How come Descartes didn't say "I am, therefore I think"?
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The objective was to answer the most basic question of philosophy.
That being proving one's own existence.
So as he lie in bed thinking about the question he realized that...he was thinking. And realized that if he were thinking that "therefore there must be a thinker".
Ergo "I think therefore I am" ( ie I think, therefore I exist).
And besides "I am therefore I think" doesn't make any philosophical sense. A box of hammers "exists" but it doesn't think.
Descartes might have realized one day that "that box of hammers cluttering up my garage friggin takes up a lotta space!" And then concluded "I also take up space" and then gone on to conclude "that like the box of hammers I take up space therefore, like the box of hammers I exist".
So the real question is why didn't he say "I take up space therefore I am", or "I fart therefore I am", and or focus on any number of low mindless attributes of the dumb things in the world that happen to really exist? Why did he focus on "thnking"?
That being proving one's own existence.
So as he lie in bed thinking about the question he realized that...he was thinking. And realized that if he were thinking that "therefore there must be a thinker".
Ergo "I think therefore I am" ( ie I think, therefore I exist).
And besides "I am therefore I think" doesn't make any philosophical sense. A box of hammers "exists" but it doesn't think.
Descartes might have realized one day that "that box of hammers cluttering up my garage friggin takes up a lotta space!" And then concluded "I also take up space" and then gone on to conclude "that like the box of hammers I take up space therefore, like the box of hammers I exist".
So the real question is why didn't he say "I take up space therefore I am", or "I fart therefore I am", and or focus on any number of low mindless attributes of the dumb things in the world that happen to really exist? Why did he focus on "thnking"?
easy: because there's no proof that the box of hammers, or space, exist. They may be illusions. But the fact that there's someone having these illusions is still undeniable. so: I'm hallucinating, therefore I am -
Descartes however was not imagining himself being someone else's illusion - I'm a simulation therefore someone else - or some machine-, who's running this simulation of me, is.
And while that's an option, it isn't the most reductive.
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I can read facial expressions. I did the test.
That being proving one's own existence.
So as he lie in bed thinking about the question he realized that...he was thinking. And realized that if he were thinking that "therefore there must be a thinker".
Ergo "I think therefore I am" ( ie I think, therefore I exist).
And besides "I am therefore I think" doesn't make any philosophical sense. A box of hammers "exists" but it doesn't think.
Descartes might have realized one day that "that box of hammers cluttering up my garage friggin takes up a lotta space!" And then concluded "I also take up space" and then gone on to conclude "that like the box of hammers I take up space therefore, like the box of hammers I exist".
So the real question is why didn't he say "I take up space therefore I am", or "I fart therefore I am", and or focus on any number of low mindless attributes of the dumb things in the world that happen to really exist? Why did he focus on "thnking"?
easy: because there's no proof that the box of hammers, or space, exist. They may be illusions. But the fact that there's someone having these illusions is still undeniable. so: I'm hallucinating, therefore I am -
Descartes however was not imagining himself being someone else's illusion - I'm a simulation therefore someone else - or some machine-, who's running this simulation of me, is.
And while that's an option, it isn't the most reductive.
Hmmm....
I will hafta digest this. But it sounds right.
He meant that the fact that he thinks is evidence or proof that he is.
I'm not a Cartesian. My metaphysics is an Idealism, a Non-Realist Idealism, Eliminative Ontic Structural Non-Reallism. I've named it "Skepticism".
I consider it to qualify as a version of India's Vedanta, because it has in common with them, some basic aspects, conclusions and consequences. It doesn't match the details of any of the three usual versions of Vedanta, but they differ greatly from eachother too.
My metaphysics is discussed at the most recent end of the Physics and Reality discussion-thread, at this Politics, Philosophy and Religion forum.
Michael829
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Michael829
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