In a criminal court you’re assumed to be
innocent unless its proven beyond reasonable doubt that you're not. In a civil
court they decide if - on the balance of probabilities - it’s more likely that
you did it than that you didn’t.
Philosophers, beginning with Descartes, have often argued that we can only be absolutely certain of
something if it’s
beyond the possibility any sort of doubt whatsoever.
These days, when we’re familiar with the concept
of virtual reality, it’s probably easier to see what the
philosophers were getting at that it’s ever been. After all, how
could I tell that I’m really sat at a desk in a library rather than
lying in a laboratory somewhere having the appropriate bits of my
brain stimulated in order to create the impression that I’m sat in
a library. Even if I were to get up and wander off to the local café
for a cup of coffee how could I really be certain that I’d gone
anywhere at all. There’s only so much information that my brain
and body can process at any one time so the virtual world being
created around me wouldn’t have to represent the entire world only
the bits that I happen to be interacting with at the time. It could
even be arranged that my body, or what I fondly imagine is my body,
is stimulated in such a way that I feel genuinely tired after running
up a flight of virtual stairs.
So, whilst it’s possible for me to doubt the
existence of the world around me, in particular the existence of
other people, there does seem to be one thing that is beyond doubt.
My own existence; Either as a real person in a real world or as the
subject of an illusion in a virtual reality that’s being created
for me.
Of course, you dear reader, assuming you exist,
might object that all this speculation about making a virtual reality this good is so
unlikely to be true that it’s currently well beyond reasonable doubt that its possible at all, and you’d
be right. I’d never get away with "I didn't think the world in which I ambushed the old lady was real and thought that I was just playing the latest version of Grand Theft Auto" in a civil court let alone a criminal one. But this isn’t really the point. To be
absolutely certain of something there must be no room for doubt
whatsoever.
So where Descartes famously said “Cogito ergo sum”,
(I think therefore I am) I could now just as well say "I'm the one getting fooled into thinking a virtual world is real therefore I am."
Definitely not feeling real this morning -- need some more coffee.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of "absolute certainty" seems, to me, to create the very problem which it claims to be addressing. The pragmatic fuzz in which most of us live (especially this morning) is rarely troubled by absolutes (absolute pain? absolute blue?) but we seem to get along nicely until someone raises the possibility we might have it all absolutely wrong (bloody Galileo!).
The gap between the obvious (the sun goes round the earth, duh!) and the not-so-obvious (oh no it doesn't) is where paranoia and con-men (cf. "The Sting") operate. No-one except white-coated specialists with special protective gear should ever go there.
It's obvious Lord Thing is a sexist prat whose hands are prone to wandering. It's not-so-obvious that this might be, in the absolute realm, unprovable, and therefore "untrue". Poor old Nick Clegg!
Mike
Mike
ReplyDeleteI actually think that Descartes took his quest for "absolute certainty" as far as he could really go and then built an unsustainable edifice on the "fact" that he couldn't doubt his own existence. This little piece is just bringing the idea of a malevolent demon up to date. As it stands I'm sure about me, but can't really be sure about you... So who am I replying to? Doesn't get us very far does it.
As for bloody Galileo I might argue that the more recent of the Observable Universe, the one we can talk about because light has had time to reach us from there, is a personal thing and centred on each of us as individuals as opposed to The Earth as God's special place.
I'm not sure that either science, or the law, actually deal in truth rather in the quality of the evidence; though the practitioners of both often imagine that they do.
I bet that Lord Thing, along with various self important elderly gentlemen who were once in light entertainment, had a modus operandi that would put his/their activities beyond reasonable doubt and hence "true"in this legal sense. But no matter how hard I try I really can't summon up much pity for poor Nick Clegg.
It is strange, however, that in these more tolerant times we're less tolerant of men behaving badly than we were back then. e.g. one of our scout masters was known by us as "Puff Penty" and used to encourage us to go swimming in the beck naked because otherwise "you'll get your costume wet". We all knew, the other scout masters knew yet it was quietly tolerated. Was it just that we didn't know how to talk about it..
I don't really "do" philosophy or science, so can't take any of that any further. Let those with suitable protective clothing do so, at their peril.
ReplyDeleteOn the other thing, it is getting truly weird, isn't it? As someone said the other day, it seems all of the entertainment personalities of one's childhood are being wheeled into court as sex pests. Didn't any non-famous men go in for that sort of thing, then? Without wanting to minimise the upset and trauma of genune victims of abuse, it does seem a little harsh to judge the behaviour of the past by current standards. I was caned several times at school (talking about absolute pain!), but can't imagine seeking redress under the current legislation and understanding of corporal punishment.
Mike