Clarification/Follow-up by Oldstillwild on 05/24/08 2:49 pm:
your comments: "The problem of the Many and the One! "

This doesnt reflect the contents of my answer at all.

Its no problem.

There are as many minds as living beings.

All living beings are connected thru its origin: LIFE itself(or for answering purposes of this question:One ).

Although all living beings are embedded into and originated from One (=LIFE ),every living being is self-sustainable basically.

So,
just for clarity reasons re this question:(coz in fact I dont wish to discuss reasonability as such at all.....):

Yes, other minds do exist.
There is only one common source.

hi.

Clarification/Follow-up by tonyrey on 05/26/08 4:39 pm:
Jim,

Even if we start with the assumption that our mind consists solely of brain activity we still would not have direct knowledge of other brains - or of anything other than our own brain for that matter. Our knowledge of everything apart from our thoughts and feelings is based on inference from sense experience. It is therefore impossible to refute solipsism or idealism decisively.

But I agree with you it is reasonable to believe we are not the sole reality. The solipsist can argue there is no need to postulate more than one mind. Why, he asks, multiply entities unnecessarily? The answer is that we cannot alter the evidence of our senses. They point to a variety of stimuli beyond our control and these stimuli occur in repeated patterns which indicate the continued existence of independent entities.

Even so it seems odd to regard our minds as the products of a multitude of electrical impulses when we are autonomous agents. It seems to me there is a radical difference between a mind and a brain...

Clarification/Follow-up by Jim.McGinness on 05/26/08 11:03 pm:
Trying to refute solipsism - as a matter of truth - is going to fail. It's the emptiness or uselessness of solipsism that causes us to reject it, not that there is any way to prove it formally untrue.

Clarification/Follow-up by tonyrey on 05/27/08 5:25 pm:
An important point, Jim. Any philosophy which diminishes or denies the richness of life must be suspect.