Solipsism

“ I have raised the question about solipsism in order to bring out the way in which the experience of all of us is superior to logic. We all draw the line with great emphasis at the fellow being. His reality must not be brought into question. We can perhaps discuss it as a problem, but we know that it will not be a real problem. We know that our experience is characterized in a social way and that this social character is all-important in our world of values. ”

“ As our thought is not the source of their actuality, neither is it the source of their intrinsic possibility. Solipsism is the reductio ad absurdum of the philosophy which would reduce all actuality experienced by the individual mind to phases, or phenomena, or self-manifestations, of the individual mind itself as the one and only actuality. And no less absurd is the philosophy which would accord to all intrinsically possible realities no being other than the ideal being which they have as the thought-objects of the individual human mind. ”

“ But, upon the other side, it does not supply us with any self at all, if we mean by self a substantive the possessor of an object or even its own states. And Solipsism is, on this side, destroyed by defect. ”

“ It may be objected that, if Reality is proved to be one experience, Solipsism follows. Again, if we can transcend the self at all, then we have made our way, it may be urged, to something perhaps not experience. Our main conclusion, in short, may be met not directly but through a dilemma. It may be threatened with destruction by a self-contradictory development of its own nature. ”

“ This explanation, in pretending to refute solipsism, of course assumes and confirms it; for all these cans and musts touch only your idea of yourself, not your actual being, and there is no thinkable world that is not within you, as you exist really. Thus idealists are wedded to solipsism irrevocably ”

“ Solipsism has always been the evident implication of idealism; but the idealists, when confronted with this consequence, which is dialectically inconvenient, have never been troubled at heart by it, for at heart they accept it. ”

“ I believe, in a word, that solipsism is a sharp horn of the pluralistic idealist’s dilemma. To the monistic idealist, on the other hand, it presents no unavoidable difficulty. For the monistic idealist’s position is, in brief, the following: In being conscious of myself I know myself as limited, thwarted, circumscribed. But one can not know oneself as bounded without knowing the existence of a boundary; and to be aware of a boundary as boundary one must be aware of a something beyond. That is to say, in the experience of my narrow, single self, I experience also a somewhat-beyond-myself. ”

“ It is by the same kind of argument that we reach our own past and future. And here Solipsism, in objecting to the existence of other selves, is unawares attempting to commit suicide. For my past self, also, is arrived at only by a process of inference, and by a process which also itself is fallible. We are so accustomed each to consider his past self as his own, that it is worth while to reflect how very largely it may be foreign. ”

“ But, before I develope this, I will state an objection which by itself might suffice.
My self, as an existence to which phenomena belong as its adjectives, is supposed to be given by a direct experience. But this gift plainly is an illusion. Such an experience can supply us with no reality beyond that of the moment. There is no faculty which can deliver the immediate revelation of a self beyond the present (Chapter x.) . And so, if Solipsism finds its one real thing in experience, that thing is confined to the limits of the mere “this.” ”

“ For dead logic would stick at solipsism; yet irrational life, as it stumbles along from moment to moment, and multiplies itself in a thousand centres, is somehow amenable to logic and finds uses for the reason it breeds.
Now, in the relation of a natural being to similar beings in the same habitat there is just the occasion we require for introducing a miraculous transcendence in knowledge, a leap out of solipsism which, though not prompted by reason, will find in reason a continual justification. For tertiary qualities are imputed to objects by psychological or pathological necessity. ”

“ It gives neither the “mine” as an adjective of the “this,” nor the “this” as dependent on and belonging to the “mine.” Even if it did so for the moment, that would still not be enough as a support for Solipsism. ”

“ But this is exactly what the true solipsist refuses to do. He contends that no experience whatever could possibly contradict him, because it would always necessarily have the peculiar for-me character, which may be described by the 'egocentric predicament'. In other words, he is well aware that solipsism cannot be based on Q as long as Q is, by definition, nothing but another way of expressing P. As a matter of fact, the solipsist who makes the statement Q attaches a different meaning to the same words; he does not wish merely to assert P, but he intends to say something entirely different. ”

“ And, if this is so, surely that is one more reason for rejecting an experience such as Solipsism would suppose. If the self is given as a reality, with all else as its adjectives, we can hardly then account for the supervening uncertainty about its limits, and explain our constant hesitation between too little and too much.
What we have seen so far is briefly this. We have no direct experience of reality as my self with its states. If we are to arrive at that conclusion, we must do so indirectly and through a process of inference. Experience gives the “this-mine.” ”

“ Semblances of matter may suffice to react upon, but not semblances of communing souls. A psychic solipsism is too hideous a mockery of our wants, and, so far as I know, has never been seriously entertained.—Chapters ix and x of Prof. ”

“ If all is given, then the apparent progress and freshness of our feelings is an illusion, and if any single part of experience is absolutely given, the whole must be given, as the absolute idealists have been logical enough to see. On the other hand, if all is created, what is to save us from solipsism? The answer is, that neither term of the distinction is to be taken abstractly. ”

“ And further if everything, of which he thinks he is aware, is in reality merely a content of his own experience he has certainly no reason for holding that anything does exist except himself: it will, of course, be possible that other persons do exist; solipsism will not be necessarily true; but he cannot possibly infer from anything he holds that it is not true. That he himself exists will of course follow from his premiss that many things are contents of his experience. But since everything, of which he thinks himself aware, is in reality merely an inseparable aspect of that awareness ”

“ Whatever we may think generally of our original mode of feeling, we have now verifiably some states in which there is no reference to a subject at all (ibid.) . And if such feelings are the mere adjectives of a subject-reality, that character must be inferred, and is certainly not given. But it is not necessary to take our stand on this disputable ground. Let us admit that the distinction of object and subject is directly presented—and we have still hardly made a step in the direction of Solipsism. ”

“ Solipsism.—The contention of this theory is that [Pg 129] nothing exists save states of consciousness in the individual. Neither the material world nor other minds exist, save in the mind of the individual. This doctrine is so opposed to common sense and daily experience that it is unnecessary to dwell upon it.
7th. Inter-Actionism (Animism) .—Here we have the world-old notion of soul and body existing as separate entities, influencing each other. Mind is here supposed to influence matter, and utilize it for the purposes of its manifestation. ”

“ But, like all the great paradoxes of philosophy, it has its value in directing our attention to a vital, yet much neglected, element of experience. We cannot avoid solipsism (q.v.) so long as we neglect the element of force or power. ”

“ It would give me the greatest satisfaction to be able to dispense with it, and thus establish physics upon a solipsistic basis; but those—and I fear they are the majority—in whom the human affections are stronger than the desire for logical economy, will, no doubt, not share my desire to render solipsism scientifically satisfactory. The second class of inferred entities raises much more serious questions. It may be thought monstrous to maintain that a thing can present any appearance at all in a place where no sense organs and nervous structure exist through which it could appear. ”

“ We realize how arbitrary and illogical is the position of those psychologists who coquet with physiology under the delusion that they are more scientific. They are led to take arbitrary positions which lead into the pitfalls of solipsism, with all its contradictions and absurdities. ”

“ Subjective modifications no doubt are always one constituent of individual experience, but always as correlative to objective modifications or change in the objective continuum. If experience were throughout subjective, not merely would the term subjective itself be meaningless, not merely would the conception of the objective never arise, but the entirely impersonal and intransitive process that remained, though it might be described as absolute becoming, could not be called even solipsism, least of all real experience. ”

“ The content of each is wholly immanent, and there are no transitions with which they are consubstantial and through which their beings may unite. Your Memorial Hall and mine, even when both are percepts, are wholly out of connection with each other. Our lives are a congeries of solipsisms, out of which in strict logic only a God could compose a universe even of discourse. No dynamic currents run between my objects and your objects. Never can our minds meet in the same. ”

“ Here then occurs the difficulty, of filling up that infinite gap before creation. Consider the supreme first being sitting in the center of an universal solitude, environ’d with the abyss of infinite nothing, a chasm of immense vacuity! what words can paint the greatness of the solecism? what mind does not start at the horror of such an absurdity? and especially supposing this state subsisted from infinite ages.
’Tis in vain to pretend, that a being of all perfections can be happy in himself, in the consciousness of those perfections, whilst he does no good to any thing ”

“ This single example would be sufficient to prove the extraordinary dominion which solitude has over the human mind. It is, indeed, unless it be managed with great good sense, the complete nursery of mischief. ”

“ I now see my error in regarding your mode of thought as the philosophy of solitude. You hold fast to the harmony of life. But I have not yet rid myself of a fear lest that which is real should, as it were, become volatilized, causing the living forms of the vast human multitude to disappear. In that case, the spirit alone would remain, or, if I understand aright, would lose itself in matter, when all individuality and all participation in actual life would cease. ”

“ The Solipsist, while he merely maintains the essential necessity of his self to the Universe and every part of it, cannot in my opinion be refuted, and so far certainly he is right. For, except as a relative point of view, there is no apartness or independence in the Universe. ”

“ There is no disorder of the mind, among all the various causes by which it may be affected, that destroys its force and activity so entirely as melancholy. It unties, as it were, all the relations, both physical and moral, of which society, in its most perfect state, consists, and sets the soul free from all sense of obligation. The private link which unites the species is destroyed; all inclination to the common intercourse of life is lost; and the only remaining disposition is for solitude. ”

“ But our misfortunes never, as we think, resemble those of others; and, besides, what consolation can it be to have our sorrows renewed by seeing their image reflected from others? Shall he entrench himself in strength of mind, and in a vain philosophy? But, in solitude, reason soon descends from its pride; we may be philosophers for the public, but we are only men with ourselves. Shall he fly, as a resource, to voluptuousness, and to other infamous pleasures? ”

“ Solitude, were it for this reason alone, is indispensably necessary to the human character; for when men are enabled to depend on themselves alone, the soul, tossed about by the tempest of life, acquires new vigor; learns to bear with constancy, or avoid with address, those dangerous rocks on which vulgar minds are inevitably wrecked; and discovers continually new resources, by which the mind resists, with stoic courage, the rigors of its fate.
Weak minds always conceive it most safe to adopt the sentiments of the multitude. ”

“ It is not by crude attempts at elimination that you can deal with the Solipsist, but rather (as in this chapter I have explained) by showing that the connection which he maintains, though really essential, has not the character which he assigns to it. You may hope to convince him that he himself commits the same fault as is committed by the assertor of naked primary qualities, or of things existing quite apart from myself—the fault, that is, of setting up as an independent reality a mere abstraction from experience. ”