Solipsism

Solipsism (pronounced sol-ip-siz-uhm)

(1) An extreme preoccupation with and indulgence of one's feelings, desires etc; egoistic self-absorption.

(2) In philosophy, the theory that only the self exists, or can be proved to exist.  The view or theory that self is the only object of real knowledge or the only thing that is real is technically, an extreme form of scepticism, a denial of the possibility knowledge can exists other than that of one's own existence.

1871: A invention of Modern English from the Latin, the construct being sōlus (alone) +‎ ipse (self) +‎ -ism.  The origin of sōlus is murky, some suggest a link with the earlier swolos, from the Proto-Italic swelos, from the primitive Indo-European swé, a reflexive pronoun from whence came se (oneself) + -los, hence the meaning "by oneself".  Another theory references solhz (whole, healthy) which would make it akin to sollus and salvus.  The third alternative is a connection with the Proto-Germanic sēliz, the Gothic sēls, (happy, good) and the Old English sēlra (better), again from the primitive Indo-European sōlhz (from whence sōlor (to console)).  Ipse (feminine ipsa, neuter ipsum; the demonstrative pronoun) was compounded from the primitive Indo-European éy and swé and, for highly technical reasons, was ipsus in the pre-classical lexicon.  Root of the –ism suffix was either the Ancient Greek -ισμός (-ismós), a suffix that forms abstract nouns of action, state, condition, doctrine; from stem of verbs in -ίζειν (-ízein) (from which English gained -ize), or was from the related Ancient Greek suffix -ισμα (-isma), which more specifically expressed a finished act or thing done.  Solipsism is a noun, solipsist is a noun & adjective, solipsistic is and adjective and solipsistically is an adverb; the noun plural is solipsisms.  For whatever reason, the potentially useful solipsismal seems never to have been coined.

Much ado about nothingness

Wanderer above the Sea of Fog (circa 1818) by Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840).  German painters of the Romantic era weren't necessarily the most solipsistic of the era but can seem so.  They painted under the long shadow cast by G.W.F. Hegel (1770–1831). 

In casual use, solipsism is a useful word to refer to the self-obsessed and there are a lot of them about.  There is a solipsism quiz to work out the extent of one’s own tendency to the solipsistic.  Solipsism is the (ultimately wholly abstract) position in metaphysics that the mind is the only thing that can be known to exist and that knowledge of anything outside the mind is not merely false but unjustified.  It can be thought of as a sceptical hypothesis of life and, if pursued to as close to a logical conclusion as it allows, can lead only to a belief that the whole of reality and the external world and other people are merely representations of the individual self, having no independent existence of their own, and may not even exist.  It differs therefore from pure scepticism in that the solipsist is actually asserting something; it should instead be thought of as a fork of pure idealism.  In Philosophy 101 classes, it’s one of the tools to train the mind.  Lecturers find it amusing because there’s sometimes a student who takes all this seriously and starts to worry; sometimes for years.  Debates between nihilists and solipsists shouldn't of course happen but they do, descending often to a contest of onedownmanship about who holds the most extreme position.

The Mean Girls (2004) crew in their native environment.  For the modern young solipsist, there is only self and shopping.

The origins of Solipsism in western philosophy are in the writings of the Greek pre-Socratic sophist philosopher Gorgias (483–375 BC) who asserted (1) nothing exists, (2) even if something exists, nothing can be known about it and (3), even if something could be known about it, knowledge about it cannot be communicated to others.  That of course is internally perfect and can go no further but because solipsism can be neither proved nor disproved, some otherwise sensible folk felt obliged to bolt it onto the universe.  Philosopher Bishop George Berkeley (1685–1753), argued physical objects do not exist independently of the mind that perceives them and that an item truly exists only so long as it is observed (otherwise it is not only meaningless but simply non-existent).  Berkeley however argued this as part of his world-view which included God and God, even if one accepts he’s probably an Anglican, surely can’t be a solipsist although, if he is, truly we do know the mind of God.

Students seduced by his dark visions may well be tempted to describe Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) as solipsist on the basis that’s how his writings make them feel but he never really explored metaphysical solipsism and it was his radical perspectivism which causes misunderstanding.  In a sense, Nietzsche not only was not, but could not be a solipsist because while solipsism is the belief only one's own mind exists, or can be known to exist, Nietzsche viewed the self not as a separate entity from existence, but rather as an integrated part of a chaotic “will-to-power” driven reality.  In Beyond Good and Evil (1886), Nietzsche argued that “there are no facts, only interpretations”, and knowledge was subjective, created by individual perspectives, meaning there was no single “objective reality” accessible to all.  In the wake of post-modernity, that no longer sounds exceptional but in the milieu of late nineteenth century intellectual life, it was a stark vision.  Nietzsche was one of those figures upon whom students were inclined to map their own world view and that was possible because of the way he phrased things; it was that adaptability (exploited by the Nazis) which persuaded later philosophers (notably Leo Strauss (1899–1973)) to write in a manner which meant their words couldn’t be misappropriated.  For Strauss, that avoided misrepresentation but didn’t help accessibility and if reading for pleasure rather than enlightenment, Nietzsche rewards more than Strauss.  To students, being told by Nietzsche that “God is dead” could be heady stuff so they should be forgiven for thinking him a solipsist; in urging them to stop valuing the “fake” worlds of Plato (or anyone else) he did seem to imply a belief only in his own constructed reality.  After all, if God was dead, there can be no objective divine perspective so each individual must create their own sense of meaning.

Nietzsche fan boy (bottom left) on the floor of a Siemens factory, Nuremberg 1910.  In German workplaces, the rules included “No smiling” and “No laughter”.

So while it’s easy to understand why the “Nietzsche a solipsist” label is tempting, most historians would call that either a mischaracterization or misunderstanding.  Certainly, there’s little in Nietzsche’s writings which could be constructed as the defense of solipsism as a doctrine and rarely did he engage in the kind of systematic, foundational epistemology in which solipsism typically is discussed.  Of course, merely that a philosopher didn’t write of something has never prevented latter-day adherents or critics interpreting what they did say which is why the neo-Marxists managed to create a reasonably hefty volume of work covering “Marxist aspects of crime & punishment” despite Karl Marx (1818-1883) mostly being silent on both topics.  Nietzsche did not argue that only one’s mind is certain to exist so in that sense rejects the very framework underpinning solipsism and was critical of the idea a stable, self-transparent subject (the I) could serve as the foundation of knowledge; his famous quip that “there is no ‘being’ behind doing” would seem at least a nail in solipsism’s coffin.

The problem was, and remains, that while perspectivism (all knowledge is from a perspective, shaped by physiology, culture, and drives) was not the same as solipsism, but for romantic youth seduced by Nietzsche’s words, things became teleological and, as Leo Strauss concluded, Nietzsche’s texts could be said to mean whatever one wanted them to mean.  He deserves still to be read but needs to be read with care because perspectivism at least implies (and probably demands) a plurality of interpretations and viewpoints rather than collapsing things to a singularity; where the confusion lies is that there’s really no denial of the existence if external world, his point rather that man has no uninterpreted access to it; what lies beyond is real, but we can perceive and understand it only through interpretive lenses.