To extend on my previous post, (in response to multiple people):

First of all, my argument isn’t existentialism. Certainly existentialism deals with it, (in that existentialism doubts the existence of thoughts themselves),but the root question is not of existence, but of definition.

The argument’s conclusion deals with existentialism. It says that there exists a possibility that we do not exist.

(Existentialism does not say that nothing happened if it was not perceived, it says that if something CANNOT be observed, then it does not exist. The big bang is observable.)

(Further, on a tangent, the big bang theory does not say that nothing came before it, merely that we have not, (and implies cannot), observe anything from before it. But of course, if you believe in both big bang and existentialism, then nothing came before it, because we cannot observe it).

Okay, take that piece of paper declaring “Here is a thought”, and cast it into space. Imagine that long after humanity dies out, (bumume we do), an alien race finds it, and decodes the message.

The message is something external to them. If you want to state it that way, yes, it causes thought in someone else, a thought that would not have occurred if they had not read the message, and it is the same thought as you were thinking when you wrote the sentence.

Even better, take a really large, really complex computer, and get it to simulate a human brain. Can it think? We do indeed have this technology, and we we can, in fact, with a large enough cluster, do exactly this right now. If any of you have heard about “Blue brain”, a couple of research teams are competing against each other with a simulated cat brain to discover more about neuronal interaction.

But I digress, the point is, would such a machine be able to think?

Now, can a slightly stupider machine think?

If no, then would you say that a very special human is incapable of thought?

And certainly we can think of stupider humans than some animals.

And certainly we can think of stupider animals.

At what point are they incapable of thought?

I ask the same question of a simpler and simpler computer.

At what point is a computer not able to think?

Now, here’s where I blow your mind: A computer does not need to be made of silicon or use electricity. A grid of stones in a field could be a computer, and technically speaking, with enough time, space and stones. run exactly the same software as your computer on your desk.

So even once a computer becomes too simple to be held in electronics, we can simplify it further into rocks. Or trees. Or the movement patterns of unladen swallows.

So the root question is: What is a thought? Having defined that, when is a “mind”, (seeing that ANYTHING can hold, represent, contain, change and create a thought), incapable of having a thought?

Further if we define something as having a mind if it thinks, than would we have to extend the set of things that have minds to include the universe?

I offer the definition of a mind to be an abstracted arrangement of [anything] that is capable of holding a thought.

Than, can there be a thought without me existing?

Well, how to define a thought?

We don’t need a full definition, merely an inkling, and if you agree that a thought can be had by simpler and simpler computers by comparision with things that are known to have thoughts, then yes, a thought can exist without me as part of the state of a ‘mind’.

There can be an arrangement of say, frogs on lilypads, that form “my” mind, and therefore thoughts, so the thoughts exist. But does the mind, the abstract arrangement of the frogs on lilypads, really exist?

It cannot be destroyed, it cannot be created, it can merely enter a different state.

The thoughts can all be destroyed: the system can enter the balnk state (The frogs and lilypads all die or move away),

But something does exist, though it might not be me, and the thought being a communication, much like the piece of paper, also exists, (it merely needs to be interpreted). Certainly, you can create, destroy, and act upon it. Although indirectly.

But I do not necessarily exist. Because the ‘mind’ cannot be created or destroyed, merely ‘defined’.

So yes, for some interpretation of the period at the end of your sentence, it does indeed contain the meaning of life, the universe, and everything.

Now, try to pick an interpretation that makes sense.