>>1133466>There is no evidence that 2 + 2 = 4. It's convention.Nope. I can take 2 marbles and group them with another 2 marbles, and count the resulting group. That is similar to how Kant described mathematics as being a synthetic activity, rather than an analytic one as you seem to be suggesting. There is evidence that 2 + 2 = 4 because I can count on my fingers and see what the result is.
>>because it *could* be true. so give me my $20 now!>No, that's your argument. You're the one asserting, without evidence, that people are conscious.I have weak evidence that other people are conscious. The "winning theory", i.e. theory that has the best support, predicts so. You seem to think that "winning theories" need to be 100% certain, but that isn't how it works: we just have a set of theories, and the one with the best support is the winning one; that is the one we use to make decisions with.
You can say the winning theory isn't 100% certain, and that is fine. I agree with you that it's possible that nobody else is conscious but me. However, what you cannot say is that there's another point of view that is at least as well supported.
Think of it this way: as an agent, I have to act in some way no matter what, even if it is simply choosing inaction. Therefore, the only question is how I should "spend" these action points I have each turn, so to speak. To figure out how to act, I look at the possible ways the world could be, and for each possible way I collect all the evidence that exists for it (no matter how crummy or circumstantial that evidence is). Yes, my memories of yesterday do in fact count as evidence for me being conscious yesterday. This might upset you, but it doesn't really matter how "bad" such evidence is as long as it is more than nothing.
>>1133465>That's fine, but it's not evidence.You seem to be ignoring my request to provide an example of what counts as evidence for something.
