"No-one experiences the existence of an outside world . Explanations such as the Matrix can explain sense impressions as well as some concept of 'external reality ' . We have no more evidence for one than the other . The fact no-one takes them seriously is a psychological point about human beings , nothing to do with reality per se . How is that based on experience ? We have no data that says 'an outside world exists ' . The assumption that such a world exists is made before we can use the data . But the belief that 'its gotten us far ' is itself a 'scientific ' type belief , in fact it has less proof on the empirical assumptions than the science itself . Justifying the validity of experience by experience is the intellectual equivalent of saying 'God must exist , because God is good and would not allow a world without God ' ."
"Lets put it another way then . If the world did not exist or did not run by the theories and laws presented by science , you would think that there would be SOME experience at SOME point in reliably recordeable human history that people had which would have shown this . Experience is the only interaction we have with existence . If some aspect of existence exists ( ex . some hypothetical parallel universe ) that never manifests itself in human experience then we have no way of knowing its existence . We can guess but our guesses , not being based on experience , are completely arbitrary . Given that there are a nearly infinite number of imaginary scenarios that we can think up , the probability of the reality of any of those scenarious is miniscule . One other point : Say that the laws of physics ( which are derived from mutual human experience ) are wrong but just appear to be right and that some omnipotent being can change them whenever he likes . If these apparent laws have remained the same for all of recorded human time , then why should we suspect that they may change at any moment ? It all comes down to probability - if things are not what we expect they are from Science , then that should have manifested itself by now ."
"No-one experiences the existence of an outside world ."
"Experience is the only interaction we have with existence"