On Thursday 29 May 2003 8:12 pm, John W. Sarkela wrote:
> A solipsist may insist that there is indeed nothing beyond the
> distinction of self. I tend to a more ontological point of view. I
> believe that there is a "rex extensa" beyond the boundary of my self.
> (I am, therefore I think so.)
>
> My objective perception of reality, the rex extensa, is indeed a
> simulation of that external reality. The very easily demonstrated fact
> that I am not omniscient leads to the conclusion that my experience of
> reality is at best a simulation of the whole she-bang.

Unless I can steer myself back on-topic, I promise to desist after this 
post...

To borrow an analogy from Alan Sondheim (he of the perl-scripts, endlessly 
munging), this aggregate of percepts is a bit like a Riemann Sphere: a 
mapping of an outer world into an inner arena, where it is upheld in 
miniature. To each his own private garden of noesis. But I would add that 
this mapping is performed by the perceptual apparatus of an embodied human 
individual, and that this apparatus is made to serve the needs of that 
individual's body: it is not an emanation of a pure angelic consciousness, 
but an extension of the reach and range of the phenotype. It isn't a fake 
mirroring an elusive reality, but a folding of the real into itself, as real 
as anything else is.

Dominic