Philosophy’s Most Famous Argument (And Why It's Wrong)

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

LINKS AND CORRECTIONS: If you want to work with an experienced study coach teaching maths, philosophy, and study skills then book your session at [e-mail]. Previous clients include students at the University of Cambridge and the LSE. Support me on Patreon here: patreon.com/UnsolicitedAdvice701?Link& Sign up to my email list for more philosophy to improve your life: forms.gle/YYfaCaiQw9r6YfkN7

[@uthman2281]

Most famaus argument is "there is Existenz"

[@Eatzbugs]

Cut it short and doubt your doubt

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Haha! The meta-sceptical position we didn't know we needed

[@mingthan7028]

Lmao....At least Doubt exists.

[@Ididor]

​@@mingthan7028 Or does it?

[@Rozpor7]

​@@Ididor Since you are doubting his speech it exists

[@Ididor]

@@Rozpor7 yes but only if you don't doubt logic itself. but then it all goes fucked anyways.

[@Here4TheHeckOfIt]

"I doubt, therefore I panic" resembles a bad acid trip.

[@Flock13]

😂😂😂

[@GrimR3ef3r]

😭😭😭

[@alexanderflood1462]

We might not be certain what "actually exists" in "reality" - but even if we can't percieve our emotions clearly, don't they still exist as an ill-defined blob? Even if our "self" is an illusion, aren't we perceiving the illusion? Barring a state of nirvana, can't we be certain that phenomena are "phenom"-ing? Great video by the way

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! And that's an interesting perspective! Though the arguments by Schwitzgebel do seem to show we can doubt even our judgments of our own perceptions

[@nightvision3182]

There is no we if the perception is an illusion. The source of thinking is not clear, so what is thinking?

[@baronvonbrunn8596]

@@nightvision3182 Thinking is just another thing that can be perceived. It doesn't matter who is thinking as long as someone/something is perceiving the process of thinking.

[@nightvision3182]

go play with your playstation dude. what nonsense are you talking about. We have zero idea what thinking is and why we think, clown@@baronvonbrunn8596

[@Bf26fge]

Doubting judgments of our own perceptions is not the same as doubting perception exists or doubting phenomena exist. I'm not sure our philosopher answered your question. I dont think the conclusion that phenomenon might not be phenomenoming is valid from the conclusion that we can doubt our perceptions either. The full argument our youtube philosopher refers to may demonstrate both that we can doubt perceptions exist or that phenomena exist, but the answer does not remove the doubt that we can actually doubt the existence of those two things, unless I misunderstood, which i doubt.

[@gigasus77]

getting big!! i knew you'd pop off!! such good content 🔥

[@dgmrdvd]

Didn't expect to see you here.

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! I genuinely appreciate all the kind comments you have left

[@kittenhalo]

why the fuck is pegasus here bruh

[@daxross2930]

Just sounds like a bunch of loopholes because language is very limited

[@user-hu3iy9gz5j]

Virgin 'I think therefore I am' vs Chad 'I am therefore I think'

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Haha! You might like this argument then: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Here_is_one_hand

[@duckduckgoose240]

Haven't watched yet, but I swear, your insights on philosophy are always so intriguing. Thanks for making these videos :>

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! I am glad you are enjoying them!

[@Econares]

Finally, a video video I could not understand. I hope this is the first and last. Love your content!

[@InvalidGoose]

Love to see one from you about marcus aurelius, I love the way you explain things. Binge watched your others, keep up the great work! Much love from The netherlands!

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! And it is certainly on my list, I just want to make sure I am not just repeating what other people have said about him

[@Akkodha.]

Your channel is one of my favorite on youtube, keep making content I WANT MORE

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! And I most certainly will

[@aelfredrex8354]

I think therefore I want dinner.

[@noahtstapp]

Ngl, 17th century bro had existential anxiety and wrote down his logic to bring it back in line

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

That is a fair assessment

[@gailsparrovv]

A great video again! Your channel is insightful and I am close to watching almost everything that you have created so far. I also find myself having the same thoughts on certain topics but you have worded them concisely it was such a delight. Please keep doing what you love and I hope you succeed in all your good endeavors. 🙏🏻

[@AUTOMOTATE]

Listening to this on a bus, from Sunderland and hearing you say it I had to double check 😂

[@BilalAhmad-ff3xq]

philosophy usually goes overmy head so vids. Like urs are a great source of knowledge, great work.

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! I am so glad you are finding them helpful

[@archykhn4513]

O.75x speed does God's work for me haha. Btw great video as alwayssss

[@SiqueScarface]

14:40 You can show this also physiologically. The number of light receptor cells in the eye is about 200 times greater than the number of nerves connecting the eye to the brain. Hence, your brain receives only about 1/200st at best of the information the eyes get.

[@kiavaxxaskew]

If this philosophy doesn't acknowledge a invisible or spiritual faculty, it's either wrong or incomplete.

[@kamerplant3957]

can you elaborate? This sounds very interesting and I'm curious how you derived this. Why would it have to be invisible for example?

[@fredriko.zachrisson9711]

Thank you. Loved your Dostojevskij video.

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you for watching!

[@Toughbiscuit_]

To me, the argument read as not we *only* exist when we think, but that we only have *proof* of ourselves when we think, doubt, and perceive

[@asmithgames5926]

Eckhart Tolle: Separate the Thinker and the Watcher

[@davidfescoto3981]

Your insights are masterful bruv from Madrid, take care.

[@BlazyBob1]

Great video as always! I love how you tied it back to Buddhist thought that went the same route but explored it for centuries rather than just an evening! By the way, if you’re interested, you should check out some of the philosophical discussions between Buddhist and Vedic scholars. I recommend Swami Sarvapriyananda’s lecture on Advaita Vedanta’s self (Ātman) vs the Buddhist non-self (Anattā). There are centuries worth of discussions between different eastern schools of thought on these topics regarding introspection, which they focused a lot more than we here in the west, and so I believe much of their insight is deeper. It’s interesting to note how Buddhism and Advaita Vedanta reached seemingly opposite conclusions about the same issues, and yet they’re the same conclusion using different language, like two arrows pointing at each other that end up pointing to the center.

[@alecmisra4964]

There is a continuity of awareness or perception of the changing inner states. It is this which constitutes the being of the thinker, not the specific, often deceptive thoughts as such.

[@klosnj11]

Previous comment not popping up (yet) so just in case, let me say it in another way. Great video. You earned a like and subscribe from me. Can't wait to throw my objections and thoughts into future rings of your making.

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! And I do really appreciate the thoughts and objections! I always mean these videos to be starting discussions rather than some sort of philosophical proclamation

[@jacquelineraner14]

I prefer to look at this problem as the proof of one's existence lies in others and their existence is proved by me recognizing them. I am would not have any meaning without the recognition of you are. Both come into existence simultaneously when the reflection is recognized as not our own. This entire idea is encompassed in a greeting that is used in South Africa. Solyabana (don't know the actual spelling) it means I see you and by seeing you I bring you into existence.

[@jeremyncrm2012]

Should be im aware, therefore I am

[@leonprice6983]

I would argue that while what you percieve may be different to reality i.e. emotions what you percive is truly what you think, as with the apple mad to look like an orange. A demon is not required for perception to be wrong all your thoughts are correct in the sense that what you're thinking of is truly what you're thinking of even if they didn't originate from you.

[@psychologynerd7280]

I find it interesting that Descartes' philosophy almost perfectly resembles that of depersonalization and derealization disorder. He may have had it in his time.

[@isaacromero3475]

Likely not. Descartes was attempting to build an epistemological foundation for the sciences and philosophy. Descartes was educated in Aristotelian-scholastic philosophy but given various incidents in the early modern period, Descartes grew to doubt that method and sought a better way to approach philosophy

[@TheSSJEnder]

@@isaacromero3475it could be possible with that still being true, remember I believe he was a soldier when this was happening and during the time period he was writing this a ton of the fundamental things of his time were changing and flipping in terms of importance, so him trying to find something stable to ground things in could’ve also been therapeutic

[@leighlendthorne2114]

I have always been deeply interested in this kind of philosophy but also very unsure of my mental sanity and have researched dissociative disorders such as this much because of how much it resembles my problems. Now I don’t know I have a dissociative disorder of some sort or not

[@ElonMuskrat-my8jy]

​@@leighlendthorne2114Usually DID comes from SA and SRA as a child. Dr. Colin A. Ross wrote about it in The Osiris Complex.

[@AndalusianLuis]

Or Existentialism-themed Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

[@VarDom07]

I like to rephrase it this way: (I think therefore something is.) I think that defining "self' is quite difficult but if we think about it differently, the fact that we are able to think proves that something must exist rather than nothing. The fact that something exists rather than nothing seems quite obvious, but it's interesting to think about it this way. That one thing is something I think we can be sure about.

[@Kyng-f8c]

Everything exists, yet nothing exists simultaneously, and the only reality of existence is perception.

[@VaughanMcCue]

I stink; therefore, I need a shower.

[@shivamshori5612]

When I shower I still stink therefore the shower doesn't exist(I literally just stand in the shower for 5 min and I didn't even applied soap )

[@VaughanMcCue]

@@shivamshori5612 It's understandable. You take a shower to relax, so there is no point getting yourself worked up into a lather.

[@FireyDeath4]

I mean, there is one thing we can certainly know. SOMETHING exists. After all, engaging with the premise necessarily requires it. And everything in existence indeed seems to be a mass of disconnected parts, reducible to singular properties that constitute the definitions of their smallest physical components. The only thing really binding them together is ontological grouping, and it's something we take for granted. It all depends on your interpretation about whether those (somewhat-arbitrary) connections mean anything to you. And, like, surely they must

[@How_to_Peaceoffical]

Great work very easy to understand.👍

[@gluteusmaximus5094]

i'm currently reading a book linked to this topic. it talks about the "self" from a neuroscientistic perspective and how it actually confirms the buddhist views. they've discovered that there is no specific region in the brain responsible for the "I"-feeling. we often think there is an "I" who thinks our thoughts but this book speaks about it actually being the other way around. the thoughts we have rather create the "I" - or the illusion of the "I". the one to blame is our Left Brain Hemnisphere, which is responsible for pattern recognition, speech/language, "mapping" and categorization. the scientist michael gazzaniga discovered that our LBH creates explanations and reasons to make sense of what's happening around us - he calls this the "interpreting Authority". he also discovered that its interpretations are often completely wrong, like it's just making things up based on our own personal experiences. the book is called "Kein Ich, kein Problem" (german for "No I, No Problem") by Dr. Chris Niebauer. i tried to explain and translate it as far as i understood it. i'm not through with it so i don't fully understand it yet but i find this approach really interesting. and potentially groundbreaking.

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Ah that sounds very interesting!

[@jacksonletts3724]

There isn’t an English translation is there? I’ve heard of the concept before, but I’d like an actual book to explain it to me.

[@gluteusmaximus5094]

@@jacksonletts3724 actually i found something on amazon. "no self, no problem - how neuropsychology is catching up to buddhism", chris niebauer. maybe this helps :)

[@richardcheney6964]

@@jacksonletts3724 There's a section in The Righteous Mind by Haidt about the same concept. But he calls 'interpreting authority' the 'rider' as if it were a guy riding on the back of an elephant.

[@Mafyeux]

As the most casual armchair philosopher, I've been looking deeply into theories of mind, the self, and the brain's part in all of it (even tying in some spiritual concepts of the soul), and the entire scope of science, philosophy and spirituality on this topic is intensely fascinating to me. 'I think therefore I am' has been said to be a most foundational conclusion, but I've developed a belief that this conclusion can only lie on top of other truly foundational existential conclusions that are necessary to understand the nature of mind. The element of 'am' in the statement betrays a truth so foundational as to be silly to even say- existence exists. Even more foundational than that is the condition under which existence must exist, the pure potential of existence itself. So, if we are looking for the indubitable, we can say that there at least must be the pure potential of existence, as well as the existence which has grown out of that potential, for the 'I' to exist within. When you come at all this from such a deeply existential perspective, you can start to dissect what the 'I' may be, as well as concepts of mind, consciousness, thought, and perception. When you really start interweaving the science and philosophy, spirituality becomes at least a possibility, if not a probability in some form. I am actually writing a book about my conclusions in this area, and I think it could really change how we live and operate our world. One of the keys is actually creating cohesive understandings of the concepts of consciousness, mind, and being, which are all in my view, distinct states of existence. At some point I found myself drawn into panpsychism, but I realized that the idea of the universe as a great conscious thinking mind didn't make sense to me, so I started separating out elements that seemed unlikely, for instance thought and perception, from the idea of pure being. I came to feel that the universe, existence itself, could indeed be comprised of such pure being, with only something like our brains needed to add the elements of consciousness, thought, and perception for us to actually experience that existence. When we say 'God is in all things', I believe we may be referring to that pure being, when we refer to God as a creator, we may be referring to the pure potential of existence bringing everything into being, like a great imagination of all things. I will really need an entire book to flesh out these ideas, but I'm really excited about it!

[@deadman746]

Descartes published the _cogito_ a couple of years before the _Meditations._ But the _Cogito_ itself is so easy to attack it doesn't seem sporting. So thanks for doing the later argument. It seems to me he's stretching toward second-order predicate logic without concluding things about where it will lead, which Gödel, Church and Turing would later do, sparked by observations by Russell.

[@joannemoore3976]

We clearly don't cease to exist when we stop thinking-ask anyone who has experienced thoughtless awareness in meditation or spontaneously. Awareness is not limited to thought.

[@Mr.banbriel]

*COGITO ERGO SUM, I THINK THEREFORE I AM ,AM*

[@medibirb6912]

The only IHNMAIMS comment I have found on here lmao

[@bettertiming]

Hey! Thank you for sharing your knowledge! Any chance you’ve encountered the concept of Obscurantism? It would be a very interesting concept to explore in a video. Great work and good luck!

[@Lichnaya_pravda]

I feel, therefore I am. "Think" is only a sort of feeling.

[@ozymandias..18-c2q]

precisely . there is no thought without emotion

[@ozymandias..18-c2q]

thought is provoked by feeling so first thing is a reaction

[@fighter4929]

Sunflowers can feel the sunlight and, furthermore, react to it. Does that mean they can think?

[@utilitymonster8267]

@@fighter4929If thinking is a feeling doesn’t mean every feeling is a thought. But I don’t agree anyway. Thought is more like an organ we developed to serve our emotions.

[@ozymandias..18-c2q]

@@fighter4929 feeling precedes thought and for me that is a fact. when i think , in fact , my biology speaks and not my spirit or something. thinking is survival mode , it's just an "evolved tool " and is connected to language. every feeling within us even negative ones serve that survival motive. if theory , knowledge or idea is not life-affirming then it is a trash , unproductive and one must throw them away. (however , for ''thought experimental purposes'' they are interesting)brain is responsible for everything and if brain is healthy , then thoughts are healthy too. body and mind are interlinked and they contribute each other , neither of it functions without another. genetical predispositions must be taken into account as well , because at the end of the day you are a HUMAN - an EVOLVED ANIMAL. as a kubrick ones said : '' the feel of the experience is more important than the ability to verbalize or analyze it.'' and what you have said about flowers is kinda funny because flowers can not think because they are ''other dimentional species'' so to say. they do not have an organ that could be responsible for developing so called thinking.

[@jello3141]

I would like to bring up the argument that you can never stop thinking. Even if you’re thinking about nothing, it’s still something. As in nothing is something to think about.

[@sdgkh09]

Cogito ergo sum is a great finding by all means but using it as to justify own mastery of thinking, or the illusion thereof, is akin to finding the mummy of a great, ancient pharaoh and then go on selling the remnants to anyone willing to buy oddities, saying that it is good for your health, dear Christian, ye who drink blood and eat flesh. Something that resembles whatever that keeps the "I"/"you" together is perceiving, receiving, stumbling and/or finding something that can be a thought, emotion, discovery (etymologically to find something that was covered, ie to dis-cover, meaning it was already there before it was found again), or, least likely, innovating things into something not done before - is slightly bit more accurate that saying "I thought of it and thus, it is my thought". Even the "I"/"you" part is largely made up of loosely-tied sense of something that is normally called a sense of idenity; Oftentimes, man is unaware that whatever he thinks is him is not what he thinks is him, and that whatever he thinks he is is likely something that he would be scared vividly to despair, which is likely why he prefers not to investigate this part he was convinced is himself. The convincing part was not done by himself either, it was presented by whatever came and argued it for him and deceives man so sweetly and so eloquently that the thought is his. This is the same as the third temptation Yeshua of Natsareth met in the desert, the temptation of entitlement; "Bow for me and all of this world is yours to take" (paraphrasing). Whatever constitutes the sense of "I"/"you" is not your own self but rather either a convinced ego or an identity (id-entity) possessing the ego. The ego is not likely to admit that it was fooled, to become humble and act in humility admitting that it itself is quite limited compared to the scope of the part that succeeded in convincing the ego to be fooled, let alone that the part doing the convincing is likely a force beyond ego's comprehension, only possible to be known when admitting that the world is, in fact, not yours to take. It is far more likely that it is someone or something that is experiencing a function coming from the brain processing itself, its body, the experienced reality and reality itself. The experienced reality is the part that can easily convince the brain to be the real thing since it argues in alignment with the functions of the brain; you sensed me thus you are me and I speak thusly for you. To reject it is to do the same act as rejecting the advesary as Yeshua did for the third time.

[@leonprice6983]

To think is an action an non-being cannot take an action, I typed a youtube comment therefore I am.

[@antinatalope]

It's the starting point of all philosophy, and thought, and awareness. It's not wrong. It's the only thing we can be sure of.

[@ElonMuskrat-my8jy]

The Orthodox take would be "I love, therefore I am."

[@Millathunmain]

Doubting the doubt of doubting doubt to doubt the doubt 💯

[@YoungMommy14]

Excellent Work, brother! Your material is nothing short of 'fantastic'. There's one thing that you neglected to mention that I think is simply 'too f'n funny to be omitted. That 'thing' is Deacartes' 'loosey goosey', 'laissez faire', 'quintessentially apathetic' attitude that he had towards 'the demonic entity in his iconic 'thought experiment'. 'Hey, Rene... I love how you're questioning your 'alleged existence' with the precision of a 'Fine tooth comb'... Any reason why you subject 'The Demon' to absolutely zero scrutiny and just assume it's existence A Priori'? Descartes was funny. Truth be told, I'm think that Sartre's (My Favourite Philisopher) Cogito Is far more compelling and 'logically viable' than Descartes'. The only issue is that I don't reasonably expect many (if anyone at all) to use 'phenomenology' as their chief Epistemic Methadology. Sarte's Cogito 'In And Of Itself' is brilliant (imo). Keep up the great work, dude!

[@zakon77-o5s]

1:16 missed the sausage

[@sfkeepay]

“…then, when we stop thinking, we actually do cease to exist.” (09:55) Is that right? On one hand, Descartes didn’t seem to me to be suggesting ongoing thought is necessary for existence…merely that the capacity and practice constitutes evidence sufficient to confirm our being. Afraid you don’t exist? Just check in with yourself via meta awareness of your internal dialogue. On the other, though some elements of consciousness hadn’t been described (not to say “discovered”) are weren’t, therefore available at the time, our brain produces work at many levels, most of which are entirely opaque as they occur in our unconscious, others are accessible but generally reside somewhere beneath conscious awareness, and may be somehow trammeled “up” for examination at “will”, and still others materialize and may be examined and manipulated by choice. The point being, we are always “thinking” even when we are entirely denied any possible awareness of those thoughts. I suspect I’ve infused your philosophy with my layman’s ignorant literalism, and lack the education needed to properly deconstruct this “cease existing having ceased thinking” conundrum.

[@rubewaddell1704]

Now I don't know if I watched this video or made the whole thing up in my head.

[@dinninfreeman2014]

If you can mistake the nature of your own thought you can mistake doubting and therefore think you doubt when you do not thus undermining the foundation "I think therefore I am". It only holds if you cab be sure of your own doubt

[@manubishe]

"I doubt therefore I am" is one if the stickers I'll gladly buy

[@LittlePiggy-p3f]

Finally you posted!

[@ppharaoh5421]

Here are the facts. All that we know or think we know or don’t know etc has one biased source. Our minds. We conjure up everything we think of from it and can never truly know if what we know is the truth. We can only believe we do

[@BallBatteryReligion]

Right. This is why I admire Buddhism so much. They recognized long ago that our consciousness and perception dictate all our experiences and that we are completely inseparable from it. Thus instead of looking at it like a roadblock in the way of some objective truth that we can only theorize exists, yet often we'd prefer pondering something we can't prove as if we know it's real rather than developing and harnessing the very schemas that translate all information back to us and that can never be removed or navigated around. Ideally if we were to properly understand, then master our perception we could at least expand our capacity for general thought and knowledge, even manipulate our experience of consciousness into different states to get closer to something objective or beyond our own entangled processes. Notably though only closer to the idea, not obtaining the actual knowledge or finding this holy grail of understanding so we can finally feel certain. It helps to compare perceptive thoughts to as many other different perceptions as possible to see if it can be agreed on by enough different individuals to start treating it as something fundamental. That's still not objective per say. But it's close, and pragmatic. Objectivity beyond just our theory of it is only realized in our day to day world as collections of adequately similar experiences of the same phenomena and a consensus agreement on what the appropriate response to it should be. Idk, to me that certainly seems like an approach that at the very least offers an accessible path that doesn't rely on abstractions, gods or attempting to define the minutia of thought itself, or treating perceptive beliefs and ideas like they're laws of nature.

[@Qstandsforred]

10:03 *"if we take his definition of a person seriously, if we ever stop thinking we will just pop out of existence".* Fallacy of denying the antecedent. There may be other things that imply existence besides thinking.

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

It was in reference to the definition of us merely as a thinking thing, not the epistemic part of the cogito argument, which was dealt with in the previous sentence. Hence it is not denying the antecedent. I admit it was confusing to deal with them both so close together. Given I take the logical structure of the relationship between definition and existence to be “(there does not exist an x such that P_1,…,P_k) -> (there does not exist c)” (intuitively: “if there is nothing fitting the definitional properties, then there is no object named by the constant c, i.e., the topic of conversation”), this is just a standard application of modus ponens.

[@Qstandsforred]

@@unsolicitedadvice9198 So the proposition is that thinking is the _only_ property of this "thinking thing"?

[@EpicNicks]

9:54 I didn't realize just how many imaginary people I deal with on a daily basis. Thanks for the bite-sized philosophy lesson.

[@chemquests]

Many people question the concept of the self, and it seems reasonable all things are dubious. Uncertainty is the background of all philosophy

[@Nonreligeousthiestic]

Thought creates the thinker. "When thought is not the thinker is not either" Jiddu Krishnamurti. I find in relationship I am a self that has a completely different life and quality than the self created by thought aka 'the thinker'

[@rolandrush5172]

I remember learning about “I think therefore I am” and the reasoning being “we can doubt all things but the fact we exist due to our ability to think about existence” and my first thought was “of course I can, that’s just a lack of imagination” That’s like saying your random emotions exist because from their perspective they experienced existence. You can easily imagine “your” ideas as spontaneous life forms being born and dying repeatedly and “your” consciousness is the after image; like a fossil or something.

[@rolandrush5172]

17:00 Oh that’s similar to my idea.. I did read a lot of eastern stories growing up, so maybe I absorbed it and came to a similar idea.

[@KingOpenReview]

That's still you existing in some way.

[@baronvonbrunn8596]

I agree that thoughts, emotions, memories and all that isn't really us in a way, since we can perceive them as something external (for example I feel the anger but I am not the anger itself), but that still leaves the thing doing the perceiving. In the end, I think it just depends on what you consider beying the "I".

[@nagoranerides3150]

Cognito Ergo Sum is just about the only insightful thing Descartes ever said. It still is, and arguments to the contrary are almost all circular.

[@rolandrush5172]

Memes (from evolutionary biology) transfer between hosts and this concept of “doubt” could just be an evolved meme to help other memes extend into the future. I feel like memes breaks a lot of this thinking

[@Finnatese]

An interesting addition about the perceptions point and blurred periphery vision, is it can be taken further; you don’t use your eyes to see out into the world. Light hits the 2D surface of eyeballs, sending information to the brain which creates the 3D world entirely in your head. Other senses add to this image. Alan watts said if you want to see what inside your mind looks like you just open your eyes

[@duunchannel]

Cogito ergo sum does not refer solely to what we call thought, but to all aspects of consciousness: "In fine, I am the same being who perceives, that is, who apprehends certain objects as by the organs of sense, since in truth, I see light, hear a noise, and feel heat. But it will be said that these presentations are false, and that I am dreaming. Let it be so. At all events it is certain that I seem to see light, hear a noise, and feel heat; this cannot be false, and this is what in me is properly called perceiving (sentire), which is nothing else than thinking." - Meditations, Part Two

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

I know that’s what he intended, but strictly speaking the Cogito Argument does not carry him that far

[@beansworth5694]

That's why I've always thought his famous argument was misworded somewhat for being the foundational minimal floor of perfect understanding that it is meant to assert itself as. "I think, therefore I, (a 'person', with all of the necessary assumptions regarding individuality and definite composition) am" should instead be "I think, therefore something had thoughts." We might be fundamentally and logically incapable of comprehending ourselves from our own actual vantage point without plenty assumptions and liberal application of abstractions, and I think that this is actually necessarily the case unless we accept the assumption that we have a third eye of sorts that is able to give us an intuitive and perfect understanding of our own nature delineated from the rest of reality clearly (such as an omniscient god or some other metaphysical sensory organ bequeathing such unto us as held by many of the thinkers who held such an optimistic view of the capacity of pure reason).

[@robinmiller871]

Perhaps, identifying with our thoughts, is a source of much conundrum?

[@philosophyversuslogic]

I've always been wondering why that verb 'doubt' is taken as its own. Actually, there are sentences like "I got stong doubts about smth", or "There are weak doubts that...". So what if I doubt? To doubt doesn't mean to think. I doubt doesn't imply I think, moreover it cannot imply any "I am's". Otherwise, I feel, therefore I am would be not less perfect.

[@SiqueScarface]

I wonder how David Hilbert's Formalism works together with Decartes' Cogito argument. (David Hilbert once described Formalism as "I don't care if it's called points, lines and planes, or tables, stools and beersteins, as long as they confirm to the same set of axioms, they are the same.")

[@AverageCommentor]

Hmm, I am confused about how doubt can possibly exist without a thinker. Doubt is only ever caused when a being thinks an idea is not certainly true. Would it not then logically follow that doubt requires thought from a being? And since this being has thoughts, it must be a thinker surely. From the definition of the term "doubt", I'm sure we can simply derive that a thinker must be the source of it. To say that doubt can exist without a thinker surely requires a redefinition of the term "doubt". Or have I made some philosophical blunders here?

[@haros2868]

Well under their definition, the guy on the video and buddists, chatgtp is fundamentally the same as we. Clearly René was reffing to I AM a conscious entity, that is proven because it can think, sense, perceive. Their counter argument is, do you stop existing when not thinking? The answer is no. Thinking is just 1 process the entity is involved. A quark exists. Whenever it interacts with photons we can see it. Whenever it doesn't interact with photons, does it stop existing fundamentally? No! A thinker stops existing when no available information exists? No! Am i half a person in sleep because I have altered awareness, and double a person when taking lsd because they highen activity? No! The thinker is 1, interacting with stuff, and even in isolation in some context (like coma). Its hilarious how those no self "believers" "think" "they" are right, when things like the hard problem of consciousness exists. How can you explain an integrated subjective experience? Without a subject? Then how is it subjective? Is it all in the mind of the omnipresent Buddha??

[@tillicollapse93]

He puts ‘to think’ on the same level as ‘to doubt’ not doubt as a result of thinking. It is a word, a concept, rather than a scientific outcome of thinking. Think about the question ‘if a tree falls and no one is there to hear it, does it make sound?’ Also 10:40 - 11:11

[@TakiGosc427]

I thought about sentence "are you sure?" as a doubt without thinker. You can put it in some bot to write it on every comment, and you have a doubt without doubter. But am I sure?

[@haros2868]

@@TakiGosc427 well all these are just word games. Were talking about a subjective experience. By definition, aside verbal tricks, it needs a subject, or experiencer, to be subjective and independent of the context of awereness of other thinkers. Whether this thought is about doubting, about pain, about sensory inputs, it goes to an observer. Thats why we humans essentially mean (I understand what you say) . A robot if says that it is programmed to say technically a lie. It should say "your sentence is processed coherently" without a center witnessing it. So no you cant truly doubt in the conscious sense without a conscious entity experiencing and influencing that doubt brain information

[@haros2868]

@@tillicollapse93 concepts are experienced by thinkers or conscious observers. The tree analogy is irrelevant. If your definition of sound is air waves then yes it made a sound. But as you said nobody was there to hear it. Which means the air waves didn't travel to an ear that later convented the information to brain information and later accessed by a consciousness. No self teachings are word games and those who ignore the hard problem of consciousness. Even to perceive an illusion or a lie, you need to be a substant entity to interact with that "false" information. So the act of being fooled requires a self , if of course we define it with the conscious sense, otherwise i fooled chatgtp, not really i fooled a bunch of discrete algorithms, they didn't integrated to a center like a mind tobe considered "truly fooled"

[@captainzork6109]

Honestly I doubt the premise of "I think"

[@sordidknifeparty]

It seems to me that it is possible that thought itself is simply a part of a larger deterministic process over which we have absolutely no control. If that is the case, then the concept of i as an individual who makes choices cannot exist even if there is something which is somehow aware of the processes which are occurring. In this way thoughts could be happening, for example the thought "I doubt my own existence", and something called an experience could be being had by something, but it's not necessarily being had by anything like "I" in the usual sense of the word

[@graphixkillzzz]

i can only know two truths: 1. i exist, because i am aware of my own thoughts. 2. i must exist somewhere, therefore a "universe" of some kind must exist. with those two truths, i infer: 1. a universe shouldn't exist for just one conscious being, therefore other conscious beings should exist. 2. if other conscious beings exist, then there must be some experiential reality that should cause a similar delusion of authentic reality to each conscious being, otherwise we couldn't effectively communicate. but these inferences are not necessarily truths.

[@PranabMallick.]

I agree with the first one. The fact that there is an awareness of thoughts, emotions,etc. needs the existence of a subject,all awareness is marked by an awareness of self-existence. The "I" refers to this subject. But,the idea that you have to exist somewhere assumes the need for space,which may not be true. The two inferences can be doubted even more.

[@badabing3391]

inference 1 doesnt follow from those truths. You could exist in a universe composed exclusively of you alone. That would satisfy both truths

[@randyzeitman1354]

Casting doubt on beliefs has nothing to do with identity. There is x. Therefore, someone distinguished X.

[@ezshottah3732]

Fantastic work

[@thenintendocyclops1074]

Read the passage you have linked, and I now feel odd, I don't understand the wording too well however the message feels understood. Though I have no clue what in it I understand, which is....actually kind of fun!

[@thenintendocyclops1074]

(Can't edit on this phone) Alright so I now understand, at least partly, what I understood after thinking on it for a bit, and this led to the calmest panic attack I've ever had right in the bathroom at work shortly after break when I had seen this. I then just laughed at the realization, whatever it is, so this will be a fun little dive into my own head. Thank you for uploading this video, and more importantly linking that excerpt, I hope your brilliance reaches a much wider audience in the near future.

[@MsSonjaRose]

But what if doubt is an emotion like anger or happiness and that would then mean that doubt is fleeting because you can have times where you don't doubt, so in saying that, we are not what we think but we just are. Nothing more than we just are what we are. And, if we just are, then we can have infinite possibility in what or who we are. This is where the problem exists because of the myriad of things we could be but we don't want to make a definitive decision on what or who this is in case we are wrong. This is what creates "doubt" and proves its an emotion and not a static theory. Its our indecisiveness in accepting ourselves as nothing until we give ourselves a description. And, the circle begins again.

[@jamescareyyatesIII]

I think, therefore I think I am and think I am not and think that I am thinking.

[@aaronweiss3294]

I think, therefore something is

[@SystemsMedicine]

Well… You’ve totally convinced me: I definitely don’t exist! Now that I think of it, you, and for that matter the rest of everything else doesn’t exist, either. Given all that, I guess I should stop typing, and go get a coffee. Thanks. Cheers. [Maybe I’ll leave a little early today…]

[@Jorn-sy6ho]

So when we sleep, our conciousness lowers (otherwise we would be insomniacs). According to Descartes we are less alive when we sleep? Or are we dead, because we can not notice our thoughts while sleeping?

[@Z-sg3yl]

By hand gestures he is only half of Jordan Peterson

[@landlubbber]

Both of those examples of flawed perceptions seem to have issues, maybe because you've classed categorisation together with perception. I can miscategorise my emotional state but the raw, perceptive data of my emotions can't be "wrong" in any meaningful sense. For our perception of our vision, on the other hand, clearly those students were able to correctly perceive the blurriness of their vision when they focused on it. The data is still good, just wrongly classified. Maybe the literature provides better examples but this doesn't seem to weaken our ability to perceive much, unless the term is defined a bit strangely

[@OrdnanceLab]

Great video on a brilliant mind whose ideas I'll never get around to reading in the original source materials. While dorks like me find this interesting and insightful, they always seem to be a combination of a philosophical Rube Goldberg Machine and academic jobs program. Thinkers like Camus, Nietzsche, and Sartre are to me much more relevant to the gritty realities of life.

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

Thank you! And I get what you mean. I sort of write these types of videos knowing they will likely underperform. But it gives my brain a break because it is a lot less emotionally heavy than reading lots of existential philosophy

[@alena-qu9vj]

I am afraid that the realities of life wouldn't be by far so gritty if not for the sick minds of such like Descartes, Camus, Nietzsche and Sartre, who polluted the air with their personal mental problems. The really suspicious thing is why it is just this material which is pushed on us by all the main outlets in the last decades. Seems the mentality of the owners of them rezonates with all that fear and doom and they will not bear any positivness.

[@titanagario9166]

If the self doesn't exist, and we are just conscious witnesses, not agents, then it seems true that if we aren't "thinking" (or having conscious experience) then we don't actually exist

[@LexFrelsari]

Descartes created AM in a thought experiment and so the world ended and AM is mocking us.😂

[@samuelvanorshaegen]

This is so interesting but I'm slightly confused about something, perhaps I'm misunderstanding the argument. How does misperception serve as a counter argument to Decartes? It seems to me that misperception is still perception. Using the same example as in the video, if I don't know what I'm feeling, then isn't me not knowing what I'm feeling just the thing that I'm perceiving? This seems much more like an inability to process or make sense of your perceptions rather than actual misperception. Personally I very often don't know how I'm feeling and sometimes I might think I'm angry while I'm actually sad, but I'm still just perceiving -- or to perhaps use a better word, 'experiencing,' -- the thing I'm feeling regardless of what I think it actually is that I'm feeling. I don't see how being able to be mistaken about internal perceptions is necessarily different to how we can be mistaken about external perceptions, and how that counters Decartes' argument, because regardless of the accuracy of your perception, you're still experiencing that perception. I hope I'm making sense, this is such a complex topic.

[@feolizx]

Perhaps it would help if you change your style of thumbnails.. Regardless, quality content!

[@unsolicitedadvice9198]

I have considered it, but these thumbnails work pretty well and also are easy for my terrible graphic design skills

[@miguelangelous]

As Descartes, I’m not searching for a belief that is true, rather one belief I simply cannot doubt….yeah ☕️

[@SC-zq6cu]

6:30 That is impossible. Being truly able to imagine something means that one is able to conceive of a scenario where said thing is possible. To believe something one has to first be aware of a scenario where that thing is possible, after that its just a matter of quantity and quality of evidence one needs to convince themselves that the thing isn't just possible but likely and these criteria can be changed. Therefore once someone can imagine something there is always a finite chance that they will believe it.

[@igorlopes7589]

Even if the perceived self is a temporary reality it is still a reality. Even if the "I" only exists for a mere instant and is substituted by another "I" there are still a series of "I"s we are talking about

[@rlstine4982]

I should not say that, but having taken Ketamine recreatively, I experienced that "I" is just a combination of thousands of small units of identity which I had the chance to see express themselves, as "I" remained an obersever. Deugs can have that effect that they can reveal how your brain works.

[@greyblob1101]

Maybe millions of observers

[@rlstine4982]

@@greyblob1101 For millions, I would go to "units of thoughts", but they definitely have their own life and agenda for sure.

[@rusthog]

FINALLY! Every time I feel like I'm breaking ground with my friend on determinism and the non-existence of consciousness, he pulls out his big black Descartes and slaps me in the face with it.

[@Nothing.321uf]

It will be insightful.... Got sickness unto death... Age of reason and the rebel... The one you suggested wasn't available there ...

[@Gign--a]

I know it from AM in I have no mouth and I must scream

[@alfrancisvictorm.sapanta1628]

1:15 I find it funny that the blur completely missed the thing it was supposed to cover HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAH

[@TheOneAndOnlySame]

My version is " I believe that I think, therefore I believe that I am "

[@charlesvandenburgh5295]

A problem: The very arguments you put forward refuting Descates' claim can only be cognitively understood by presuming the very thing your arguments seek to disprove. Thus your arguments refute themselves.

[@GerhardTreibheit]

Ok, but hear me out. Everytime I'm able to stop thinking, it ALWAYS leads to me leaving this plane of existence.... 🤔 Dreams, Meditation..... Even when I'm daydreaming, people ask "were are you right now", and when they do that, they literally throw my attention back to this plane if existence..... I've only watched until 9:50, but "you stop existing once you stop thinking" seems valid to me. It doesn't mean that you can't just reappear again. Also, when I fall into a coma, and then come back (from what I understand) the time when I was under NEVER EVEN HAPPENED from my own perspective. It's like I skipped 3 days. Did I exist during those 3 days? I think NOT 🤔

[@scissorcorn9956]

“I do not think, therefore I do not am.”

[@capuchinosofia4771]

Then, if i percieve (even if i percieve a lie) i exist. Perception as a basis. Like electricity for a computer. Or its Input. Without an input the computer will never turn on, or if its on already, it will never do anything. So if i can percieve something, anything, wether a lie or a truth, then its confirming my existance. No need to "think". We just need to percieve.