Critiscisms of the Cogito

Cards (8)

  • 3 critiscisms of the Cogito
    1. One must experience before you think - the cogito is syntetic a posteriori(Humes fork)
    2. The demon could still be making you percieve the decieving thoughts
    3. Clear and distinct cannot be selfjustifying
  • Hume says that we never experience the self. Therefore we cannot know that we are.
  • Decartes assumes that he has demonstrated the existence of the self.
    However this only proves the existence of a mind - not neccesarily his own
  • Hume says that Decartes confuses similarity with identity

    Decartes has noticed a collection of similar thoughts but has concluded that these similar thoughts belong to the same entity - Res Cogitans.
    Decartes has confused himself, he has not proved there is a self who has these thoughts only that these thoughts exist
  • Res Cogitans
    the thinking thing
  • Decartes responds to Hume and say the idea of percetion must come before the idea of imperfection
  • Hume argues that God is developed from the augmentation and abstraction of our experiences
  • there is no way for an individual to validate his own self as you are assuming that the self exists in order to do so . Therefore, the Cogito is not an intuition but an inference as it cannot be certain.