s that there really is a dog on the mat, and the external world exists.Craig: Good point, but what you are stating in philosophical terms is the Surprise Principle. This principle states that if there are multiple hypotheses then the one least surprising is the best hypothesis. But let me ask you this question: what is an explanation?Joe: Well, an explanatio tells how something happensCraig: Right, but how does something "happen"?Joe: Something happens when another thing causes it.Craig: Right again, but let me put it into easier terms besides "things". For example, you push someone in a crowded line, they fall over and hit the next person, then what happens?Joe: Every person causes someone else to fall over.Craig: Right, but you don't actually see a cause do you? Of course you don't. A cause is a comparison between what happens before, and what happens after. You would never say, "Oh there's a cause," you just assume that the person that was pushed cause everyone else to fall. You are comparing what happened before to what happened after. For us to find the best cause or explanation for what we are sensing we have to compare, "before" and "after". The point is that we don't know what the before is, we just sense the after. We are the people falling over in line and since we cannot se the before, we would not know what knocked us over.Joe: What does that have to do with choosing a cause. Just because I can't compare a before and after, why does that mean I cannot pick the hypothesis that makes the most sense?Craig: Good point. Since you cannot determine what is the cause of our sense data, then any hypothesis is as good as the next. If I have no idea what caused me to fall over when I was in line, then I could say that space aliens flew down and pushed me over. Since you have lack of knowledge of the cause then you cannot specifically say that it was a certain fact. In our sense data of the dog on the mat I can th...
