oSolipsism Berkeley–Ovchinnikov: The Argument of Categorical Alibi. A Proof of the Performative Impossibility of Solipsism

This paper presents the Argument of Categorical Alibi, a performative refutation of strong metaphysical solipsism. Abstract:For three centuries, solipsism has been treated as a logically irrefutable trap: any objection can be reduced to content within the solipsist’s dream. This paper changes the question. Instead of trying to prove the external world, it asks whence the category of the Other arises in a supposedly closed mind. The answer is that the category cannot be derived from the “I” through negation, dreaming, or internal splitting. The paper then develops the consequence: an architecture that contains the Other as a constitutive element cannot be thought as a closed system. It closes the remaining loopholes—the boundary, the burden of proof, the Kantian retreat, silence, and brute fact—by showing that each either reintroduces the Other or collapses into skepticism. The result is not an ontological proof of the external world but a performative one: strong solipsism annihilates itself in the attempt to state it. The argument is addressed to philosophers working on epistemology, idealism, and the limits of first-person authority.