Words&Dirt

“If you’ve ever been a college undergraduate taking Philosophy 101, you’ve probably encountered the concept of philosophical solipsism. According to solipsism, reality exists only inside your own mind. What follows then is that you can only be certain of your own status as a conscious being. Everyone else might be some sort of mindless marionette operated by alien overlords or cat parasites, or possibly running about with no motivation at all. You’ll never prove otherwise.

Scientists have solved the problem of solipsism with a strategy called inference to the best explanation. It’s a cheap accommodation and no one is happy about it, with the possible exception of those alien overlords.”

––We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, by Karen Joy Fowler, pg. 132

“Nothing is more suitable to that philosophy, than a modest scepticism to a certain degree, and a fair confession of ignorance in subjects, that exceed all human capacity.”

––A Treatise of Human Nature, by David Hume, pg. 455