Abort? Retry? Fail?

Note: This page will make much more sense if you've read "Bomb #20 Learns a Little Phenomonology." Click here to go there if you haven't already!

Bomb #20 fails Philosophy 101. Bomb #20's response to Doolittle's brief Socratic dialogue on phenomonology--in which Doolittle attempts to convince it not to detonate because it can't be absolutely certain that it actually received detonation orders due to the unavoidable and potentially misleading mediation between the self and exterior reality--represents an unwarranted, and irrational, leap of logic. The lesson of phenomonology, according to Doolittle, is that outside reality is fundamentally unknowable, that we can never be sure that the data we receive from our senses are true and accurate. Bomb #20, however, concludes, after brief contemplation in the peace and quiet of the bomb bay, that because we can never truly differentiate between true and false data about that which is outside the self, that all data from the outside world must be false. It becomes its own god, the ultimate naval-gazer: "The only thing that exists is myself."

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