In discussing the importance of Cogito Ergo Sum, one would be remiss to ignore the foundational aspects for other philosophers. As the father of rationalism, Descartes has not only laid a claim as the foundation for the rest of his meditations, but future metaphysical claims. He lays the basis of the utmost importance of scientific clarity, and scientific self-evidence. Spinoza and other influential rationalists of the like use Descartes claims as a platform with which to move forward with their…
Defending Descartes: A Textual and Philosophical Analysis of Descartes’s Cogito Ergo Sum Regarding every fundamental philosophical quandary, including questions of epistemology, morality, ontology, and axiology, there are leaders of the major movements to answer these questions. These are often the most memorable and sound arguments of the time, or the most influential on the ideologies held today. Rene Descartes is certainly one of these aforementioned philosophers. In his Meditations on First…
philosophers throughout time. Particularly, it has been discussed in detail by famous philosophers Descartes and Socrates. Both of these philosophers believed in the act of self-awareness. Moreover, Descartes is recognized for his famous line, “Cogito, Ergo Sum,” which is loosely translated to “I think, therefore I am.” Whereas Socrates was famous for his claim that the unexamined life is not worth living. Notably, each of these philosophers had revolutionary ideas on what it means to be a…
David Hume is an empiricist. Empiricism is the ideology that all knowledge is obtained through sense experience, or interactions with the world through sight, taste, touch, smell, and sound (Markie, 2017). This school of thought also encompasses a posteriori thinking. The term a posteriori refers to drawing conclusions only after having experienced something through the senses. These are the bases of Hume’s understanding of knowledge and philosophy. In his work, An Enquiry Concerning Human…
knowledge. He didn’t trust the way he learned it because he had learned most of his knowledge through his senses, but then he realized his senses could be deceived at any time. He asked himself if he really exists, and there is where cogito ergo sum came from. Cogito Ergo Sum means “I think, therefore I am” in English. This means that if something thinks, then it exists. He had came…
three parts. In the first part it will explain that what Descartes’ method is. In the second part, it will explain the philosophical meaning of this method. And in the final part will explain the relations of this method to Descartes’ argument of the Cogito. The first thing that this essay will address is about Descartes’ philosophical method. Descartes not only was a philosopher, but also he was a great mathematician. Therefore, he strongly believed that as in mathematics there is a method and…
is a being that can deceive us every step of the way and leaves the physical world as nonexistent were that the case. With this, he reckons that even there is a deceiving demon, the fact that he can think cannot be denied and declares it as “cogito ergo sum” or “I think, therefore, I am” (Meditation II). To affirm existence is to be able to think, even if we do not have a body which encompasses all the senses that could be deceived therefore making it impossible to exist. This establishes the…
Descartes program of methodological doubt was to doubt absolutely everything. He thought that if all were doing is perceiving how do we know that what we’re perceiving is real when sometimes even our mind makes mistakes. For example, we see things aren’t there or hear a noise that wasn’t actually made or even think we see a family member but it was actually someone else. In my opinion Descartes theory goes very deep into the mind and really makes you think and almost makes you afraid. When it…
finally reaches the state of absolute knowledge, that is, the realization that he is God. Similarly, Hegel believes that the history of us human beings and our society as a whole is just the history of God himself. Descartes heavily focused on the Cogito Ergo Sum. He based the premises of the existence of a divine being off of the fact that we are thinking things with an idea of perfection, which has to come from a perfect being, God. All in all, to my way of thinking, Descartes’ ideas of God…
truth and his knowledge of science and philosophy depends upon the truth. One is able to doubt the square of ten is one hundred if the fact that one plus one equal to two is doubtful. Likewise, all of knowledge will be true if they are built upon the Cogito argument. Moreover, he shows that mind is more dependable than senses by using the example of wax. Descartes points out that the senses are not reliable by using the dreaming out argument and the evil demon argument. People attain their…