BS: Happy Solipstice!

Subject: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Paul Burke
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 04:00 AM

Today is the feast day of St. Solipsus, the Patron Saint of solipsists, and as vice- chairman of The Solipsist Society, it is my pleasure to wish each and every one of you a very happy Solipstice.

There will be a celebratory solypso session at the Berkeley's Arms.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 05:04 AM

solipsism

In philosophy, a view that maintains that the self is the only thing that can be known to exist. It is an extreme form of scepticism. The solipsist sees himself or herself as the only individual in existence, assuming other people to be a reflection of his or her own consciousness.


Now who does that remind me of?

Giok ☺☻

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: gnu
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 06:15 AM

So, how can there be a vice-chairman? Just a reflection.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 06:23 AM

A vice in the wilderness?
G ☺☻

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Paul Burke
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 07:32 AM

I didn't want the responsibility of being chairman. I actually resigned a while ago, but nobody accepted my resignation.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: *daylia*
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 07:35 AM

Solipstice? Awwww ... try Chapstick. Comes in festive cherry flavour too.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 08:53 AM

Get off it. You guys only exist because I thought you up, just like I thought up everything.

Why, even my brothers and sister cannot remember an existence when I was not -- ergo, I have always been and always will be, per omnia saecula saeculorum.

So don't make me unthink you. (And don't try that old "I'm not going to think about you" business. It's been tried and those that tried it are now unthoughts; they vanished, screaming, into Nothingness when I unthought them. And you wouldn't like that and I wouldn't like to do it, especially since it would just ruin your seasonal holidays. But I will if I have to.)

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 09:09 AM

I've never had a chap on my lips!
Giok

Paul your resignation is to take effect immediately.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 09:11 AM

Yes I know Giok. I made you post that.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Paul Burke
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 09:16 AM

I'm off to join the Solipsist Workers' Party (Marxist-Leninist) then. You are a crowd of counterrevolutionary cryptofascistic neoimperialist Socinians!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: RangerSteve
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 10:00 AM

So why are there so many jerks in my life? Why would I think them up? A possible answer is that they're the real people and I'm just someone one of them thought up and he/she treats me like s**t for his/her own amusement. Therefore, I have to take all the crap that's handed to me and be nice to people I don't like, because I don't know which of them is real and I don't want them to unthink me because basically, the good times outweigh the bad. This business could make me very paranoid, and I'm in law enforcement, and the last thing anyone needs is a gun-toting paranoid. This is all Paul Burke's fault for bringing it up in the first place. No doubt he's the one who thought me up, so, thanks, Paul for the life, but could you do away with some of the idiots I work for and possible get me landlord to lower my rent? I promise to be good.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Paul Burke
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 11:55 AM

There there, put that gun away and calm down CALM DOWN...

You need to read Flann O'Brien's "At Swim-Two_birds", which is all about the author's responsibility to the characters he dreams up, and what happens when those characters decide to get even with him. An essay about the plot.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 11:57 AM

Because I have decided that you haven't suffered enough, that's why.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 12:08 PM

So this is why none of us (you) remembers being born nor dying?

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Amos
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 12:13 PM

Rapaire:

Unthink me. I double-dawg-dare you.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 12:17 PM

I think therefore you aren't!
G ☺☻

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: robomatic
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 12:18 PM

Solipsism: A great philosophy if only I could convince somebody else of it!


Goes somewhat with the song: "I'm my own grandpaw". and with the story "All You Zombies" by Robert Heinlein in which a foundling hermaphrodite gets knocked up, has her baby at the same time the doctors conclude that there's more man than woman left over, then as a man goes back in time and seduces herself.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Bill D
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 01:56 PM

I think I think, therefore, I think I am......I think.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Amos
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 05:25 PM

I guess Rapaire backfired and un-constructed hisself when he tried to unthink me. Does that prove he was right, or that he was wrong? This Solipsism can get very tricky...


A

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: CapriUni
Date: 21 Dec 05 - 07:50 PM

The thing is, it is impossible to unthink anything.

For example try following these instructions:

Do not think of a purple, polka-dotted elephant, even for an instant.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: SharonA
Date: 22 Dec 05 - 07:34 PM

CapriUni: Does that include the time during which one reads your description of what we're not supposed to think of? By the way, I'm not thinking of it; I'm thinking of a white horse.

This discussion reminds me of the song "Railroad Bill and the Kitten"!

But I can't help wondering: who thought up Dubya?

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Peace
Date: 22 Dec 05 - 08:14 PM

"Does that prove he was right, or that he was wrong?"

Well, yes and no, Amos.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 04:02 AM

Nemo me impune lacessit!

Giok

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: folktheatre
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 04:26 AM

"celebratory solypso session" Isn't that another word for a Soca session? Or is it a different leg of calypso that I haven't heard about?



ho ho ho....

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Paul Burke
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 05:23 AM

Definitely not Soca- that's for Socinians.

When I wake up in the morning and I open my eyes
And I contemplate the Universe I realise
That I am the only one that I can prove to exist-
You stand out from the crowd when you're a solipsist!

CH: Solipsism, solipsism
    Theres never a schism in solipsism.

Next week, the apocalypso.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 05:34 AM

It just occurred to me - can you imagine a solipsist with schizophrenia? He'd be his own worst enemy!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Rapparee
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 07:04 AM

I have done it, and Amos no longer exists. I have thought up someone who calls itself "Amos" because I demand it for balance in the Universe, but the original entity called "Amos" has been wiped away without a trace, completely and utterly. The new "Amos" will have the memories of the old, except for that time in when his ship docked in Ulan Bator and he took shore leave and stayed with that sultry, sensual woman of the world who introduced him (for I have decided now upon the sex of the entity) to life, love, lust, greed, envy, gluttony, simony, calumny, and great Art.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: folktheatre
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 07:14 AM

apocalypso. ha ha! Doom dub! Anyway......

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: gnu
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 08:50 AM

Meanwhile, back in zee shark tank, Philippe desparately tries to unthink zee great predator feesh and return safey aboard Calypso. As hees oxygen runs low, and wiss zee sea being whipped into a torrent by zee appraoching storm, we can only try to unthink zee shark wiss Philippe.

Remember, only through your donations can we bring quality programming like this to you. And, for a donation of $1M, you can have this change purse, with the PBS logo, to put the rest of your money in. You can call anytime with your pledge - not just during this next half hour of waiting to see Philippe do the unthinkable. Our volunteers are.............

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 08:50 AM

I used to like calypso but now I prefer collapso.
I only drink to steady my nerves!
G.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Snuffy
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 09:26 AM

Nemo me impune lacessit!

Leave aff the foreign talk - jist say "See you, Jimmy"

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: Amos
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 10:39 AM

Hahahahahahaha.

Rapaire is delusory.


Hahahahahahaha.

And I am not delusory!!!!


Ha.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Solipstice!
From: CapriUni
Date: 23 Dec 05 - 10:43 AM

CapriUni: Does that include the time during which one reads your description of what we're not supposed to think of? By the way, I'm not thinking of it; I'm thinking of a white horse.

I think it must (therefore, it must), because you have to interpret and decode the words, and in so doing, you give them context and meaning.

That's why you can't unthink someone out of existance: every time you make a decision about who needs to be unthunk, you have no choice but to think about who they are, the context in which you've placed them, and how the context is altered because you've put them there. Every time you do that, you're only reinforcing their existance.