Posted on 11/04/2002 7:52:21 AM PST by thinktwice
Descartes was a geometrician. He found only in mathematics and geometry the certainty that he required. Therefore, he used the methods of geometry to think about the world. Now, in geometry, one begins with a search for axioms, simple undeniable truths – for example, the axiom that a straight line is the shortest distance between two points. On the foundations of such “self-evident” propositions, whole geometrical systems can be built.
Following his geometrical model, Descartes proceeds to doubt everything – de onmibus dubitandum. He will suspend belief in the knowledge he learned from childhood, all those things “which I allowed myself in youth to be persuaded without having inquired into their truth.” Doubt will be his method, a deliberate strategy for proceeding toward certainty. (Descartes is a doubter not by nature, but by necessity. What he really wants is secure understanding so he can stop doubting.)
Descartes finds that he has no trouble doubting the existence of real objects/events – our senses too easily deceive us. And we can doubt the existence of a supernatural realm of reality – figments and fantasies are too often conjured by our native imaginations. But now his geometrical model pays off: in trying to doubt everything, he discovers something that he can’t doubt. What he can’t doubt is that he is doubting. Obviously, I exist if I doubt that I exist. My doubt that I exist proves that I exist, for I have to exist to be able to doubt. Therefore I can’t doubt that I exist. Hence, there is at least one fact in the universe that is beyond doubt. “I am, I exist is necessarily true each time that I pronounce it, or that I mentally conceive it.
Descartes thus becomes the author of the most famous phrase in Western philosophy: Cognito ergo sum, or, in his original French, Je pense, donc je suis. – I think, therefore I exist. With roots in St. Augustine, this is certainly one of the catchiest ideas yet created by the human mind.
Meaning is the order of things. You gave an order of existence when you said existence precedes human cognition.
There are two basic orders to existence. One, the relation or meaning of the parts to the whole. The other, the relation of a thing to its end.
You are being rhetorical, I presume. The negation is as meaningful as the affirmation. This too, was Aristotle recognized.
I was responding to this link, form that was referenced by the person I was responding to, which attaches the term 'formal cause' to Aristotle and ultimately seeks to make the same point as Plato. You have a problem as to the ultimate source take it up with him. It is all the same to me because it is wrong no matter how you look at it.
A very socratic response. Socrates recognized the big stretch, "to think we have any meaning to such a power." Although he had his own way of phrasing it. He thought it an arrogant and pitful presumption to think that humans possessed that of themselves. At the same time, he never denied a meaningful relation to such. He recognized the significance of knowledge as a participation in what was larger than himself.
That's news to me ... Details, please.
I would be intereted in this too. If there is one thing Rand cannot be accused of, it is mysticism.
Since mysticism is any supposed knowledge from any supposed source other than objective reason from objective evidence, that would make you a mystic. How do you make Rand a mystic, since objective reason is the only source for knwoledge she accepted?
Hank
I see. Your "existence precedes cognition" is only to say that existence = reason?
Certainly what is known must exist before it can be known. This is hardly an earthshaking metaphysical or epistemological observation. It certainly is not a statement about the "meaning" of existence.
There are two basic orders to existence. One, the relation or meaning of the parts to the whole. The other, the relation of a thing to its end.
The relation of parts to whole is a question one might deal with in ontology, a branch of metaphysics, hardly one of "two basic orders of existense." Metaphysically, "ends," do not exist. Ends only exist as concepts, and only have meaning to beings capable of having ends, that is, rational/volitional beings. The notion that the "relation of a thing to its end" mixes teleological and metaphysical concepts. With the exception of organisms, which are an end in themselves, no "thing" has an end or purpose except that which a rational being assigns to it.
Where does this confused notion of "two basic orders of existence," come from.
Hank
Well, then let it stand as that. This is an ordering. And as history shows, others have disagreed. That is to say, they have conceived of other different orders. The parts have been ordered variously. All the same, if there are no parts, there is no order. If there is no change, there is no end. There are only so many orders. You might have 288, as Varro once reported there were 288 ideas of what constituted happiness, but they can be reduced, he said, to 4 basic ones.
Catholic catechists teach children a rote answer to the question: "Why did God make you?"
The memorized answer is ... "God made me to know him, to love him, and to serve him; in this world and the next."
To support that theological position, theologians apparently came up with mystical explanations such as ...
There are two basic orders to existence. One, the relation or meaning of the parts to the whole. The other, the relation of a thing to its end.
Right, Cornelis?
Although maybe he was Lutheran, because they also ask Wozu hat uns Gott erschaffen? And they answer, Gott hat uns erschaffen damit wir ihn erkennen, ihn lieben, ihm dienen und dadurch in den Himmel kommen.
This can be cute up to a point, but if you simply want to keep the conversation at the level of being, there is nothing more to say.
Actually, the Catholics and Lutherans recognized a more fundamental order. They distinguish between being in itself and created being. Although even here, we might remember Aristotle and Plato. They are not the same, however. Just similarities.
I can understand Aristotle saying it, while also recognizing that Aristotle's use of terms such as "whole" and "end" would involve, not God as I think you believe, but real-world things.
For me it runs even deeper than this. I have had discussions on this very board where individuals who are clearly well educated and should know better will make this error, and when it is pointed out, "This is reification, for this reason, therefore this is wrong go try again." Just say, 'No it isn't' and go on to make the exact same error all over again. It seems to me that until one truly sees what reification is, it is nearly invisible and impossible to see. Once seen clearly, it is never (well, rarely) mistaken again.
However, there is a reason for it. Care to guess what it is?
Oh sure, if admitted the whole game goes out the window. If there are no reified forms or 'essence' that is prior to existence then these cannot have existed in the "Mind of God" prior to His creating them. (I named thee before thy mother conceived thee) Furthermore ID becomes impossible without this reification, since species must have existed in the Mind of God before He could have created them, or He wouldn't have known what to create. The Design of the Designer.
This exposes the fallacy of this line of thinking. Go back little more than a century, when people were trying to figure out the 'medium' that light traveled through, and postulated the 'ether.' Now, if all concepts are reified, then they all exist as accurate representations in the Mind of God first. The 'ether' was an erroneous concept, so God must have had an 'intentionally' erroneous concept in His mind, for men to first entertain in error, before coming to 'The Truth.'
The 'ether' too abstract?
Since the beginning of history 'Leviathan', the whale, was thought to be a 'great fish.' It was only recently, with the advent of science, that we came to realize that whales were in fact mammals. Now, if all concepts of species were perfectly represented in the Mind of God, only to accessed by men as needed, such an error would never take place, since the 'Idealized Form' would not be a creation of man but a creation of God, who cannot commit error. The fact of correcting incorrect concepts proves they have no 'metaphysical' existence but are the products of the human mind.
Where was the essence of the T Rex prior to 1850 or so, when it was first discovered? Hiding in the Mind of God to lead man to eventual evolutionary error? Or of the other dynosaurs? How about the 'essence' of the concept of the atomic explosion? Seen from this point of view there is nothing that human beings create that was not first thought of and created in 'essence' or Platonic Form or Formal Cause by God first. This is equally true of stem cell research as it is of genetic engineering, cloning or RU-486. So whence comes the objection to what God has already created? Where were 'black holes' prior to Einstein? Where were 'quarks' prior to atom smashers? The whole of human history is replete with discarded concepts that prove they cannot be such reified, idealized forms.
so easily and correctly dismissed by Ayn Rand,
I saw a replay of an early Phil Donahue where he had Rand on. Some lady from the audience was berating her, how she used to believe Rand then went to college and learned this and that and blah, blah, blah . . . . And about then Rand cut her off, said she would answer the question if someone else asked it without the woman's implied insult. The audience, and myself, were mystified. Phil just moved on.
I puzzled over this for days, then the light went on, I saw what she had done. Rand had a superior,(i would say intuitive - if it weren't a contradiction in terms) ability to instantly take a statement, analyze it for content, determine if it was premise or conclusion, and if conclusion, trace back the logic chain and identify the premises. She identified the insult in the premise of the woman's statement. I have seen and read much since then and have always marveled at this ability. This rejection of reification is a primary example of it. Either the logic chain or the premise is faulty. And for those who have an ideology that, by definition takes place prior to existence this fallacy is inherent in the premise, and usually emobodied in the logic chain somewhere as well.
This thread is based upon Decartes' "I think, therefore I am" which came from his ruminations of the 'demon box.' It was always obvious to me that if we take all his givens as true, it raises more questions than it answers prior to his conclusion 'Cogito ergo sum.'
Why is the 'demon' a demon? If the 'demon' is all there is, then that demon is, for all intents and purposes God, since there is no other. If the 'demon' is truly a demon, this implies in contrast to God; so where is God in this scenario? Did God create the demon? Why, to deceive Descartes? Who created the 'box?' The demon or God? Who created the man, the demon or God? Why is the demon deceiving the man and why is God permitting it?
I could go on all day, the stolen concepts in the construction abound. Abandon these stolen concepts and the fact that he had Descartes before dehorse is obvious, he must exist to think, not exist because he thinks. This leads back to the subject, Decartes reified thought and based existence upon that reification. This is self-contradictory since thought must 'exist' prior to existence. If we correct the error: I am, therefore exist to I think.
One final point, to quote from the article:
Descartes finds that he has no trouble doubting the existence of real objects/events - our senses too easily deceive us.
See all the begged questions here? How does he know what his senses are? How does he know his senses deceive him unless he already knows they exist? How does he know what deception is, if he cannot first know truth, what is not deception, if he cannot be sure everything is not deception? If all is deception then how does he know that 'deception' is, in fact, not a deception? If he presupposes the existence of 'deception' then has this not proved 'existence' without going through the rest of the rigamaroll?
Rand cut through all this with the simple Axiom, for there to be anything existing that perceives anything, there must be existence first. But then, you know this already.
Yours: I see. Your "existence precedes cognition" is only to say that existence = reason?
NO! Something must exist before it can be perceived. It must be perceived before rational consciousness can identify it. The process by which rational conscious identifies that which is perceived is objective reason.
If this is not clear, you have chosen not to understand.
Hank
Not all, but some. I also see that we have already agreed existence precedes human cognition. The question was (there were other questions): does existence = reason?
Let's be courteous, as so far we have. It appears that there is an aspect to existence that is not entirely equated with existence (your NO!). And reason is a "process by which rational conscious identifies that which is perceived." Reason is therefore a possible source, but not the only source. Unless you want to argue now that perception is reason. But if memory serves me right, that was already dismissed on this thread.
Yes, but I very much enjoyed and appreciated your discussion of it. I know you did not need me to say it, I said it because a very clear explication of truth usually receives scorn when it deserves praise. It is a moral issue.
Thanks!
Hank
reify ... to treat (an abstraction) as substantially existing, or as a concrete material object -- reification: n
Thank you for the new word (new to me) that must have a significant place within philosophical dialogue. Need I wonder why I've never heard it?
That reminds me of the general ignorance surrounding the word eudaemonism; how many people have ever heard that -- highly significant -- philosophical word?
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