this is because some people find Rene Descartes interesting (i find him repulsive) so lets have a Descartes discussion what do you think about his conclusion
I think therefore I am....for those who don't know in Latin its cogito ergo sum
basically can we really conclude that only we exist and have proof of it and everything else could be fake (illusion or demon playing tricks etc)
| Bannik wrote: |
basically can we really conclude that only we exist and have proof of it and everything else could be fake (illusion or demon playing tricks etc) |
Well, yes, it is possible that everything you experience is fake, and not really there.
One step further would be to consider that you are fake, and don't really exist. The wonderful thing about his simple statement is that it gives you defense against that last step; you wouldn't be able to think about whether you exist or not if you didn't exist. | ocalhoun wrote: |
| you wouldn't be able to think about whether you exist or not if you didn't exist. |
Didn't he argue the existence of God in the same way, in that God has to exist because we think God?
I wonder at what point we would stop thinking though? Is that when we do not exist at all? Do babies think for example? When do they start to think?^It doesn't work for others though... you can't say "he thinks, therefore he exists," because you don't really know that he thinks... You can see evidence that he does, but that could be faked.
| deanhills wrote: |
| ocalhoun wrote: | | you wouldn't be able to think about whether you exist or not if you didn't exist. |
Didn't he argue the existence of God in the same way, in that God has to exist because we think God? |
Actually, something like that, yes. What you're thinking of is in Meditationes de prima philosophia ("Meditations on First Philosophy"). On the first day, Descartes pretty much destroys everything he thought he knew and goes to bed completely ignorant. On the second day, he manages to figure out just one true thing: "... hoc pronuntiatum: ego sum, ego existo, quoties a me profertur, vel mente concipitur, necessario esse verum." That bit in bold there - ego sum, ego existo - is "I think, I exist". The whole sentence fragment reads: "... this proposition: 'I am, I exist,' spoken by me, or conceived in my mind, is necessarily true."
Descartes goes to bed on the second day satisfied that he's managed to figure that much out. On the third day he tackles the question of God. His argument is, frankly, idiotic, and is based in part on the ontological proof of the existence of God. It goes basically like this:
- i (Descartes) have a clear idea in my mind of God.
- The idea of God is that of a perfect "thing"/being/whatever (all that matters is that God is perfect, and Descartes has an idea of God).
- i am not perfect.
- i, being imperfect, cannot have generated a perfect idea (perfection cannot come from imperfection).
- Therefore, the idea must have been generated by something outside of me.
- That thing has to be perfect, in order to have generated a perfect idea and given it to me.
- God is, according to my idea, perfect and outside of me.
- Therefore, God exists.
Basically, Descartes says that he can't have come up with the idea of a perfect God unless a perfect God put it there.
| deanhills wrote: |
| I wonder at what point we would stop thinking though? Is that when we do not exist at all? Do babies think for example? When do they start to think? |
"i think, i exist" is not "i think while i exist". It just describes a chain of thought that you can use to prove to yourself that you exist, should you every question that fact. If you stop thinking, you don't stop existing... but you stop being able to prove to yourself that you exist (not like you'd know or care, because you wouldn't be thinking at the time). | Indi wrote: |
| deanhills wrote: | | ocalhoun wrote: | | you wouldn't be able to think about whether you exist or not if you didn't exist. |
Didn't he argue the existence of God in the same way, in that God has to exist because we think God? |
Actually, something like that, yes. What you're thinking of is in Meditationes de prima philosophia ("Meditations on First Philosophy"). On the first day, Descartes pretty much destroys everything he thought he knew and goes to bed completely ignorant. On the second day, he manages to figure out just one true thing: "... hoc pronuntiatum: ego sum, ego existo, quoties a me profertur, vel mente concipitur, necessario esse verum." That bit in bold there - ego sum, ego existo - is "I think, I exist". The whole sentence fragment reads: "... this proposition: 'I am, I exist,' spoken by me, or conceived in my mind, is necessarily true."
Descartes goes to bed on the second day satisfied that he's managed to figure that much out. On the third day he tackles the question of God. His argument is, frankly, idiotic, and is based in part on the ontological proof of the existence of God. It goes basically like this:
- i (Descartes) have a clear idea in my mind of God.
- The idea of God is that of a perfect "thing"/being/whatever (all that matters is that God is perfect, and Descartes has an idea of God).
- i am not perfect.
- i, being imperfect, cannot have generated a perfect idea (perfection cannot come from imperfection).
- Therefore, the idea must have been generated by something outside of me.
- That thing has to be perfect, in order to have generated a perfect idea and given it to me.
- God is, according to my idea, perfect and outside of me.
- Therefore, God exists.
Basically, Descartes says that he can't have come up with the idea of a perfect God unless a perfect God put it there.
| deanhills wrote: | | I wonder at what point we would stop thinking though? Is that when we do not exist at all? Do babies think for example? When do they start to think? |
"i think, i exist" is not "i think while i exist". It just describes a chain of thought that you can use to prove to yourself that you exist, should you every question that fact. If you stop thinking, you don't stop existing... but you stop being able to prove to yourself that you exist (not like you'd know or care, because you wouldn't be thinking at the time). |
its actually not a bad argument if you also use it like me, if only I exist and there is no god then I must have imagined all that is before me BUT i cant create this because it is beyond my grasp (you cant create something if you dont understand it, sorta) so there must be something that is able too create and imagine all of this and this being or thing must be god as he would know EVERYTHING....
but i still dont like descartes he can go suck a wallnut | Bannik wrote: |
its actually not a bad argument if you also use it like me, if only I exist and there is no god then I must have imagined all that is before me BUT i cant create this because it is beyond my grasp (you cant create something if you dont understand it, sorta) so there must be something that is able too create and imagine all of this and this being or thing must be god as he would know EVERYTHING....
but i still dont like descartes he can go suck a wallnut |
I probably like Descartes, because he was thinking .... 
... isn't there this sense right from the beginning when we are born, of "becoming" something that we aren't yet? That there are all kinds of possibilities in which direction we can take to that "becoming" and that we could make number of choices out of a million or more possible of choices to what that "becoming" would finally be? Yet, when we get much older realize that we are incomplete in that we cannot really control all the elements for making the "becoming" that we had visualized possible? We realize we are imperfect in our bodies, but there is still this sense of something completely perfect and that its attainment perhaps lies outside our physical selves? It has to, otherwise we would have been born perfect and complete, and would not have needed to become anything different? 
maybe we are already born perfect, maybe imperfection is actually perfection...
i cant explain it well, sry, my flaws are the inability too express myself.
| Bannik wrote: |
| maybe we are already born perfect, maybe imperfection is actually perfection... |
Or maybe imperfection is on the reverse side of perfection? Like positive is on the reverse side of negative? | deanhills wrote: |
| Bannik wrote: | | maybe we are already born perfect, maybe imperfection is actually perfection... |
Or maybe imperfection is on the reverse side of perfection? Like positive is on the reverse side of negative? |
my brain hurts now.... 
you did that in purpose didn't you...
oh more on Descartes - tell me how did Descartes die? | Bannik wrote: |
| deanhills wrote: | | Bannik wrote: | | maybe we are already born perfect, maybe imperfection is actually perfection... |
Or maybe imperfection is on the reverse side of perfection? Like positive is on the reverse side of negative? |
my brain hurts now....
you did that in purpose didn't you...
oh more on Descartes - tell me how did Descartes die? |
I guess he stopped thinking 
More seriously, he died of pneumonia apparently while he was in Stockholm Sweden. He was there at the invitation of Queen Christina, in a teaching capacity (he had to give her the lessons at 5:00 a.m. in the morning).
Source: http://www.notablebiographies.com/De-Du/Descartes-Rene.html | deanhills wrote: |
| Bannik wrote: | | deanhills wrote: | | Bannik wrote: | | maybe we are already born perfect, maybe imperfection is actually perfection... |
Or maybe imperfection is on the reverse side of perfection? Like positive is on the reverse side of negative? |
my brain hurts now....
you did that in purpose didn't you...
oh more on Descartes - tell me how did Descartes die? |
I guess he stopped thinking
More seriously, he died of pneumonia apparently while he was in Stockholm Sweden. He was there at the invitation of Queen Christina, in a teaching capacity (he had to give her the lessons at 5:00 a.m. in the morning).
Source: http://www.notablebiographies.com/De-Du/Descartes-Rene.html |
actually he was killed........thats all i will say you must google for more knowledge | Bannik wrote: |
| deanhills wrote: | | Bannik wrote: | | deanhills wrote: | | Bannik wrote: | | maybe we are already born perfect, maybe imperfection is actually perfection... |
Or maybe imperfection is on the reverse side of perfection? Like positive is on the reverse side of negative? |
my brain hurts now....
you did that in purpose didn't you...
oh more on Descartes - tell me how did Descartes die? |
I guess he stopped thinking
More seriously, he died of pneumonia apparently while he was in Stockholm Sweden. He was there at the invitation of Queen Christina, in a teaching capacity (he had to give her the lessons at 5:00 a.m. in the morning).
Source: http://www.notablebiographies.com/De-Du/Descartes-Rene.html |
actually he was killed........thats all i will say you must google for more knowledge |
I thought that is exactly what I had done. Unless someone has re-written his biography? 
