Laki

About me:

My Philosophical views:
I'm always happy to elaborate, provide justification or debate on these.
Click on the bullet points to expand them.

• Pyrrhonian Skepticism

  Based on the Münchhausen-Trilemma and the Problem of the Criterion — any attempt to justify a belief leads to either infinite regress, circularity, or an arbitrary stopping point. Therefore we can't know anything.
• Arbitrary Foundationalism

  In response to objective truth being inaccessible, I resign the pursuit of truth and instead adopt a set of axioms and inference rules for the sake of discourse and everyday life — which I know to be absolutely arbitrary and lacking any rational justification.
• Ethical Subjectivism / Relativism

  When I say "X is good", it's a linguistic shorthand for "I like X, I want it and it makes me feel positive". With "X is bad" I mean to convey "I have an aversion towards X, I don't want it and it makes me feel negative".
• Modal Anti-Realism

  Possible worlds and modal facts (necessity, possibility, contingency) are not real features of reality — they are pseudo-concepts and — if anything — describe the limitations of the claimants imagination.
• Eternalism, B-Theory, Humean Regularity and Indeterminism

  All points in time — past, present, and future — exist equally and permanently. Imagine the universe as a 4D block. This entails that the flow of time or that there is a present at all is not necessary. I would even go so far as saying its unlikely since a "flow" of time would invoke an infinite regress of meta-times. Causality and the laws of physics might just be regularities within this 4D block. When an event is of deterministic nature, that means that when the regularities are applied to the prior time slice, there is only one possible time slice that follows. Indeterministic events like quantum randomness might not be random in the sense that a dice is rolled when they happen but that applying the regularities to the prior time slice yields multiple possible following time slices. Thus randomness doesn't have to happen but instead can just be about whether a point in time can only be followed by one specific other point in time. It's about whether we can know what will happen even though what will happen might already be set.
• Hard Incompatibilism

  Free will is impossible regardless of whether reality is deterministic, indeterministic, or a mix of both.
• Agnosticism

  I haven't seen any sound argument for the existence of God, nor have I seen any against it. Thus I withhold judgement on whether God exists, just like I withhold judgement on any other unfalsified unproven propositions like "Invisible undetectable unicorns exist".
• Mereological Nihilism

  Composite objects like a human or a chair don't exist as separate entities beyond being aggregations of more fundamental parts.
• Illusionism about Qualia, Consciousness and Identity

  Qualia (the subjective part of experience) and consciousness are illusions and don't exist in the way we feel they do. I also find Attention Schema Theory plausible. I view the notion that you from right now are the same entity from 5 minutes ago, as well as the assumption that there is something beyond matter that constitutes identity as psychologically useful illusions. These intuitions are nothing more than false but harmless psychological phenomena. Thus I reject the claim that there is anything in the sense of identity at all. I believe, although contra-intuitive, this view entails no unwanted philosophical consequences.
• Pseudo-Concepts

  I feel like in many cases, apparent philosophical disagreements and inquiries are simply the result of fuzzy, badly-defined terms. Interlocutors assume a shared understanding when in fact they don't possess one at all. Terms like morality, good, bad, purpose of life, free will and others are abstractions of simple survival instincts of evolutionary origins. They are often taken as definitional primitives because they don't actually mean anything.
• Diachronic-Aggregative Expectational Preferential Individual Ethical Egoism

  The concept of utility is used to describe a goal that extends beyond mere pleasure-seeking; rather, it is a situational blend of multiple aims (e.g., pleasure, fulfillment, knowledge, and the absence of pain). To maximize utility, therefore, is to do what yields the greatest overall utility, which is itself defined as a combination of these priorities.
  
  Now imagine a function u(t) that tracks the amount of utility at a given point in time. The integral of u(t) from t = my_birth to t = my_death represents the total utility accumulated over my entire life, ∫u(t) dt. Thus, the objective shifts from maximizing utility in the present moment to maximizing utility over the entire lifespan.
  
  When weighing two options, we do not always know with certainty how much utility each will produce. To account for uncertainty, probability is introduced, allowing us to evaluate outcomes in terms of expected utility (EU).
  
  What I ultimately seek in life is the maximization of ∫u(t) dt. This objective considers only my own utility, not that of others—except insofar as, through empathy or coincidence, my gains overlap with theirs. I do not claim that this framework is morally correct, nor that others ought to adopt it. I merely assert that I want everyone to act in ways that maximize ∫u(t) dt for my personal utility.
• Nominalism

  Only particulars (specific objects) exist. Universals (A property, quality or relation) and abstract objects (e.g., numbers) don't exist other than being merely names or labels.

Who I'd like to meet:

Really anyone, but preferably my age or above. If we share interests, please interact! If you are interested in any of my philosophical positions, whether you oppose them or not, I'm always happy to talk about them and hear your takes.