I think the assumption that "you" has a referent separate from Bob or Alice is the problem.

EITHER there's some spirit soul thing, a ghost going around to these bodies inhabiting them, in which case there's no paradox because there is a real difference

OR there are not these spirits and souls, and then there's no "you" that isn't synonymous with Bob, or synonymous with Alice, and there's no paradox. — flannel jesus

If I have a soul that goes into another body, then it's still me. No?

If I do not have a soul, then there is nothing to go into another body.

No contradiction either way.

The world merely is. Whether it's this or that is your own testimony about the world. Consequently, people's perspective isn't the world.

As SolarWind posted his thesis 5 years ago, I had been thinking about this issue also way before that. Here I used LLMs as a tool to help formalize the thesis. — bizso09

Fair enough. However, I must say that as I look through your conversation with Gemini I see the familiar pattern playing out where (in my opinion) the LLM treats your assertions largely as stipulations rather than pausing to assess whether the key inference actually follows.

As for your reply above, I would say that you are not deriving the singularity or absoluteness of “You”; you are simply stipulating it. From the fact that only one perspective is this one, it does not follow that only one perspective is first-person.

The inference “if another perspective were first-person, it would be You” is invalid; it confuses token uniqueness with category membership. Other perspectives are not You, but that does not make them third-person simpliciter.

No contradiction arises unless you assume, without argument, that “first-person” must be a single global slot. That assumption, not logic, is doing all the work. Absent an argument for that assumption, there is no contradiction to resolve.

No, it's not a fifth person. It is merely a reference point, or pointer, i.e. a window of first person perspective. It is not a physical being, soul or spirit, but merely just an additional fact of the world. The physical beings are the four people listed in the puzzle, along with their respective experiences. — bizso09

Ah. I also misunderstood.

Well, for sure, the world is not self-contradictory.

Yes, that's clear now, but what I was asking is: If "You" had been a 5th person, would that remove the puzzle? If so, that would tell us that the puzzle is generated by the idea that point of view can arise irrespective of physical embodiment. This is similar to the point made by @Joshs that we're forcing words (or, in this case, a concept about subjectivity) into a framework where they may not fit.

The whole thing reminds me of Thomas Nagel's interesting question, "Is the fact that I am Thomas Nagel a fact about the world?" Looks trivial, until we see that it's Thomas Nagel's question, a question only he can ask. Which connects with:

You is not meant to be a spirit or soul, but more like a reference point, or pointer, i.e. a window of first person perspective. It is not physical, but it is an additional fact included in the world. . . . I argue that the You is an objective fact of the world — bizso09

But is it? That's Nagel's question. (The difference between "token-indexicals and absolute global fact", as @Esse Quam Videri puts it.) I know you argue that "I am me" is an important fact, and I agree, but I think what everyone is disputing is whether it's a fact about "the world". And at this point, we can all choose sides about what "fact" and "the world" ought to refer to! Witt's view makes a good touchstone, whether or not you agree with him.

In my view, reducing the issue to mere play of words, ignores a fundamental fact of reality, which is that you are observing the world as a "You". It is true that ignoring such a fact helps us, as human species, survive, since it makes the assumption the others are just like us, and it is the socially accepted theory of the world. After all, we expect cooperation from others, and we use our model of others to try to influence them for our benefit. Therefore, it is natural to assume that others are likewise a "You". However, this train of thought unfortunately contains a logical jump in thinking, which is an error.

Scenario 1: You are Alice. This means that you have access to Alice's thoughts, feelings, perception, and can see, hear, feel through her body.
Scenario 2: You are Bob. This means that you have access to Bob's experience, etc.
The question is, what is the difference between the two scenarios? — bizso09

I can include two more Scenarios:
Scenario 3: You are Alice, Bob, Cecil, Dan all at the same time. You are simultaneously experiencing the world through all these vantage points.
Scenario 4: You do not exist. Alice, Bob, Cecil, Dan are all in the world, but You are not there to see it.

I assume that in your argument, all four Scenarios are meaningless and identical. As a side, your argument is what a theoretical philosophical Zombie plus may say, who has no access to the "Window", because to them indeed all four Scenarios are the exact same, and there is no way to transfer them to knowledge of the proof of the "You", since this fact is objectively non-transferable, but nevertheless holds true to a person who has access to it.

The inference “if another perspective were first-person, it would be You” is invalid; it confuses token uniqueness with category membership. Other perspectives are not You, but that does not make them third-person simpliciter. — Esse Quam Videri

Your mistake is that you are abstracting away the world, rather than seeing it exactly as it is. In your reality, indeed other perspectives are not first person, apart from yours only. In fact, in my world, your perspective is not even first, because only mine is. Therefore, our worlds are mutually exclusive.

If we are nitpicking about grammar, then let me also be very precise. I mean first person, and I stand by the literal definition of the words. Somebody else's perspective is literally a third person. It is important to get this clear, because the fact that which perspective is the one we refer to as first person, is exactly the problem that "You" identifies and solves, and which is contained in the fact that "You" can always tell unequivocally who you are, which is not a trivial matter.

When you say that I am ME, and ME refers to Alice, or ME refers to Bob, or ME refers to Esse, is a non-trivial fact of the world that must be accounted for, notwithstanding the fact that the words are coming out of Esse's mouth, which is a corollary, but not an antecedent.

Whether it is a fact or not of the world is very simple. I exist as Me. Everything is viewed from my perspective. This happens to be at a location of OP. If this was not a fact, then OP might still write his things, but of course I would be dead. OP would be nothing more but a mere philosophical zombie plus, who has a body, thoughts, experiences, but it's actually just an object of reality. What he doesn't have is the current centre of perception that is being experienced right now, by virtue of me existing.

Of course, how can I prove this to you, that this "You" I'm talking about exists. I know it for sure, since I know I'm here. That's enough for me. But how can I prove it to you? I can't. Because this fact is not something that is objectively visible. You don't have access to the fact that I am OP, and OP is not just a philosophical zombie acting as if he was me. Even if he might have his own experience, how could I prove that that experience is actually "Mine", and not some random experience of some "Other" person. I cannot. The fact that it's "Mine" experience, concern an additional fact of the world, that only I have access to, but which is nonetheless global unique and absolute in the world I live in.

My argument hinges on the assumption, that you the Reader, could similarly derive the existence of your own very "Mine" fact, by virtue of you existing. Then if I assume that you are honest, and not lying, this would lead to a contradiction in the world. Your "Mine" and my "Mine" both concern first person view points, which is singular by definition, and cannot coexist simultaneously. On the other hand, if I assume that you are lying, or you are denying the existence of "Mine" for yourself, then you are admitting that you are a philosophical zombie plus, but at the same time you are resolving the contradiction this way.

You've hit upon the reason why Frege distinguished ideas from sense and reference. The intersubjective meaning of language must be invariant to the perspective-dependent realities of each individual in order to avoid inconsistent semantics, in spite of the fact that from the perspective of each individual, only their own ideas exist and intersubjective truth is dependent upon their perspective.

It is analogous to the platform-independent definitions of programming languages. The semantics of a programming language, e.g Java, and source code written in java, is oblivious/invariant to the fact that it will be compiled/interpreted and executed in terms of different hardware instructions running on different machines. So on the one hand, the meaning of a java program is invariant to which piece of hardware it will be interpreted and executed on, and yet the truth of an executed java program reduces to the hardware operations of a specific computer.

Does that mean that the world is fundamentally self-contradictory? — bizso09

This immediately made me think of the balance of opposites we find in this world. I'm not sure if this is what you are looking for, but various selves do not necessarily contradict, but exist upon a spectrum with opposites at each end. Individuals vs. the whole.

And this reminded me of some of the opening lines in The Tao -

... All in the world know the beauty of the beautiful, and in doing this they have (the idea of) what ugliness is; they all know the skill of the skilful, and in doing this they have (the idea of) what the want of skill is.

... So it is that existence and non-existence give birth the one to (the idea of) the other; that difficulty and ease produce the one (the idea of) the other; that length and shortness fashion out the one the figure of the other; that (the ideas of) height and lowness arise from the contrast of the one with the other; that the musical notes and tones become harmonious through the relation of one with another; and that being before and behind give the idea of one following another.

Even though the java programming language can be compiled to run on any computer, it is an additional fact of the world that which specific computer it actually runs on. It is convenient to ignore this fact in order to "avoid inconsistent semantics", but that ignorance is wrong nevertheless, when we talk about the world in its totality.

On the other hand, there is absolutely no difference between the two scenarios. There are still only four people in the world, and each of them have their own respective experiences, thoughts, feelings and perceptions. Alice is still Alice, just like Bob is still Bob, in both cases. — bizso09

The difference is in who you are. You exist correct? If you exist separate from Bob in Alice in such a way that you can access Bob and Alice's subjective experience, then you are separate from them and no contradiction arises.

I see you are talking about relatives, meaning things are relational to one another. However, I argue that in the world, the You is an absolute global unique fact. It's coordinate zero so to speak. There are no multiple coordinate zeros, unless there are multiple disjoint worlds, at which point one of the worlds would become the true coordinate zero again.

If I was both Alice and Bob, then it is Scenario 3, you're talking about. The point I want to state is that I want to affirm the existence of this fact called "You", which some people deny. The contradiction arises when someone else claims to be "You", when in fact they are not, and assuming they are honest. I'm also asserting that there is no You1, You2, etc, but only a single global "You".

You is an absolute global unique fact. It's coordinate zero so to speak. There are no multiple coordinate zeros, unless there are multiple disjoint worlds, at which point one of the worlds would become the true coordinate zero again. — bizso09

Hmm ... interesting. The thought that comes to my mind is that none of us live in absolute isolation. My brain operates in a loop intimately connected to the environment.

Stimulus detected > analyzed > response

argue that in the world, the You is an absolute global unique fact. It's coordinate zero so to speak. There are no multiple coordinate zeros, unless there are multiple disjoint worlds, at which point one of the worlds would become the true coordinate zero again. — bizso09

The are multiple coordinate zeros in regards to cosmology. I don't see all of this as a contradiction. I just see it as us not understanding things as well as as we could, and hopefully will. It's not how we think of things. Yet it's true.

This deals with the physical world and its workings. I also include subjective experiences in this realm, although they are traditionally not part of the objective reality. What I'm concerned about is this "You", which is just a pointer or selection. But it has information content, hence a fact. It's like a flag or label you plant somewhere.

If I was both Alice and Bob, then it is Scenario 3, you're talking about. — bizso09

I do not see a scenario 3 in your OP. But if what I mentioned is a 'scenario 3', that's fine.

The point I want to state is that I want to affirm the existence of this fact called "You", which some people deny. — bizso09

Its your thought experiment. Make it however you want as long as its not self-contradictory. You can't have 'you' exist and not be a separate being. "You" in your scenario is an independent observer that in theory can observe other subjective experience. I have no problem with this, but this doesn't lead to a contradiction either.

The contradiction arises when someone else claims to be "You", when in fact they are not, and assuming they are honest. I'm also asserting that there is no You1, You2, etc, but only a single global "You". — bizso09

Well of course if someone else claims to be someone or something else, its a contradiction. Are you claiming scenario 1 and 2 are happening at the same time? In which case its still not a contradiction, "You" just have access to two subjective experiences at once.

Saying “in your reality only your perspective is first-person” is exactly the token-indexical point, not a denial of it. Once you relativize first-person facts to a perspective (“in your reality / in my world”), global absoluteness is gone.

This would become clear if the argument were to be formalized. At the beginning of the argument you treat first-person perspective like a predicate that takes a subject and a perspective as parameters. The decisive moment in your argument is where you introduce the notion of the Window. This is where you absolutize the predicate by dropping the subject parameter, thereby equivocating on the meaning of "first-person perspective".

Grammatical person does not track metaphysical kind: the fact that I must refer to your perspective in the third person does not make your perspective third-person simpliciter. It is first-person for you.

The non-triviality of self-location (“who am I?”) does not turn indexical facts into world-level constants. No contradiction arises unless one assumes—without argument—that first-person must be a single global slot. That assumption, not logic, is still doing all the work.

I think we realize too little how often our arguments are of the form:— A.: "I went to Grantchester this afternoon." B.: "No I didn't." — Frank Ramsey, 1925

Note that to present the point, Ramsey names his philosophers "A" and "B".

Indexicals are very interesting. Their analysis is both interesting and important because everyday speech is riddled with them, so analysing everyday speech requires analysing indexicals.

But I would remind everyone that there is a great liberation that comes with eliminating them from technical discussion.

There is endless discussion here about the centrality of the first-person perspective or even its ineliminability, and so on. To this I say, it wasn't an accident, it wasn't a mistake, it is a step deliberately taken that pays endless dividends.

If you want to know whether A or B went to Grantchester this afternoon, that's a problem you can work on, even if it turns out the evidence is not conclusive. But considering how "I" both did and didn't go is just spinning your wheels. We switch to the third-person on purpose, because it works.

The are multiple coordinate zeros in regards to cosmology. — Patterner

I mean, there can be multiple heres and nows, but still the fact is that I'm only seeing one of them, and how come it's this one if they are all here and now, shouldn't I be seeing them all? I know about quantum superstates, and wave function collapse, but I don't think this explains the "You".

Once you relativize first-person facts to a perspective (“in your reality / in my world”), global absoluteness is gone. — Esse Quam Videri

This is a fair point you raise, my mistake leads to a circular argument! I'm relativizing "You" to "Your World", which defeats the purpose of "You" in the first place. This is wrong. In fact, I should be stating, in The World. To remain consistent, I'm referring to "The world" where the "You" is with OP, not with Esse. It was an exercise in hypotheticals to give you the possibility of having a world where Esse is the You, just so that you can follow my line of logic, and come to the conclusion that "You" is not OP, which would of course contradict to the fact that is happening in "The world". Permitting you to arrive at this conclusion would allow the contradiction to happen, provided that I accept it as honest truth.

I admit that I mix it up sometimes, "Your world" or "The world". In reality, I can only refer to "The World" and nothing else, because that's the only world I know, and which I can derive from the fact that I exist as "You" in "The World". There is no other worlds to speak of. This is how the global unique nature of "You" emerges.

Nice. It looks like you've noticed the pressure point, however, I don't think your proposed solution evades the problem. You’re right that relativizing “You” undermines the argument, but replacing “your world” with “The World” doesn’t fix that, because “The World” is still being defined indexically as the world in which you are You. That just reintroduces the same subject parameter under a different name.

Unless “The World” can be specified independently of the very first-person perspective it is supposed to ground rather than being fixed by it, the argument remains circular. Capitalizing “World” doesn’t turn a subject-relative fact into a global one. As it stands, “You is global because it is true in The World” and “This is The World because I am You in it” mutually define one another.

If this still seems unclear or incorrect on my part, no worries. We may have reached the point where we're simply talking past one another.

You are interpreting this way, because the "You" term is overloaded, just like "first person perspective". These can mean on the one hand something that is relative to an object in the world, and this concerns the indexical meanings of the terms. On the other hand, "You" and "first person perspective" is also used as a term to denote, "coordinate zero", "Window", "flag", "selection". While the indexical meanings can be use in the relative sense, I'm talking about these terms in the absolute sense. Let me illustrate.

Indexical meaning: Bob says, "I am Bob". Here I refers to the Bob object, and nothing else. It's stating something, relative to the Bob object, while it is Bob making the statement.

Absolute fact meaning: I'm the Window. The Window is at Bob. The Window here refers to "The World", where the observation is occurring, and this coincidentally just happens to be where Bob is, but it could be anywhere else too.

they're both fiction... all he's done is posit the same ole same ole "True world vs Apparent world." Consequently Nietzsche details how The True and Apparent worlds eventually became fable in Twilight of the Idols... in a six step process...

6. We have suppressed the true world: what world survives? the apparent world perhaps?... Certainly not! In abolishing the true world we have also abolished the world of appearance! — Nietzsche, Twilight of Idols

You're now just left with the world as is.

@bizso09 unfortunately you're just arguing Socrates and Plato. Which has aready been exposed and done away with in contemporary philosophy.

As it stands, “You is global because it is true in The World” and “This is The World because I am You in it” mutually define one another. — Esse Quam Videri

You are correct stating that "You" and "The World" are interlinked. There is no independent "The World" without "You", and vice versa. The contradiction happens, if you claimed that You is with Esse, not with OP. This would contradict, because "The World" is global. and you would be attempting to link a fact (You is with Esse) to "You", which is already linked (You is with OP).

There is no part of "The World" that exists independently to "You", because everything can be related back to "You" one way or the other. If something did exist independently, that would imply the existence of a disjoint world. I already covered that case before, how this would be impossible, simply via the introduction of an encapsulating world which would again relate back everything to "You".

I think using the term "You" is confusing, so I'd prefer to use the term "Window".

There is no part of "The World" that exists independently to "You", — bizso09

Sorry homie, the outer world isn't the work of our organs. The world exists independently of you.

I already covered that case before, how this would be impossible, simply via the introduction of an encapsulating world which would again relate back everything to "You". — bizso09

The error of imaginary causes... as in the world doesn't work like that so your "proof" is good for an imaginary world that does work like that...

Oh yeah... the fable of the True and Apparent world...

It's scenarios, but actually the contradiction would arise in the real actual world. The puzzle is good for pinpointing what "You" is.

I don't attempt to explain the entire world. I'm just deriving conclusions starting from the fact that I exist.

Well of course if someone else claims to be someone or something else, its a contradiction. — Philosophim

Exactly. So my question is, are you claiming to be a "You" right now in the real world? Because if so, it's a contradiction.