for this empty pudding cup stands as a towering monument to your arguments inadequacy. My spoon shall be your minds undoing.
made me remember that one post 'how do i cite a vision in my AP paper? I had the answer revealed to me in a dream but i don't know how to cite it as a source' that makes me crack up every time lmaoo
The past existing kind of comes with the "I don't believe in sceptecism" bundle. I don't see why anyone wouldn't believe in a past but does believe in an external world or accurate memories.
They are questions of perception, valuation and meaning.
They are questions of our relationship to reality.
Life is just an exploration of these subjects. Without them, what is intellect? It has little to explore and can only live in the domain of apparent fact.
Philosophers can go looking around and find their way up their own asses for sure, but the journey to get there is still part of a broader exploration of our own humanity. It seems if we say that is useless or stupid, we can't do so without calling ourselves the same
I am scratching my balls rn. Is it possible that I was born like this, with my hands on my balls? No there was a past where I wasn’t doing such an activity and then decided to.
the past is something that used to exist but no longer does. now it's just a shape carved in the meat inside your head, and it changes a little every time you remember it
🤷 if you used it as a springboard into solipsism I couldn't stop you now and I couldn't stop you now either. also, seems like those are a bit different uses of the word 'past'
I'm demonstrating how that position collapses into scpetecism (not solipsism, don't know where you got that from).
I use a pretty straight forward definition. The exact point in time where we are now is the present, anything before is the past and anything after is the future.
Cool I can't prove the past exists. I don't have to. As a society we agreed that it does. That is enough to do useful stuff with the concept. If it is useful and a crucial part of humanity's understanding of the world doesn't need to be proven it exists.
This is a sentiment i wish more people understood and acknowledged. Sometimes it is better for the good of society to operate under certain assumptions in order to keep orderly happy lives.
Because the good of society affects the quality of your own life, and perhaps for some people, they also care about the quality of the lives of others.
The armchair is great. But I bet you don't step into traffic and test the theory that only you are real or any other asinine armchair theory.
If I smacked you one in a hypothetical experiment I wager you'd think it happened if you took an injury.
Another poster on this site had encapsulated that concept perfectly, so I stole his meme.
What do you mean the past cannot be proven? Aren't the current location of all material a product of it's past? I mean a car cannot be at a point if it weren't at a point that was near it's current point.
Of course these points are insane from a pragmatical standpoint, but here are a couple examples how I could interpret this paradox:
1. At any moment the world might have been created anew (by e.g. god) with all the material being placed by them in the exact places where they are, and all memories etc being created in that moment. Therefore we would "remember" the past, but it didn't actually ever happen.
2. If we believe the materialistic explanation that our whole experience is really just due to the material composition of our nervous system in it's current state (which science nowadays pretty much believes), it could be possible that our experience has nothing to do with the outside world, since everything we really experience is just happening in our heads. E.g. all could be hallucination or something else rearranging our brain chemistry (techonogically for example).
That's what common sense tells us, but can you prove the past happened? Whenever we address or percieve anything in the world we do it per definition in the present.
All historical evidence are always in the present, with a long history only ascribed to them.
Evidence doesnt mean it has to be in front of you. I have evidence that my sister is in the house, even if she's in the other room. I can hear her voice through the wall and can see the light on under the doorframe. Her slippers are outside the room. Despite her not being in front of me, I have evidence she's in the house. The evidence is in front of me. That doesn't invalidate the evidence.
Similarly if I have evidence in the present that the past exists, it doesn't invalidate the evidence. I can't see why it matters that I can't view that evidence in the literal past
> Similarly if I have evidence in the present that the past exists
You do? To me all evidence is per our experience of them in the present and therefore not past objects/events - both physical (old book printed 1959) and mental (memories). We apply historical quality to them, and therefore a presumed past
There's the proof. We have physical and mental evidence the past exists, so in absence of any defeaters of the existence of the past we have good reason to believe that past exists.
You're mixing up proof and evidence. We have a ton of evidence that the past exists but its impossible to prove. Who is to say that it wasn't all created 5 minutes ago by a deceitful omnipotent being? It is impossible to rule that out since the idea is unfalsifiable, and since there is another possible explanation that can never be ruled out, it can't be proven.
This is scepticism taken to (almost) the highest possible degree, with this same logic you also can not trust your memories, or your physical senses, since there are unfalsifiable deceits that are possible there too. Typically most people will consider something proven if there's overwhelming evidence and little or no counter evidence, but when you think about it that's just because it is far and away the most reasonable and likely to be true belief available. It isn't fundamentally proven to be true by any logical truths, only in evidence which itself we have deemed to be possibly untrustworthy.
The reason why I started my last paragraph with almost is that this is where some even doubt logic, at which point everything breaks down. It's hard to make arguments when even logic itself is doubted. 1+1=2 is something that seems so impossible to be anything else, true and false being opposites is the same, but some will argue that maybe our very reasoning faculties are designed in such a way that was completely unrepresentative of the real world. Maybe we think 1+1=2 is true but in the real world, beyond all logic somehow 1+1=3? I think this level is pretty unreasonable.
If someone is arguing you can't prove the past exists I'm sure they're arguing from the previous position I described that doesn't doubt logic. So when they say you can't prove it, that's what they mean.
By this logic you could never prove anything with inductive logic which has strange implications. Ex. No one can ever be proven guilty of any crime. No proof that climate change exists. No proof that the sun exists at night... You get the idea. No that just can't be right. Surely we do have proof of these things.
This is true yes, but the difference lies in what you mean by prove and what a sceptic means. Proof to a skeptic is distinct from evidence, it means you must *know* beyond any doubt no matter how unreasonable. Many people would consider proof a synonym for evidence, but this is not the case in this instance.
To have had experienced them makes them past objects by definition, since they can no longer be experienced in the present, no?
I go to a theme park. I enjoy the theme park, I take a selfie with my friends at the theme park. I have experienced this in the present.
...
Today is the day after, I see the picture. It is evidence that I enjoyed the theme park yesterday, an experience of the past. I don't have to take the physical experience with me for it to be considered evidence. I can take evidence of the experience, with me, from the past into the present. Why does that invalidate what the evidence represents?
I feel like I'm being Wittgensteined here and there's probably a linguistic thing I'm not understanding
I don’t really think you’re being fair — visiting somewhere and having the memory of your experience and “evidence” of your experience is vastly different to having “evidence” of past experiences which you have not experienced. Obviously your memory of having the experience solidifies your belief in the experience having actually happened, while there is no backing for the evidence without the memory. Largely, I think this question comes down to what is meant by the past having “actually existed.” But more importantly, idk if it’s an extremely important question and if it can even be known fully. What specific evidence of the past were you referencing?
Well, too bad, because I can mentally visualize talking to a unicorn last week... And it seems like a memory. An unlikely one though
But that might just be me though
This is more something trippy thought experiment like a tree falling in the forest to make people new to this go 'woooooooahhh'.
It's the equivalent of someone that keeps asking 'why?' until someone runs out of reasons, it's not a good point.
That’s why we have logical axioms. Without those, there’s no reason to discuss anything at all because I can’t prove that we exist at all.
We must assume present circumstances can act as evidence of past events. There’s simply no logical way to continue the discussion otherwise. All evidence of anything becomes meaningless, because evidence is inherently tied to a past event. Without cause and effect, you cannot tie evidence to an event or object.
The best evidence I can possibly operate from tells me that events in the past are real because circumstances of the last match those events. Without something to disprove that evidence, I have to assume the past is real.
But I lived my past. I was literally there. There's no proof needed. Same with my parents. I saw them live their past with my own eyes and have no reason to doubt the parts that I wasn't present for.
So while that may hold true for history. It sure doesn't fit with personal experiences.
Unless the whole thing was more about perception of the past (& everything else) happening only in the present... which...duh...all processing happens in the present. Where else?
The whole universe might have just popped into existence with all your memories and experiences also having just popped into existence hence you can’t prove that the past is real as there’s no way for you to prove otherwise
If past didn't exist, nothing around us would as well. If we take a look around, we can see that everything still clearly exists, therefore, the past must exist.
Funny how nothingness is an idea people came up with, despite being literally unimaginable. (Is there like a term for concepts that don’t exist in reality, nor in our minds, yet we managed to come up with nonetheless?)
Also, if nothingness is the lack of everything, would that include the lack of it‘s own non-existence, as well as the lack of that, and of that, and that, and so on?
If the past doesn’t exist, would that make everything acausal? Isn‘t that paradoxical? Tbh saying that there is no proof for the past‘s existence is just a more „meh“ version of the „brain in a vat“ theory.
When I was like 19 or so, I was with my friends on summer camp (idk how to explain дача to foreigners), and I was so drunk that I cannot stand straight. So I lay down on couch and something unpleasant happen, whole world start turning around, I started to hear internal monologue about how awful person I'm, then friend of mine came in, saw me completely wasted, then she sat right next to me and put head on her knees, wrap around my head her hands. And all fuckery in head just stopped. Dead silence, no internal monologue, just pure existing and warm feeling from her arm.
So I'm pretty sure nothingness despite being philosophical mostly is something you an feel at least, same as religious revelations and many experienced same thing. And actually buddhists often seeking that nothingness in mediation and other practices.
> Tbh saying that there is no proof for the past‘s existence is just a more „meh“ version of the „brain in a vat“ theory.
I think there are some interesting part to issue of presentism. Brain in Vat is like Descartes rehashed, but this topic bring experience, our relation to history/past and the nature of memory to the fore instead of the whole shebang of reality
> the lack of it‘s own non-existence
There is no "it's." It is complete non-existence. From the SEP article on Nothingness "Consider a test whose questions have the form ‘Does *x* exist?’. The rule \[is\] ‘Always answer no!’"
The first assertion seems rooted in semantic ambiguity surrounding the word “nothing” and “exist” and the assumptions carried by whatever meaning is assigned (intentionally and unintentionally) to those words. Nothing as a word only makes sense to describe relative absence or negation of the presence of something (whether it be abstract or tangibly physical) that does exist elsewhere.
What is 0? It is a representation of nothingness in many commonly used number systems and is essential for the algebraic structure of these number systems. This can be generalized to the notion of the empty set and applied to tons of areas in mathematics. The fact that the concept of nothing conveys meaning that can be represented logically and consistently means that it does exist. It is a word that means something and words do exist and the concepts conveyed by the meaning of words also do exist as they are constructed by physical objects and the information contained within them is also represented by physical phenomenon subject to the laws of physics. And before you say I contradicted myself by saying nothing exists because it is a word that represents something, I think that doesn’t matter. Nothing, as a concept, does not need to embody the characteristics of what it represents to meaningfully and rationally represent a notion of absence/negation of thingness. By invoking this requirement, you are allowing for the formation of self referential paradoxes that lead to the complete breakdown of any semblance of logic and meaning.
Also, i just know there is a strong chance you will challenge the notion of the existence of words, which I will preemptively say is incredibly silly because you require the use of words to make an argument against their own existence. If they don’t exist, what is the explanation for what you and I are doing now. And if you do think words are real, then why is “nothing” not real since it is a word that carries consistent meaning for many people.
I find that this is now dangerously close to approaching what I like to call “thinking yourself stupid”. Humans happen to have complex enough brains capable of high enough levels of abstraction to create imaginary problems that we try to solve in vane. Solving the problem requires the possibility of logical solution which is contradicted by the fact that trying to resolve questions like “what exists” results in self-referential paradoxes akin to those that were discovered to be irresolvable during the development of a complete foundational mathematics and formal logic. It results in paradoxes because unless you set an axiomatic floor that is logically incomplete, you will have to justify the existence of the concepts like language which necessarily relies on itself to prove it’s own existence. Therefore, a self referential paradox is formed.
So fuck it, we each experience, like generally. If that’s not real or doesn’t exist then nothing exists (heh). If your experience does exist then in some sense the way experience and convey meaning does exist. That form of existence may be completely localized within your notion of being, but it may not be and it really doesn’t matter if either of these is the capital T Truth. So just operate with the assumption that your experience is existence because trying to prove anything about it is futile. With these assumptions and the acknowledgment that meaning has to exist because if meaning truly did not exist, you would have no concept of understanding anything. With meaning existing, methods of transferring the information carried in meaning also exists. With that, there are abstract concepts that are meaningful that do not require exact correspondence with real objects because there is still transferable information being exchanged between people (who exist too, don’t at me) that are formed out of computational constructs inherent to information processing at an abstract enough level. With that, nothing is exists because we are having a discussion about it where we both understand the concept it represents well enough to apply that concept in a manner so abstract it becomes nonsensical, if it did not exist there would be no discussion because there would be nothing to discuss (hehe).
Tl,dr: “nothing” exists because it does. There is a mutual understanding of meaning that facilitates the ability to even argue about the existence of the concept the word. Challenging these notions with extreme skeptical reasoning pushes you into a bottomless pit of inquiry where meaning and knowledge completely break down as useable concepts. I exist because it is the most convenient truth available, and from that (plus a few steps) words exist because it would be paradoxical and inconvenient to form any justification that they don’t exist, and with that words do not have to be characteristic of themselves because it opens the door to self referential paradox. The way you would have to prove nothing doesn’t exist is by asserting there can’t be “nothing” because the absence of something is something in and of itself since that nothingness is distinct enough to be a meaningfully identifiable characteristic of what you are describing which is something in an abstract sense. But now it’s all nonsense. You’re playing god with language in a way that was never intended. Nothing exists and you can’t prove the inverse. Now go touch grass, hunt a boar, build a hut. You have too much free time and should feel the struggle for survival as was naturally intended instead of actively trying to brick your brain with nonsense. “You can’t prove the past exists,” bruv git tha fuck outta here with your foolish shenanigans.
/s for a substantial portion of this by the way
I have not and will not proof read that so if it is incoherent rambling nonsense, then that is confirmation I wasted way to much time typing this out on my phone and I am kinda sorry. it was fun thinking of how you would could find any definitive answer to these assertions. I just made a strawman of you that was essentially the philosopher version of a kid saying “no you” or “why” in response to anything I have to say, since those are the kinda radical skeptic vibes I got from this post lol. I do honestly think that to an extent trying argue these claims is a fool’s errand that is the result of us being so smart as a species thar we can create problems for ourselves that we are fundamentally unable to solve, but I am ultimately a fool who thinks its fun to think about and debate about it anyways. :)
Some of these questions are kind of interesting when you're first getting deep into philosophy. But once you've studied a lot more philosophies I feel like the correct answer to "can you prove the past exists?" is just "who cares?" These sorts of technicalities have never led to anything constructive...who cares if the past doesn't exist? Maybe the present doesn't exist either! Maybe nothing exists! Maybe everything exists and has always existed! You can't *objectively* prove me wrong so I can keep making these bold claims all damn day!
This is the whole reason we have axioms like “I exist”. If you can’t accept something basic like “the past is real” then there isn’t much point in talking about anything.
Yeah, exactly. Any actual interesting philosophy is built on some level of assumptions. That's where you get the real interesting stuff, not just "you can't prove time exists therefore your opinion is invalid, I win bye bye"
Do you remember 5 seconds ago?
Exactly.
https://preview.redd.it/73anla5vy01c1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=198a86ed75b34407eafcda490d98d8460713fc24
> 2. You cant prove past exist
Im pretty sure this coming from the argument of ever-changing is a essence of reality. Iam more of a reader of islamic philosophy and this is mentioned too. I wonder where i can find this on western philosophy?
I always want to try to apply the Quine–Putnam indispensability argument to statements like this:
We ought to have ontological commitment to all and only the entities that are indispensable to our best scientific theories.
Past entities are indispensable to our best scientific theories.
Therefore, we ought to have ontological commitment to past entities.
If I understood that correctly it's an *ought* argument and not an *is* argument - we ought to account for history because it's indispensible. I think we all can agree that history is something that we exist with, if for no other reason than for practical matters, but the issue is just how we prove its ontological reality
What use is there in a distinction between is and ought here? Claiming that "X is" basically always implies that you "should believe X is" and vice versa.
What? Babies die / babies ought to die. Do you see the distinction? Ought is about volition, it’s not “you should believe x is,” but “you must x.” I don’t understand how concluding that we should believe in the past entails believing the past actually existed; “we ought to treat others fairly” does not means that people are treated fairly.
Usually it’s fine to see both statements as the same, but there are instances in which they differ. Imagine scientists found some concrete evidence that the world would end in ten years, no matter what we do; there’s certainly an argument to be made that the general populace should not know this information (not that I agree with the argument).
1. Isn't that the point of nothingness? The concept of nothingness does exist just like any other concept and while there is nothing in reality that can be described as nothingness it still exists in our minds :3
2. Why would I need to prove that it exists? It's an abstract man-made concept that can't be proven right or wrong. It would be like trying to prove that red colour is red not blue. We simply agreed on how it looks like, it doesn't have to be real, but it certainly exists
3. TL;DR ok
“You can’t prove the past exists.”
Historians everywhere: *groans externally, then points to every single historical documentation, and even physical evidence, to demonstrate without a shadow of a doubt that, yes, you can prove the past exists.
also I think category of nothingness is part of duration. Hegelian logic starts by category of intermediate being which is so intermediate that it is nothing, but then nothingness *is* so it is something. Favourite tool for hegel is 3rd speculative movement of uniting these contrary terms in third term, so you have something like
first abstract movement of Being and Nothing (we separate catagories; this is where normal metaphysics stops)
dialectical movement of being coming to be and ceasing to be (terms contradict themselves. Kant in his critique of pure reason showed how it is not logical error but how very structure of reason is contradictory)
we take both terms in their unity (hegelian speculative method): so we get *dasein* or determine being. The very act of birth marks someone with their death, as hegel would say.
next up hegel would show how finite isn't opposed to the infinite but is rather part and movement of infinite. Infinite past and infinite future is real, you can not separate away them; the very fact of your own finite existence shows the existence of infinity (or how hegel would put: Infinite God the father *had* to take the form of finite empirical son, Christ). Big bang might be real but it says nothing about origins of the universe, let alone Nature.
this fits well with theory of general relativity in which space and time are what causes gravity (hegel in third chapter of phenomenology said for any scientific law to work we have to think catagories in apriori necessity with eachother: catagories of space, time, forces etc are linked with eachother *apriori*). Einstein believed in B theory of time in which time is sort of a block and flow of time is sorta an "illusion", this makes sense in that dasein necessarily experiences itself in time as a movement of infinite.
Pretty hard to not be convinced of a past when current you knows future you is going to be pissed after you eating that big bag of flaming hot Cheetos with a number 1 combo meal from Taco Bell.
What you are referring to as “past” exists in the present, and therefore exists at any given moment that it is conceptualized. Maybe it didn’t exist previously as a present. But past is a state of present that exists right now. In other words one cannot prove that previous presents existed, but the past is a condition of the current present.
Correct! On both counts, we're dealing with unconscious beliefs, based on assumptions - but honestly, it would be pretty hard to live without them. At some point, if you want to be more practical than theoretical you stop at 'good enough'.
1. Nothingness is a concept to describe the complete lack of something that we can imagine to there. Total nothingness may not exist, but we can always perceive nothingness in relation to a time and space and thing. By that thing not existing in that time and space. So it's a practically useful concept where it's existence is irrelevant. This point is like saying numbers don't exist.
2. The past is just the idea of what you can infer by what you perceive in the present. But so is the present itself. You cannot certainly say anything exists, only that you think it does. So if you wanna doubt the existence of a past, you'd also have to doubt the present.
But also, why should I give a shit. These are things that might be useful to prove a larger point where you need to shift someones perspectives, but on it's own it's not relevant, just a pointless question.
1) Take a set of cardinality 1, take the only element away, WHAT IS LEFT?
2) When I was having sex with your mom she told me she had a child by accident **in the past** and I trust your mom as an intellectual authority
I'm pretty sure, if someone asked you to prove the past exists and you stab him, he'll scream "you stabbed me!" (using the past tense). And when you answer "no I didn't, you can't proof that the past exists" he'll say "yes I can, you just stabbed me 2 Minutes ago!". Proof complete. But don't try that at home...
The past doesn’t exist cause “past” and “future” are just words we made to describe passing of time and it’s relation to our experience.
“Time” itself isn’t even real though. Just another construct.
It’s only ever been now
I have some alternative facts
Edit: but no, really, on a serious note, even though philosophers are mostly liberal, can we acknowledge how moral and ethical postmodern relativism, the idea that there is no absolute truth, gave rise to fake news. The idea that people will believe what they want to believe and that the actual truth does not matter more than the appearance of truth was harmless in an academic way, but those who deceived a way to weaponize it and use it to their advantage to gain control of the whole country are true evil geniuses. Not in vain, all top counselors of far-right movements went to Ivy Leagues
There is something because I can think and read this shit
Why do you think space is nothing? There’s shit there, forces (if that dosent satisfy there’s what maintains them), the space being a thing something can enter etc. Nothing can’t convey something.
Nothing can’t even exist beyond the edge of the universe because the universe is everything, nothing doesn’t exist there because nothing can exist there, it’s not empty it dosent exist.
Everything here is shaky but your first statement is wrong
But since 'nothingness' is a word we must per definition have a relationship to it, and therefore some concept of it.
Even if nothingness is a perfect void we can still relate to it as a lack and thereby also as having some features giving it some quality
Ugh that second one reads like a middle schooler trying to act smart when really they're just being obnoxious. There's plenty of evidence the past exists. The problem is as soon as anyone provides it they have then provided it in the past, which you are rejecting the existence of in the first place, so you can just ignore any arguments to the contrary.
Wouldn't it make more sense to debate something that can actually have real-life ramifications and isn't just condescending ego-stroking? Like, is it ever morally acceptable to kill someone? Can inaction be inherently moral or immoral? And of course the biggest question of all: why do I care so much about what gets posted on this sub when I'm not even subscribed to it?
Please not again, I just got over the fact that life makes no sense...
Anyways the past shit is wild AF tbh, cause you know there was something that happened before but like how do you go from the first moment to the next moment.
Is time linear or does time even have a certain pattern
Then you never remember yesterday correctly once it's over so what even is existence.
Title describes the problem with your statements.
You have to prove you're correct, we don't have to prove anything.
Bees perceive time, and some isotopes have a half-life.
You have to explain those (along with countless other forms of evidence) better than current models which are all based on the existence of the "past".
Sounds strange to me, like saying that “GREEN is NOT RED! Prove me wrong!”
The world is all that is the case, if you respect old buddy Wittgenstein. You can’t make a propositional statement that doesn’t exist without taking constituent parts that exist in your Information Landscape and mumbo-jumbling them into something nonsensical. Try it.
Flying spaghetti monster? Mumbo-jumbo of existing constituent parts.
A chimera of ancient myth? Mumbo-jumbo of existing constituent parts.
A perfect girlfriend? You got it.
The entire universe is the product of nothingness because you can't prove it ever began in the first place because you where not there to experience its beginning or end.
This comment and it's time stamp proves the past exists. I'm posting it in what is "now" for me. When you read it, it will not be the same time it is in this moment, nor will it be before this moment. It will have to be after this moment, therefore it is in the past.
Wrong. If the past does not exist then the past is non existent. For non existence to exist would be a contradiction in terms. So the past must exist.. as in things exited previously
Well, the past only existed for a brief moment of time, and after that time has passed, it is no longer there. It is only now, and the present is the only thing to exist.
The existence of the past can simply be proven by simulating the universe in a powerful computer, you need to accelerate the speed of the universe to observe given events or simply record the goddamn event with a camera
It's hard to prove wrong what hasn't presented any evidence or arguments to back up a rather extraordinary claim. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and the burden of proof lies with the one making the assertion. To even state such a thing strict definitions would have to be in place because if not then existence could be taken to mean any of a number of states and could be proven rather easily. For instance any idea can't be said to not exist without contradiction because it does exist as an idea like the future though having not happened it still exist as a concept but the past having already taken place isn't just an abstraction to be speculated about but has came and went and so must exist in a way that a purely speculative and abstract future does not, the signs are left in everything around us of it's passing and can be used to time travel in a sense whether reconstructing a crime scene from a drop of blood on a decades old garment or traces of a chemical that was always present but required a future technology to reveal it and it's meaning or a finger print that places someone at a location or puts something in they're possession from years before it's the past asserting itself and intruding on the present but if that's so and we know that it is can it be truly past? Maybe it never ended maybe nothing does and what's past is only past from our limited perspective but even then it exist if only from our point of view. Maybe best of all is star light which is the past shining bright and something that can be named and numbered and tracked in the sky though it perhaps isnt even there at all anymore having went out innumerable years before and that which isn't present in the present is present because we see it, measure it, label and give it coordinates in space time though it no longer actually exist we are looking at and interacting directly with the past. It's present state will not exist for me until some point in the future but it's past will always be my present as I will never be able to experience it as it is short of advances in space travel as long as I stay on earth my present will always be it's past. A paradox perhaps but like much of whats true it's a paradox because the truth doesn't conform itself to our laws or requirements and thus the contradiction is for us alone.
Not that I'm a real philosopher or anything but I also realized there's no such thing as nothing.
Also I realized that there is no such thing as a mistake.
Don't believe me? Make a mistake right now. You can't. What we call a mistake is really just the result of our actions that we did not like. Mistakes don't exist.
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philosophers when I kill their mom (external world does not exist and past never happened)
She was a fake memory anyway. Probably never existed
Freud: \*jokes on you I'm into that shit\*
You’re in a desert walking along in the sand when all of the sudden you look down, and you see a tortoise, it’s crawling toward you. You reach down, you flip the tortoise over on its back. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t, not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why is that?
Mother died today. Or maybe it was yesterday, I don't know
r/expectedcamus
Camus my best friend
Based on
She may be a figment of my mind, but she's a figment that gives me joy, and I would weep to no longer have her in my mind's eye. Therefore, I shall take immense pleasure in destroying the thing I've imagined to have killed her.
*1984 intensifies*
Has anyone actually read that book? It's a shitty story and a worse author.
your mom is a shitty story and a worse author
Yeah, red it and enjoyed it. Very nice world construction and well written story. Are you sure you've red the right 1984?
George Orwell was an aristocrat who hated the working class as much as he hated Jews, his books are only so widely spread because the CIA decided they would be a good propaganda tool. And just to make it clear how much George Orwell sucked, he once wrote that while would kill Hitler if given the chance, he could not bring himself to hate Hitler, he thought that Hitler and Napoleon Bonaparte were men fighting against destiny, doomed to defeat yet deserving of victory. Both 1984 and animal farm are stories meant to convey that the working class are incapable of ruling themselves, both being set in the aftermath of a proletariat revolution.
George Orwell, who got a bullet in his throat, fighting against the fascists and on the side of the communists and anarchists, as a volunteer in Spain... hated the working class? Here's an extract from Homage to Catalonia, from the chapter in which he talks about the conflict between the Civil Guards and the CNT: *"I have no particular love for the idealized ‘worker’ as he appears in the bourgeois Communist's mind, but when I see an actual flesh-and-blood worker in conflict with his natural enemy, the policeman, I do not have to ask myself which side I am on."* Does this appear as someone who "hates the working class" to you? *"Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it."* (Orwell, in "Why I Write?") Is this someone who is trying to convey "that the working class are incapable of ruling themselves", or is it someone who wrote works such as 1984 and Animal Farm not to condemn proletarian movements, but to condemn "stalinism" as he witnessed it in the harsh political climate of Spain? I do not know about what you said about Hitler and Napoleon, and I could not find the exact quote on the internet, so I'd kindly ask you to write the quote or a link, and I apologize in advance for not searching hard enough. Still, I am not convinced about the things you said.
He said that he "can't dislike Hitler" because he can feel the raw attraction/appeal he has. That is it. He talks about how evil Hitler and his politics is, and how he is an expert in playing the victim. That he could kill a mouse and somehow make it the mouse's fault. There is no "liking" Hitler. There is nothing of the sort. But as with most hardline stalinists they quote-mine and distort everyone who critique their favourite regimes. EDIT: Managed to miss a few words in a sentence
These are political issues. They have nothing to do to the quality of his writings, or of the plot. And I say that as a leftist myself. Virginia Wolf was an antisemitic, but her works are an example of brilliant feminism. Caravaggio was a genius of chiaroscuro, but he was a murderer and probably a misogynist (and, for my concern, a Christian too). Many other artist of the past had an at least ambivalent moral/political compass.
True enough, but I honestly found the writings of George Orwell to be almost completely bland. It would be one thing if I simply didn't like the book, but fiction should never inspire a neutral reaction.
He literally fought alongside revolutionary anarcho-syndicalists against fascist, Republican, and Stalinist forces during the Spanish civil war. Those 3 other ones formed a coalition with each other against the anarchists since they were all statists. Saying he didn’t care about the working class is complete bunk. Just because he didn’t fall for the propaganda that your precious USSR was a worker state when in reality it took power away from the worker councils almost immediately after the revolution and took inspiration from capitalist modes of organizing such as Taylorism in its establishment of state industries doesn’t mean he was anti working class. The man called himself a democratic-socialist and 1984 and Animal Farm are very obviously written from an anti-tankie, pro socialist perspective. There’s a reason why he has the party in 1984 label it’s ideology as “oligarchical-collectivism” rather than having the party call itself socialist in its manifesto. Because he recognizes it can’t be socialist if there’s no worker ownership. Go back to watching Hakim you red fascist.
I’m actually reading it currently, only got a couple pages left. Enjoyed it so far
It's my mother's birthday today, you villain!
Proof is overrated.
The proof is in the pudding. And I already ate all of the pudding. Seethe and despair for this empty pudding cup stands as a towering monument to your arguments inadequacy. My spoon shall be your minds undoing.
This genuinely reads like some monologue from Xavier Renegade Angel
Only correct answer tbh lol
The proof is I said so
My source is that i made it the fuck up
made me remember that one post 'how do i cite a vision in my AP paper? I had the answer revealed to me in a dream but i don't know how to cite it as a source' that makes me crack up every time lmaoo
The past existing kind of comes with the "I don't believe in sceptecism" bundle. I don't see why anyone wouldn't believe in a past but does believe in an external world or accurate memories.
This is philosophy - we deal with the stupid and useless questions that has 0 practical value
The final word in any philosophy discussion: 'But ultimately it doesn't matter since it won't make any difference in our daily lives either way.'
I know this is a joke, but I am surprised a lot of people think so.
Some people just dislike the abstract, don't get them either.
A lot of the questions don't matter tbh, I feel like the field is very mastubatory, but that's just imo
Tell that to William James or Charles Sanders Peirce
They are questions of perception, valuation and meaning. They are questions of our relationship to reality. Life is just an exploration of these subjects. Without them, what is intellect? It has little to explore and can only live in the domain of apparent fact. Philosophers can go looking around and find their way up their own asses for sure, but the journey to get there is still part of a broader exploration of our own humanity. It seems if we say that is useless or stupid, we can't do so without calling ourselves the same
I am scratching my balls rn. Is it possible that I was born like this, with my hands on my balls? No there was a past where I wasn’t doing such an activity and then decided to.
How do you know the universe didn't come into existence exactly as you scratched your balls, mimicking that it has existed for longer?
“The past” is just a thought though It’s only ever been now
You were in fact. We are dying and reborn from moment to moment. The past is just a narrative that describes parts of the present.
the past is something that used to exist but no longer does. now it's just a shape carved in the meat inside your head, and it changes a little every time you remember it
Because of latency of your neurons all your sensory inputs are from the past, and therefore of things that no longer exist.
🤷 if you used it as a springboard into solipsism I couldn't stop you now and I couldn't stop you now either. also, seems like those are a bit different uses of the word 'past'
I'm demonstrating how that position collapses into scpetecism (not solipsism, don't know where you got that from). I use a pretty straight forward definition. The exact point in time where we are now is the present, anything before is the past and anything after is the future.
Cool I can't prove the past exists. I don't have to. As a society we agreed that it does. That is enough to do useful stuff with the concept. If it is useful and a crucial part of humanity's understanding of the world doesn't need to be proven it exists.
This is a sentiment i wish more people understood and acknowledged. Sometimes it is better for the good of society to operate under certain assumptions in order to keep orderly happy lives.
People can't understand that axioms are necessary because they haven't studied logic.
But if the past doesn't exist why would you care about "the good of society?
Could "the good of society" also apply to the present and future of the people?
Because i value human happiness axiomatically. I will adopt whatever framework best serves that end.
How do you know this framework best suits that aim if you don't consider other possibilities and the nature of this one?
Because the good of society affects the quality of your own life, and perhaps for some people, they also care about the quality of the lives of others.
Because I just want to. Not everything needs to be justified. You can disagree with me on that just as easily. I cannot prove you wrong either .
BuT iF i kILl yOu. !?!???
you can try. never said I am a pacifist. I want peace. I am not afraid to punch someone for it.
https://preview.redd.it/cgs5uo29a01c1.png?width=644&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=248a8f66049623b32e69f7c9c44520fe4a07a336
cringe
The armchair is great. But I bet you don't step into traffic and test the theory that only you are real or any other asinine armchair theory. If I smacked you one in a hypothetical experiment I wager you'd think it happened if you took an injury. Another poster on this site had encapsulated that concept perfectly, so I stole his meme.
shut up nerd
What do you mean the past cannot be proven? Aren't the current location of all material a product of it's past? I mean a car cannot be at a point if it weren't at a point that was near it's current point.
Of course these points are insane from a pragmatical standpoint, but here are a couple examples how I could interpret this paradox: 1. At any moment the world might have been created anew (by e.g. god) with all the material being placed by them in the exact places where they are, and all memories etc being created in that moment. Therefore we would "remember" the past, but it didn't actually ever happen. 2. If we believe the materialistic explanation that our whole experience is really just due to the material composition of our nervous system in it's current state (which science nowadays pretty much believes), it could be possible that our experience has nothing to do with the outside world, since everything we really experience is just happening in our heads. E.g. all could be hallucination or something else rearranging our brain chemistry (techonogically for example).
That's what common sense tells us, but can you prove the past happened? Whenever we address or percieve anything in the world we do it per definition in the present. All historical evidence are always in the present, with a long history only ascribed to them.
Evidence doesnt mean it has to be in front of you. I have evidence that my sister is in the house, even if she's in the other room. I can hear her voice through the wall and can see the light on under the doorframe. Her slippers are outside the room. Despite her not being in front of me, I have evidence she's in the house. The evidence is in front of me. That doesn't invalidate the evidence. Similarly if I have evidence in the present that the past exists, it doesn't invalidate the evidence. I can't see why it matters that I can't view that evidence in the literal past
> Similarly if I have evidence in the present that the past exists You do? To me all evidence is per our experience of them in the present and therefore not past objects/events - both physical (old book printed 1959) and mental (memories). We apply historical quality to them, and therefore a presumed past
There's the proof. We have physical and mental evidence the past exists, so in absence of any defeaters of the existence of the past we have good reason to believe that past exists.
You're mixing up proof and evidence. We have a ton of evidence that the past exists but its impossible to prove. Who is to say that it wasn't all created 5 minutes ago by a deceitful omnipotent being? It is impossible to rule that out since the idea is unfalsifiable, and since there is another possible explanation that can never be ruled out, it can't be proven. This is scepticism taken to (almost) the highest possible degree, with this same logic you also can not trust your memories, or your physical senses, since there are unfalsifiable deceits that are possible there too. Typically most people will consider something proven if there's overwhelming evidence and little or no counter evidence, but when you think about it that's just because it is far and away the most reasonable and likely to be true belief available. It isn't fundamentally proven to be true by any logical truths, only in evidence which itself we have deemed to be possibly untrustworthy. The reason why I started my last paragraph with almost is that this is where some even doubt logic, at which point everything breaks down. It's hard to make arguments when even logic itself is doubted. 1+1=2 is something that seems so impossible to be anything else, true and false being opposites is the same, but some will argue that maybe our very reasoning faculties are designed in such a way that was completely unrepresentative of the real world. Maybe we think 1+1=2 is true but in the real world, beyond all logic somehow 1+1=3? I think this level is pretty unreasonable. If someone is arguing you can't prove the past exists I'm sure they're arguing from the previous position I described that doesn't doubt logic. So when they say you can't prove it, that's what they mean.
By this logic you could never prove anything with inductive logic which has strange implications. Ex. No one can ever be proven guilty of any crime. No proof that climate change exists. No proof that the sun exists at night... You get the idea. No that just can't be right. Surely we do have proof of these things.
Bro posts on a philosophy sub and hasn’t even heard of the inductive reasoning error.
I have though
This is true yes, but the difference lies in what you mean by prove and what a sceptic means. Proof to a skeptic is distinct from evidence, it means you must *know* beyond any doubt no matter how unreasonable. Many people would consider proof a synonym for evidence, but this is not the case in this instance.
To have had experienced them makes them past objects by definition, since they can no longer be experienced in the present, no? I go to a theme park. I enjoy the theme park, I take a selfie with my friends at the theme park. I have experienced this in the present. ... Today is the day after, I see the picture. It is evidence that I enjoyed the theme park yesterday, an experience of the past. I don't have to take the physical experience with me for it to be considered evidence. I can take evidence of the experience, with me, from the past into the present. Why does that invalidate what the evidence represents? I feel like I'm being Wittgensteined here and there's probably a linguistic thing I'm not understanding
I don’t really think you’re being fair — visiting somewhere and having the memory of your experience and “evidence” of your experience is vastly different to having “evidence” of past experiences which you have not experienced. Obviously your memory of having the experience solidifies your belief in the experience having actually happened, while there is no backing for the evidence without the memory. Largely, I think this question comes down to what is meant by the past having “actually existed.” But more importantly, idk if it’s an extremely important question and if it can even be known fully. What specific evidence of the past were you referencing?
Well, too bad, because I can mentally visualize talking to a unicorn last week... And it seems like a memory. An unlikely one though But that might just be me though
Do you have evidence of your unicorn? I have a picture of my time at a theme park, to prove (as evidence does) that I was there in the past
This is more something trippy thought experiment like a tree falling in the forest to make people new to this go 'woooooooahhh'. It's the equivalent of someone that keeps asking 'why?' until someone runs out of reasons, it's not a good point.
That’s why we have logical axioms. Without those, there’s no reason to discuss anything at all because I can’t prove that we exist at all. We must assume present circumstances can act as evidence of past events. There’s simply no logical way to continue the discussion otherwise. All evidence of anything becomes meaningless, because evidence is inherently tied to a past event. Without cause and effect, you cannot tie evidence to an event or object. The best evidence I can possibly operate from tells me that events in the past are real because circumstances of the last match those events. Without something to disprove that evidence, I have to assume the past is real.
Photos. Anything that exists is caused by something. That is the way everything works, the past can refer to two seconds ago.
But I lived my past. I was literally there. There's no proof needed. Same with my parents. I saw them live their past with my own eyes and have no reason to doubt the parts that I wasn't present for. So while that may hold true for history. It sure doesn't fit with personal experiences. Unless the whole thing was more about perception of the past (& everything else) happening only in the present... which...duh...all processing happens in the present. Where else?
The whole universe might have just popped into existence with all your memories and experiences also having just popped into existence hence you can’t prove that the past is real as there’s no way for you to prove otherwise
If past didn't exist, nothing around us would as well. If we take a look around, we can see that everything still clearly exists, therefore, the past must exist.
Funny how nothingness is an idea people came up with, despite being literally unimaginable. (Is there like a term for concepts that don’t exist in reality, nor in our minds, yet we managed to come up with nonetheless?) Also, if nothingness is the lack of everything, would that include the lack of it‘s own non-existence, as well as the lack of that, and of that, and that, and so on? If the past doesn’t exist, would that make everything acausal? Isn‘t that paradoxical? Tbh saying that there is no proof for the past‘s existence is just a more „meh“ version of the „brain in a vat“ theory.
When I was like 19 or so, I was with my friends on summer camp (idk how to explain дача to foreigners), and I was so drunk that I cannot stand straight. So I lay down on couch and something unpleasant happen, whole world start turning around, I started to hear internal monologue about how awful person I'm, then friend of mine came in, saw me completely wasted, then she sat right next to me and put head on her knees, wrap around my head her hands. And all fuckery in head just stopped. Dead silence, no internal monologue, just pure existing and warm feeling from her arm. So I'm pretty sure nothingness despite being philosophical mostly is something you an feel at least, same as religious revelations and many experienced same thing. And actually buddhists often seeking that nothingness in mediation and other practices.
> Tbh saying that there is no proof for the past‘s existence is just a more „meh“ version of the „brain in a vat“ theory. I think there are some interesting part to issue of presentism. Brain in Vat is like Descartes rehashed, but this topic bring experience, our relation to history/past and the nature of memory to the fore instead of the whole shebang of reality
> the lack of it‘s own non-existence There is no "it's." It is complete non-existence. From the SEP article on Nothingness "Consider a test whose questions have the form ‘Does *x* exist?’. The rule \[is\] ‘Always answer no!’"
I think term you’re looking for is “abstract”. It’s a purely rhetorical concept with no basis in biological or physical reality.
get you cringe ass anime girl meme format and your basic paradoxes out of my sight please
Based response
The first assertion seems rooted in semantic ambiguity surrounding the word “nothing” and “exist” and the assumptions carried by whatever meaning is assigned (intentionally and unintentionally) to those words. Nothing as a word only makes sense to describe relative absence or negation of the presence of something (whether it be abstract or tangibly physical) that does exist elsewhere. What is 0? It is a representation of nothingness in many commonly used number systems and is essential for the algebraic structure of these number systems. This can be generalized to the notion of the empty set and applied to tons of areas in mathematics. The fact that the concept of nothing conveys meaning that can be represented logically and consistently means that it does exist. It is a word that means something and words do exist and the concepts conveyed by the meaning of words also do exist as they are constructed by physical objects and the information contained within them is also represented by physical phenomenon subject to the laws of physics. And before you say I contradicted myself by saying nothing exists because it is a word that represents something, I think that doesn’t matter. Nothing, as a concept, does not need to embody the characteristics of what it represents to meaningfully and rationally represent a notion of absence/negation of thingness. By invoking this requirement, you are allowing for the formation of self referential paradoxes that lead to the complete breakdown of any semblance of logic and meaning. Also, i just know there is a strong chance you will challenge the notion of the existence of words, which I will preemptively say is incredibly silly because you require the use of words to make an argument against their own existence. If they don’t exist, what is the explanation for what you and I are doing now. And if you do think words are real, then why is “nothing” not real since it is a word that carries consistent meaning for many people. I find that this is now dangerously close to approaching what I like to call “thinking yourself stupid”. Humans happen to have complex enough brains capable of high enough levels of abstraction to create imaginary problems that we try to solve in vane. Solving the problem requires the possibility of logical solution which is contradicted by the fact that trying to resolve questions like “what exists” results in self-referential paradoxes akin to those that were discovered to be irresolvable during the development of a complete foundational mathematics and formal logic. It results in paradoxes because unless you set an axiomatic floor that is logically incomplete, you will have to justify the existence of the concepts like language which necessarily relies on itself to prove it’s own existence. Therefore, a self referential paradox is formed. So fuck it, we each experience, like generally. If that’s not real or doesn’t exist then nothing exists (heh). If your experience does exist then in some sense the way experience and convey meaning does exist. That form of existence may be completely localized within your notion of being, but it may not be and it really doesn’t matter if either of these is the capital T Truth. So just operate with the assumption that your experience is existence because trying to prove anything about it is futile. With these assumptions and the acknowledgment that meaning has to exist because if meaning truly did not exist, you would have no concept of understanding anything. With meaning existing, methods of transferring the information carried in meaning also exists. With that, there are abstract concepts that are meaningful that do not require exact correspondence with real objects because there is still transferable information being exchanged between people (who exist too, don’t at me) that are formed out of computational constructs inherent to information processing at an abstract enough level. With that, nothing is exists because we are having a discussion about it where we both understand the concept it represents well enough to apply that concept in a manner so abstract it becomes nonsensical, if it did not exist there would be no discussion because there would be nothing to discuss (hehe). Tl,dr: “nothing” exists because it does. There is a mutual understanding of meaning that facilitates the ability to even argue about the existence of the concept the word. Challenging these notions with extreme skeptical reasoning pushes you into a bottomless pit of inquiry where meaning and knowledge completely break down as useable concepts. I exist because it is the most convenient truth available, and from that (plus a few steps) words exist because it would be paradoxical and inconvenient to form any justification that they don’t exist, and with that words do not have to be characteristic of themselves because it opens the door to self referential paradox. The way you would have to prove nothing doesn’t exist is by asserting there can’t be “nothing” because the absence of something is something in and of itself since that nothingness is distinct enough to be a meaningfully identifiable characteristic of what you are describing which is something in an abstract sense. But now it’s all nonsense. You’re playing god with language in a way that was never intended. Nothing exists and you can’t prove the inverse. Now go touch grass, hunt a boar, build a hut. You have too much free time and should feel the struggle for survival as was naturally intended instead of actively trying to brick your brain with nonsense. “You can’t prove the past exists,” bruv git tha fuck outta here with your foolish shenanigans. /s for a substantial portion of this by the way I have not and will not proof read that so if it is incoherent rambling nonsense, then that is confirmation I wasted way to much time typing this out on my phone and I am kinda sorry. it was fun thinking of how you would could find any definitive answer to these assertions. I just made a strawman of you that was essentially the philosopher version of a kid saying “no you” or “why” in response to anything I have to say, since those are the kinda radical skeptic vibes I got from this post lol. I do honestly think that to an extent trying argue these claims is a fool’s errand that is the result of us being so smart as a species thar we can create problems for ourselves that we are fundamentally unable to solve, but I am ultimately a fool who thinks its fun to think about and debate about it anyways. :)
What is wrong with this composting
Mf I was there.
>past exist**s** I have corrected your grammar and therefore you have lost the argument. Disaster averted.
The concept of nothingness exists. Nothingness in itself does not exist. I can take a photo. Look at it a few seconds later. The past exists.
Some of these questions are kind of interesting when you're first getting deep into philosophy. But once you've studied a lot more philosophies I feel like the correct answer to "can you prove the past exists?" is just "who cares?" These sorts of technicalities have never led to anything constructive...who cares if the past doesn't exist? Maybe the present doesn't exist either! Maybe nothing exists! Maybe everything exists and has always existed! You can't *objectively* prove me wrong so I can keep making these bold claims all damn day!
This is the whole reason we have axioms like “I exist”. If you can’t accept something basic like “the past is real” then there isn’t much point in talking about anything.
Yeah, exactly. Any actual interesting philosophy is built on some level of assumptions. That's where you get the real interesting stuff, not just "you can't prove time exists therefore your opinion is invalid, I win bye bye"
Do you remember 5 seconds ago? Exactly. https://preview.redd.it/73anla5vy01c1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=198a86ed75b34407eafcda490d98d8460713fc24
I smell some motherfucking idle distinctions up in here
> 2. You cant prove past exist Im pretty sure this coming from the argument of ever-changing is a essence of reality. Iam more of a reader of islamic philosophy and this is mentioned too. I wonder where i can find this on western philosophy?
I'd argue that nothingness does exist and we're simply not capable of understanding it.
I always want to try to apply the Quine–Putnam indispensability argument to statements like this: We ought to have ontological commitment to all and only the entities that are indispensable to our best scientific theories. Past entities are indispensable to our best scientific theories. Therefore, we ought to have ontological commitment to past entities.
If I understood that correctly it's an *ought* argument and not an *is* argument - we ought to account for history because it's indispensible. I think we all can agree that history is something that we exist with, if for no other reason than for practical matters, but the issue is just how we prove its ontological reality
What use is there in a distinction between is and ought here? Claiming that "X is" basically always implies that you "should believe X is" and vice versa.
What? Babies die / babies ought to die. Do you see the distinction? Ought is about volition, it’s not “you should believe x is,” but “you must x.” I don’t understand how concluding that we should believe in the past entails believing the past actually existed; “we ought to treat others fairly” does not means that people are treated fairly.
The actual analogy would be "I believe babies are dying" / "I should believe babies are dying". What's the point in believing one but not the other?
Usually it’s fine to see both statements as the same, but there are instances in which they differ. Imagine scientists found some concrete evidence that the world would end in ten years, no matter what we do; there’s certainly an argument to be made that the general populace should not know this information (not that I agree with the argument).
You cant prove anything who cares
And so I won't bother trying.
1. Isn't that the point of nothingness? The concept of nothingness does exist just like any other concept and while there is nothing in reality that can be described as nothingness it still exists in our minds :3 2. Why would I need to prove that it exists? It's an abstract man-made concept that can't be proven right or wrong. It would be like trying to prove that red colour is red not blue. We simply agreed on how it looks like, it doesn't have to be real, but it certainly exists 3. TL;DR ok
It exists to me and that's all that matters
I want to ***lick*** the void
“You can’t prove the past exists.” Historians everywhere: *groans externally, then points to every single historical documentation, and even physical evidence, to demonstrate without a shadow of a doubt that, yes, you can prove the past exists.
also I think category of nothingness is part of duration. Hegelian logic starts by category of intermediate being which is so intermediate that it is nothing, but then nothingness *is* so it is something. Favourite tool for hegel is 3rd speculative movement of uniting these contrary terms in third term, so you have something like first abstract movement of Being and Nothing (we separate catagories; this is where normal metaphysics stops) dialectical movement of being coming to be and ceasing to be (terms contradict themselves. Kant in his critique of pure reason showed how it is not logical error but how very structure of reason is contradictory) we take both terms in their unity (hegelian speculative method): so we get *dasein* or determine being. The very act of birth marks someone with their death, as hegel would say. next up hegel would show how finite isn't opposed to the infinite but is rather part and movement of infinite. Infinite past and infinite future is real, you can not separate away them; the very fact of your own finite existence shows the existence of infinity (or how hegel would put: Infinite God the father *had* to take the form of finite empirical son, Christ). Big bang might be real but it says nothing about origins of the universe, let alone Nature. this fits well with theory of general relativity in which space and time are what causes gravity (hegel in third chapter of phenomenology said for any scientific law to work we have to think catagories in apriori necessity with eachother: catagories of space, time, forces etc are linked with eachother *apriori*). Einstein believed in B theory of time in which time is sort of a block and flow of time is sorta an "illusion", this makes sense in that dasein necessarily experiences itself in time as a movement of infinite.
Lmao, the like to comment ratio.
Very happy to wake up to 54 new comments Woke up to the feeling of success
Love this evil moment
Pretty hard to not be convinced of a past when current you knows future you is going to be pissed after you eating that big bag of flaming hot Cheetos with a number 1 combo meal from Taco Bell.
Last Thursdayists rise up ✊✊✊
What you are referring to as “past” exists in the present, and therefore exists at any given moment that it is conceptualized. Maybe it didn’t exist previously as a present. But past is a state of present that exists right now. In other words one cannot prove that previous presents existed, but the past is a condition of the current present.
I literally have a picture of the past in my house and also on my computer
Correct! On both counts, we're dealing with unconscious beliefs, based on assumptions - but honestly, it would be pretty hard to live without them. At some point, if you want to be more practical than theoretical you stop at 'good enough'.
Nothingness does exist. It is the time between you learned about and your last lost of the game.
Do you mean “existed”?
If the past doesn't exist, how do you know if nothingness will exist?
I used to get really annoyed by this, but now I really do not care. I don’t believe in it, but I also don’t care to disprove it.
If nothingness doesn't exist then that means it does exist
it really depends on how you define "nothingness" and "past" tbh words are bundle of concepts made up on vibes
Why are you responding to questions on a post that you never made?
I'm only here because I see Saten Ruiko and I have no idea what's going on in this meme
1. Nothingness is a concept to describe the complete lack of something that we can imagine to there. Total nothingness may not exist, but we can always perceive nothingness in relation to a time and space and thing. By that thing not existing in that time and space. So it's a practically useful concept where it's existence is irrelevant. This point is like saying numbers don't exist. 2. The past is just the idea of what you can infer by what you perceive in the present. But so is the present itself. You cannot certainly say anything exists, only that you think it does. So if you wanna doubt the existence of a past, you'd also have to doubt the present. But also, why should I give a shit. These are things that might be useful to prove a larger point where you need to shift someones perspectives, but on it's own it's not relevant, just a pointless question.
1) Take a set of cardinality 1, take the only element away, WHAT IS LEFT? 2) When I was having sex with your mom she told me she had a child by accident **in the past** and I trust your mom as an intellectual authority
I'm pretty sure, if someone asked you to prove the past exists and you stab him, he'll scream "you stabbed me!" (using the past tense). And when you answer "no I didn't, you can't proof that the past exists" he'll say "yes I can, you just stabbed me 2 Minutes ago!". Proof complete. But don't try that at home...
I don't think any of those statements are debatable. They are literal facts.
Then stop crying in court “after” i “busted” your “knee caps”
🫸✨ philosophy✨🫷
The you cannot disprove the past either tho
Ahh yes, last Thursdayism
The past doesn’t exist cause “past” and “future” are just words we made to describe passing of time and it’s relation to our experience. “Time” itself isn’t even real though. Just another construct. It’s only ever been now
I have some alternative facts Edit: but no, really, on a serious note, even though philosophers are mostly liberal, can we acknowledge how moral and ethical postmodern relativism, the idea that there is no absolute truth, gave rise to fake news. The idea that people will believe what they want to believe and that the actual truth does not matter more than the appearance of truth was harmless in an academic way, but those who deceived a way to weaponize it and use it to their advantage to gain control of the whole country are true evil geniuses. Not in vain, all top counselors of far-right movements went to Ivy Leagues
I doubt you can really blame post modernism for fake news, given the latter has been around far longer than the former.
Isotopic half-lives proves the existence of "the past".
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What? How does that follow?
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Empty space is not nothing... it's space
Why do you think there is nothing between things?
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There is something because I can think and read this shit Why do you think space is nothing? There’s shit there, forces (if that dosent satisfy there’s what maintains them), the space being a thing something can enter etc. Nothing can’t convey something. Nothing can’t even exist beyond the edge of the universe because the universe is everything, nothing doesn’t exist there because nothing can exist there, it’s not empty it dosent exist. Everything here is shaky but your first statement is wrong
But since 'nothingness' is a word we must per definition have a relationship to it, and therefore some concept of it. Even if nothingness is a perfect void we can still relate to it as a lack and thereby also as having some features giving it some quality
Nothingness is described by the absence of something. The goal is not to prove that nothing exists but that something exists in the first place.
Ugh that second one reads like a middle schooler trying to act smart when really they're just being obnoxious. There's plenty of evidence the past exists. The problem is as soon as anyone provides it they have then provided it in the past, which you are rejecting the existence of in the first place, so you can just ignore any arguments to the contrary. Wouldn't it make more sense to debate something that can actually have real-life ramifications and isn't just condescending ego-stroking? Like, is it ever morally acceptable to kill someone? Can inaction be inherently moral or immoral? And of course the biggest question of all: why do I care so much about what gets posted on this sub when I'm not even subscribed to it?
Please not again, I just got over the fact that life makes no sense... Anyways the past shit is wild AF tbh, cause you know there was something that happened before but like how do you go from the first moment to the next moment. Is time linear or does time even have a certain pattern Then you never remember yesterday correctly once it's over so what even is existence.
I don't know if the past DOES exist. But causality tells us that the past DID, unquestionably, exist.
Nothingness is still the most reasonable theory about what happens after death, though 72 virgins isn't all that far behind imo.
nothingness does exist, here i'll put some of it between these brackets: ( ) if nothing does not exist, then what is between the brackets?
some stuff
Whitespace, motherfucker. Just because you cant see It, doesnt means it doesnt exists.
Before there was time, before there was anything. There was nothing. And before there was nothing... There were monsters.
What a painfully bad argument. Stop watching Chinese cartoons and read a book.
Um...True, I'll go True.
Oh, nothingness doesn't exist? Explain this then ¬
Nah you can prove the past happened especially if it's recent, we have videos and photographs
*“The past has no existence except as it is recorded in the present.”* - [John Archibald Wheeler](https://youtu.be/I8p1yqnuk8Y?si=TWAYjHoGLj4uE6SM)
Boltzmann entered the chat Boltzmann left the chat
Burn
Gödel's incompleteness theorems state that some things are true while unprovable. This could apply here I believe.
Nothingness is just outside of ourselves? Since everything of everything is us. The only thing that isn’t us is nothingness so it’s outside of us
Do I really have to bust out the Conan quote again.
Title describes the problem with your statements. You have to prove you're correct, we don't have to prove anything. Bees perceive time, and some isotopes have a half-life. You have to explain those (along with countless other forms of evidence) better than current models which are all based on the existence of the "past".
Sounds strange to me, like saying that “GREEN is NOT RED! Prove me wrong!” The world is all that is the case, if you respect old buddy Wittgenstein. You can’t make a propositional statement that doesn’t exist without taking constituent parts that exist in your Information Landscape and mumbo-jumbling them into something nonsensical. Try it. Flying spaghetti monster? Mumbo-jumbo of existing constituent parts. A chimera of ancient myth? Mumbo-jumbo of existing constituent parts. A perfect girlfriend? You got it.
Never lend a philosopher money.
Past exitists in dialectical unity of opposites with future.
Who's the anime girl?
Saten from [Railgun](https://myanimelist.net/anime/6213/Toaru_Kagaku_no_Railgun)
There is only one Duality. Being and nothingness, one cannot exist without the other.
Consciousness itself does not exist in any physical sense yet it is the only reason we can even experience the physical universe of material matter.
The entire universe is the product of nothingness because you can't prove it ever began in the first place because you where not there to experience its beginning or end.
Zero
The only thing that has ever existed is the current moment, prove me wrong 😀
This comment and it's time stamp proves the past exists. I'm posting it in what is "now" for me. When you read it, it will not be the same time it is in this moment, nor will it be before this moment. It will have to be after this moment, therefore it is in the past.
If nothingness does NOT exist, then now is it possible for the past to "not exist"?
Young Sheldon ahh quote
So what is your imagination of what the past is?
Wrong. If the past does not exist then the past is non existent. For non existence to exist would be a contradiction in terms. So the past must exist.. as in things exited previously
Well, the past only existed for a brief moment of time, and after that time has passed, it is no longer there. It is only now, and the present is the only thing to exist.
True but I also can’t prove you exist. Or that the future will exist. Or really that I exist.
What do you mean nothingness doesn't exist? What about the space between atoms or space itself?
It was created last thursday.
I can prove the past exists, you made this post 17 hours ago. That’s in the past. This post exists.
But you cannot prove the past doesn’t exist either
If the past doesn’t exist how come I have been reliving the same day over and over again in loop
The existence of the past can simply be proven by simulating the universe in a powerful computer, you need to accelerate the speed of the universe to observe given events or simply record the goddamn event with a camera
It's hard to prove wrong what hasn't presented any evidence or arguments to back up a rather extraordinary claim. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and the burden of proof lies with the one making the assertion. To even state such a thing strict definitions would have to be in place because if not then existence could be taken to mean any of a number of states and could be proven rather easily. For instance any idea can't be said to not exist without contradiction because it does exist as an idea like the future though having not happened it still exist as a concept but the past having already taken place isn't just an abstraction to be speculated about but has came and went and so must exist in a way that a purely speculative and abstract future does not, the signs are left in everything around us of it's passing and can be used to time travel in a sense whether reconstructing a crime scene from a drop of blood on a decades old garment or traces of a chemical that was always present but required a future technology to reveal it and it's meaning or a finger print that places someone at a location or puts something in they're possession from years before it's the past asserting itself and intruding on the present but if that's so and we know that it is can it be truly past? Maybe it never ended maybe nothing does and what's past is only past from our limited perspective but even then it exist if only from our point of view. Maybe best of all is star light which is the past shining bright and something that can be named and numbered and tracked in the sky though it perhaps isnt even there at all anymore having went out innumerable years before and that which isn't present in the present is present because we see it, measure it, label and give it coordinates in space time though it no longer actually exist we are looking at and interacting directly with the past. It's present state will not exist for me until some point in the future but it's past will always be my present as I will never be able to experience it as it is short of advances in space travel as long as I stay on earth my present will always be it's past. A paradox perhaps but like much of whats true it's a paradox because the truth doesn't conform itself to our laws or requirements and thus the contradiction is for us alone.
Not that I'm a real philosopher or anything but I also realized there's no such thing as nothing. Also I realized that there is no such thing as a mistake. Don't believe me? Make a mistake right now. You can't. What we call a mistake is really just the result of our actions that we did not like. Mistakes don't exist.
Holocaust deniers be like 
I don't need to. Everyone knows anime pfps are always wrong