Weird Thought Experiments

[anoni]

Welcome to the Weird Thought Experiments thread!

In this thread you post weird thought experiments! What is a weird thought experiment?

A thought experiment is generally when you consider a unique scenario and try to imagine the consequences of that scenario or how that scenario plays out. A weird thought experiment is the same, but the consequences lead to an interesting conclusion. An example might be

"If all the world were furries, animals would be called "ferals" and PETA would be renamed to PETF" or maybe "If I had PhD, every appointment I make would be a doctors appointment!"

Here's one that I thought of just now
"If we could communicate with an alternate universe that was basically identical to our universe, we wouldn't know. We would send in some signal and the same signal would be received because in the alternate identical universe, they're sending the same signal. We probably would just assume the communicator was broken"

[Cinder42]

That sounds really cool actuolly.

I've had an extensive conversation with my boyfriend before about how society would be different if humans had evolved naturally with tails. And not the tiny ones people are sometimes born with but long ones. Cloths would be designed differently, there would probobly be some exessories made just for them. Or on the other hand, how would they be handled? They're attached to your butt so would they be some sort of taboo "no touching" zone? Would they even be hidden in pants like it was indecent to show them?

[Dubaku]

As a result of playing GTA V.

I've had the f---ed up thought of tossing a grenade in the school parking lot, because it's so full everyday, I only wondered. I'd imagine it'd cause a huge chain reaction. I'd probably be hunted down and killed. The thoughts I have when bored.

[Cheza]

My third fursuit is technically my first and my second one at the same time. x-x'

[FaeMinx]

.... Furries are real, but not as they are now known.

A long long time ago myriad species became so technologically adept and enlightened that they all essentially merged into 1 race of beings all intimately connected and supportive of all in creation.

These beings developed the ability to not only shape shift, but to 'personality' shift as well. Essentially each one of these beings existed as many beings at once.

These beings, being so advanced and enlightened, were essentially immortal by our standards...

As such it became problematic raising children as the development the infant required before it was mature and enlightened enough to fully participate in their advanced society was eons.

However,  they came up with a solution.

With immense resources they created a virtual holographic simulation of the universe they evolved in, creating also a vast virtual intelligence to govern this simulated universe.

This virtual intelligence had the appearance of omnipotent consciousness, but in fact was only an incredibly involved adaptive equation of cause and effect.

Newborns of this advanced race of beings were hooked up to this 'virtual reality' matrix style and were allowed to pass through countless lives (governed by the virtual intelligence) as they developed.

However, once the 'children' had developed a sufficient amount of self awareness, they began to emulate their parents by playing out different personalities and forms, even though they were essentially locked into a single form per lifetime period.

Of course the advanced race closely monitored the development of each child, and once they started exhibiting this behaviour, it was an indication the child would soon be ready to awaken fully into the true reality, leaving the virtual reality of limitation and strife behind.

On a certain planet in the virtual universe called Earth, many of the almost awakened children could be found in a sub culture known as.... the Furry Fandom...

?..

[Ryan Naismith]

If we are composed out of nature, and math is the language of nature, then the way we feel should be explainable in mathematical terms. A = nature, B = feeling, C = math. A=C and B=A then C=B.

[Trixsie Vixen]

Here's a thought experiment on the nature of knowledge

I ask Anoni what time it is and he checks the clock and it says 3 pm so he tells me the time.  Then I realise I have my phone and check the time anyway and confirm that it is 3 pm.

Unknown to either of us the clock which Anoni checked had stopped the day before at 3 pm.

Anoni answered my question accurately,  he believed it was correct.

So is it correct to say he KNEW that it was 3 pm?

[anoni]

@Trixie it's a good question, I would liken it to someone who makes a mistake like this

16    1/      1
--- = --- =  ---
64    /4      4

In this case the person got the right answer by crossing out the sixes, but used the wrong method. Did he really get the right answer?

I guess the answer is, yes he did, the watch does say it is 3pm, and therefore I knew that, according to my watch anyway, it was 3pm. But I used an incorrect method to get to that case, and if I had used that same method in an hour, I wouldn't of known.

[Trixsie Vixen]

This topic has been a favourite of philosophers wanting to get to the bottom of what is knowledge.


The long standing definition is that knowledge is justified true belief, and satisfies the following 3 criteria:



1 P is true
2 S believes that P is true, and
3 S is justified in believing that P is true


However the intuition of most people (well at least most westerners as there is cultural variation) is that in the example Anoni did not know (merely believed) that is was 3pm, even though it meets these three criteria.


These sort of problems are known as Gettier problems
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettier_problem


There have been multiple attempts to redefine knowledge to prevent this problem, but each seems to be vulnerable to a new thought experiment.