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submitted 1 week ago by Laura@lemmy.ml to c/philosophy@lemmy.ml

If nothing interacts with it, does it exist?

Not “unknown”. Not “unobserved”.

I mean: no interaction at all.

Because in experiments, nothing happens inside a system on its own.

Events only appear when something meets something else.

So maybe this is the real question:

Is existence something things have—

or something that only appears when things interact?

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[-] sylver_dragon@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

If the thing you are claiming exists does not interact with anything else in any way, how are you proving that thing exists in the first place? It's basically a circular argument. You make a claim that something exists yet then state that it is impossible to prove that the thing exists. It's just one big circle of "trust me, bro". The question isn't "does it exist?" the question is properly, "how do you know it exists in the first place?" You need to prove that the unicorns exist before expecting people to accept that they exist. Their existence is not a given.

[-] Laura@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 week ago

What if, regardless of whether something interacts or not, there is still an observer of it?

In that case, the question is no longer “does it interact?”, but “what makes it observable in the first place?”

I actually came across a paper that presents experimental evidence for the existence of such an observer.

If you’re interested, here it is: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/393397861_Experimental_Evidence_of_Nonlocal_EEG-Quantum_State_Correlations_A_Novel_Empirical_Approach_to_the_Hard_Problem_of_Consciousness

this post was submitted on 19 Mar 2026
2 points (66.7% liked)

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