How do we know we really exist?

here's how. buy some pudding and then eat it. if the carton is empty and no one else is around, it MUST have been you that ate it. So that's proof.

Descartes. I have pudding all over my face. Therefore, I exist.

It seems impossible to know for sure. Probably the most successful attempts in philosophy have been made by Immanuel Kant and P.F.Strawson, following in his footsteps. They both adopted an approach called 'transcendental argument', or the 'kantian enterprise'.Very roughly speaking, the trick is to find something in the necessary conditions of thought that secures the existence of an external world; then, because you know you are thinking, this must be true as well. Of course, you might be wrong about a lot of other things, but at least you could be sure about that one thing you had secured. Kant himself argued that, because of the way the mind works, something must exist which is not the mind, ie something external and real.

Transcendental arguments are promising and useful, but probably don't achieve what they're supposed to. It's a hugely complicated debate. Feel free to email me if you want more info, but if you're just mildly curious it's a lot of work on your part for no definite answers.

Even if we only exist as an imagination, we still EXIST as an imagination. The source and/or purpose of our existence (a dream, big bang, god(s)) isn't relevant to the fact that we are experiencing this moment.

We exist as God's idea, no imagination, and we know that we exist because we are alive, and always of the desire for these three items: to live forever, to know everything, and to always be happy. Our desire for these three things never really changes, and we exist as something conscious of these three desires.

The material body cannot supply these three items; the mind cannot and the intelligence cannot. The only reasonable conclusion is that I am consciousness. But what kind of consciousness? Subordinate consciousness—I am part of the Supreme Consciousness, God.

we know we exist because of the magazine us weekly. no one would imagine a world with that.

you cant know if you exist , or if any of this exist

this world could be a figment of your imagination , or you yourself could be a creature that exists in another creatures imagination

god could be the one dreaming of us all

your question could never be answered

it's a thought but then reality kicks back in like when you get hungry and have to go t work or the rent man come a calling. that's how I know

If you can feel pain, enjoy happiness, feel hungry and thirsty,and can breath, you are really exist. If you are existing, we are existing and every thing exists

The bills keep coming in the mail.

I don't think anyone could have imagined me