bogdugg

I played it - and if it was truly only made by two people is quite impressive - but it's just alright. The world is very cool, and is structured around multiple levels of a tower each with their own language that you need to learn to progress. My main issue with the game is that the differences between these languages, and the puzzles built around them, aren't particularly interesting or deep or varied. There are a few gems, but overall it's much closer to a traditional adventure game than you might expect on first glance.

That said, the art and world design are very cool.

Edit: As an aside, it's worth noting that the Steam Reviews metric is a tad misleading in a similar way to Rotten Tomatoes, in that it only gauges ratio of positive reviews, over what those reviews are actually saying. A universal consensus of a game being a 7/10 (if we assume 7/10 is positive) will appear "better" than a game where 99% of people believe it is a 10/10, but 1% think it sucks. It's good at predicting whether you will like it, it is bad at predicting how much.

If your perception is subject to failure, so to is the evidence, no matter how convincing. So yes, we act upon the assumption that reality exists. We both agree with this.

But that doesn't mean it is true. And all I'm saying is for this very narrow point of what I care most about, Descartes does have a point. I care more about my mind than my foot. I mean, maybe you can think of a better way to frame the argument because I doubt you even disagree. If you have a gun and you are forced to shoot yourself anywhere on your body, would you choose your foot or your brain?

The better counter to me would be to prove external value. Would I sacrifice myself for someone else? If I believe reality doesn't exist, the answer should presumably be no. If I believe reality does exist, the answer could be yes. Or alternatively, shooting myself in the foot suggests I believe in a causal relationship within reality towards shooting my brain and losing consciousness, which I shouldn't necessarily believe.

But even then, it's not that I disbelieve reality, it's just that I can't know for certain what's real outside my mind, so there's not really any contradiction between acting as if it is real and being uncertain if it is.

All this is doesn't matter anyway: the point is less you could be a brain in a vat, but rather if you were a brain in a vat, would you be any less you? I don't think so.

I have more evidence that the real world exists than I do that you are a thinking mind.

I have more evidence that I am a thinking mind than that I do that the real world exists. There's no point arguing this point it won't go anywhere.

The default is the assumption that the way the universe presents itself is the way it is.

Sure, but this is still an assumption I would need to agree to - though obviously a productive one - not necessarily true. The only thing I can know is my experience.

This isn't particularly useful beyond explaining why I view my consciousness as primary and hands secondary or tertiary or something. The brain is tricky because again, I don't know where it ends and my consciousness begins.

That's one way of seeing things, and I respect that viewpoint, but I disagree. I primarily view myself as my consciousness; everything else is secondary. How do you know you aren't a brain in a vat?

By determined, I mean it follows a logical set of rules, not that it is set on a specific action. The idea would be that it was determined to make all those choices because everything else is also following the rules of the universe. Just as it was determined that they play in traffic, so was it determined for me to tell them to stop, just as it was determined for them to listen. They didn't choose to change their mind, they were always going to change their mind.

We are constantly making and updating our choices in response to new information. Just because the brain decided upon one course of action at one point in time does not preclude it from changing course in the future. That's just a new choice. All available information is taken into consideration at all points in time.

I believe consciousness is a result of processes of the brain, and the brain is a very complex machine. It's hard to say anything too concretely beyond that because I don't really understand how it works. I live as though the brain and my consciousness are in perfect sync, but I'm unsure how true that is.

There are, for example, experiments where it can be shown that decisions are made before we are consciously aware that we have made them. Others show that severing a nerve between the hemispheres of our brain can result in two independent consciousnesses. Who can say where I end and my brain begins?

What drives the thing that drives the hammer? What drives the thing that drives the thing that drives the hammer? What drives the thing that drives the thing that drives the thing that drives the hammer?

Physical processes out of our control.

Doesn’t that imply that people have the ability to change their behavior?

My answer changes depending on your meaning but:

Of course. My brain is constantly updating and improving itself. I'm just not ultimately in control of how that process happens. Though that does not mean that I should stop living. I can still experience and enjoy my life, and 'choose' to improve it. It's just that the I that made that choice is a consequence of my brain calculating optimal paths based on a myriad of factors: genetics, culture, circumstance, biological drives, personal history, drugs, etc.

One interpretation would be Many Worlds; that is, every quantum possibility is real in its own multiversal branch. So, to assign moral agency you would need to show that I chose the world I'm in now, over some other version of my life in which different choices were made. Although, I'm not certain you even need to go that far: I have no idea to what degree quantum randomness can actually affect our choices. But, in any case, that too would be out of our control.

I'm a fairly hardcore/radical determinist, and tend to agree that individuals shouldn't be held morally responsible for actions, any more than a hammer is morally responsible for driving a nail. However, that does not mean people should be free from consequence. There are plenty of reasons - even as a hardcore determinist - to hold people to account for their actions, either as a social corrective mechanism, public safety, deterrent, or personal sanity.

As for getting their actions to align with your morals, that's a more complicated question that depends on the type of person they are.

The Curse of the Black Pearl, and it's not particularly close.