Brains in Vats & External World Scepticism

1. Can we know anything?

1.1. The sceptical argument

1.2. You do not know whether you are a BIV or an embodied being in the world.

1.3. It is a claim about knowledge, it is not claiming that you're a BIV

2. Reference and thoughts reach

2.1. Hilary Putnam

2.2. Argument relies on what we're capable of representing or referring to.

2.3. Churchill and the Ant

2.4. The aliens and the tree

2.5. The turing test for reference

3. Refuting the skeptic

3.1. The BIV hypothesis is self-refuting

3.2. Just like when you say 'I am speaking' It is correct up until the point you suppose that you are

3.3. Similarly if you can intelligibly suppose you are a BIV, then you aren't

4. The argument

4.1. Supposition: We are BIVs

4.2. If in the good world, supposition is false. If in bad world supposition is also false.

4.3. Because... of Putnam's externalism about content. The BIV will not have casual or dispositional connection to entities. Therefore it would be 'we are BIVS-in-the-simultion

4.4. The skeptic requires us to refer to what only the people in the good world can refer to, whilst being in the bad. This of course cannot be done!

5. Intentionality: Abountness

6. External world scepticism of the BIV variety is self-refuting!

7. Reference: Picking out