Fair. Yeah, we can do a whole thread on Descartes, and that's already been done too. I realize there's a lot to Cartesian interpretation which I'm fine with bringing in to the question, I just don't want to get bogged down in arguing what Descartes really meant is all.

So I'd be more than happy to grant that Descartes may escape this charge that Sartre is bringing up, when we consider the whole of his work. I think that all the greats are like this when they speak about one another: We can choose one or the other in defending them because they're just that rich of thinkers.

But with something as... airy?... as the philosophical subject I want something to grasp onto in thinking out the concept.

I think, generally speaking, the trap of skepticism which these thoughts can inspire is worth skipping over, but I'm hopping in and just looking at the dimensions of it. Why is this temptation here? What brings people to the Inn of Solipsism as they travel the philosophy road?

Is everyone on the same page that Descartes gives an argument for his existence from doubt? (link) Some, like ↪frank, seem to be missing this. The "shift from certainty to doubt" is not Sartre, it is Descartes, and it is not a shift from certainty so much as an avenue to certainty. — Leontiskos

By "Shift from certainty to doubt" I mean that Sartre is asking what would remain of doubt if we were only an instant, whereas for Descartes the instant in which one speaks to themself the cogito that is a certainty that even an evil demon could not deceive. Descartes uses doubt, and his doubt is even a genuine exploration, but he's on a search for certainty. Whereas Sartre is trying to explicate the metaphysical structures of a being which can lie to itself, or find itself in bad faith. How is it possible for this seemingly singular unity which flows through time, that seems transparent to itself, can lie to itself? So he focuses on the necessities of doubt in order to divide up the cogito into the tripartite division of time.

But think about why Descartes responded so vehemently to Gassendi when Gassendi made a similar claim. What you are saying is, "Descartes' wrangling with skepticism wasn't real; it was just a charade." If it wasn't real, if Descartes did not really descend into skepticism and really come out, then his meditation is completely worthless. "Descartes came back up with knowledge, therefore he never seriously entertained skepticism," is a really problematic way to assess Descartes' meditation, and Descartes explicitly rejects this problematic/cynical reading. — Leontiskos

Because Gassendi was passing over the important part to his argument. I'm not saying that Descartes' methodological decision is a charade, only that if we keep reading the meditations we eventually get out of skeptical doubt and find knowledge.

Yes! It might take us too far astray, but the notions of continuity are actually deeply related -- the quote here is in the third section on temporality, but the first section on temporality references a definition of mathematical continuity proposed by Poincare as a basis for understanding his ideas about consciousness. He requires a being which is what it is not and is not what it is as its very
being, and he states Poincare's definition as "a=b, b=c, a÷c" -- when I did the dig, because I had no idea what he was on about, what I found was that it's better to read "a÷c" as "a divides from c"; this got along with another rendition of Poincare's definition which made more sense to me: "a=b, b=c, a<c" (where a, b, and c are infinitesimals, which from what we could see would be why it's not so popular nowadays since infinitesimals aren't really used anymore, from what I saw)

That "flow" from the past towards the future with a nothing that divides the two as the present is very much what he's getting at rather than a continuous series of instants.

Descartes’ mistake: the subject isn’t as much a different substance than the object, as it is differently conditioned than an object. — Mww

What is the substance of the object (and, thereby, the subject by your sentence)? And what is this different conditioning?

Yeh. Hopefully the above clarified a bit, but to reiterate -- I'm the one bringing in the notion of the skeptic to the notion of the subject by way of Descartes and Sartre. By my understanding, to go towards exegesis (but I'm trying to not fall into a sandpit of exegesis), neither of them are skeptics at all.

I think it's correct to assume that we cannot understand the world without reference to time, and so the Cogito must be understood within the context of time.

However, that does not mean that the Cogito proves that time exists, nor does it suggest that Descartes failed in his attempt to be infinitely skeptical by assuming the existence of time. It only means that an understanding of the world is impossible without placing events within time.

This approach I'm arguing is consistent with Kant's view that time does not necessarily exist outside humans because it is a form of intuition necessary for our perception of reality, but not an inherent property of the world itself. — Hanover

The cogito in Kant is interesting since it's just an abstract appendage to every assertion that one could possibly make. It refers to the transcendental ego -- a necessary feature of any assertion prior even to being baptized in the schematism of time.

I think the phenomenological approach gets by Kant's objections (well... not really objections, since the order of argument started with Kant and a lot of the ideas Kant started are "baked in" to phenomenology as a concern. Perhaps better to sya "gets around Kant's conceptions"). Using Chalmer's idea of the philosophy room: In some sense since we're in the phenomenology room when Kant shows up we can point him down the hallway towards the noumenology room where his points will stand. But since we're only speaking of the phenomena we can leave the things-in-themselves and the various noumena behind and underneath the phenomena, forever locked away.

Some commentators insist that it does, but I'd have to go on an expedition to find those sources. :smile: — frank

My thinking is that the text and some exegesis is there to give us a little something more to dig into than our own thoughts, but I do mean to ask the question about what it is I or we think about the cogito -- what is it we can infer from stating "I think"? Can you infer "I am" by thinking "I think"?

But I don't know how to interpret Descartes as getting stuck on the evil demon since he moves past the evil demon in the meditations. It seems to me that this is a temptation for modern readers because the solution isn't persuasive to us but the problem, as stated, is.

But Descartes didn't get stuck there.

Well, given that Sartre is talking about radical doubt as being given to us only through time reference (something like Kant's intuitions I feel) there is nothing other to hang experience off of is there?

'Rely' is probably the sticky word here. Sartre likes to make words less like words. — I like sushi

Skepticism is something I'm bringing in to thinking about the subject, or the cogito, but Sartre is not a skeptic.

I'm still in the middle of reading it, but yeah the in-itself is not who I am but a kind of facticity (or, at least, historicity -- I'm thinking these things are on the same plane, ie. the in-itself, but I could turn out wrong): the familiar objects of the world but without any synthetic relation which the for-itself brings (though there's a twist, here, because consciousness, the for-itself, is nothing). The for-itself brings its past along but the speaking of my past as an event that I partake in is to make of myself an in-itself, as I understand it.

I'm cool with introducing jargon and technicalities and revisiting these themes. In large part I've been looking for a good quote for entry to force myself to go back over the text from where I'm at and respond to various objections people might bring up with what I've read so far of the text to sort of solidify where I'm at.

I just wanted to avoid them so that the barrier to entry was relatively low.

Descartes' foundation is a benevolent God, right? The Evil Demon is used to show that logical truths aren't indubitable. For a piece of knowledge to survive the Evil Demon, it would have to be intrinsic to the Cogito itself. Is change intrinsic to the Cogito? — frank

I'd say certainty -- clear and distinct ideas -- is how he gets there. Looking at Meditation 3 right now:

....For without doubt, Those of them which Represent Substances are something More, or (as I may say) have More of Objective Reallity in them, then those that Represent only Modes or Accidents; and again, That by Which I understand a Mighty God, Eternal, Infinite, Omniscient, Omnipotent Creatour of all things besides himself, has certainly in it more Objective Reallity, then Those Ideas by which Finite Substances are Exhibited.... — Descartes Meditation III

I read up to about there to refresh my memory. The theme I see is certainty, which is understood as something which is clear and distinct that cannot be doubted.

I'm noticing upon looking at this that Descartes allows a past for his own argument, and seems to include objects even as he builds up there so it seems, at least by the Meditations, he's closer to Sartre than I was getting on about, and that this is really mostly a pop-notion that I'm describing.

I think of the Cogito as experiential. At this moment, I experience the world around me. I find that I can't doubt that this experience is happening. That I think of cognition as something that's happening does suggest that I think in story arcs. — frank

Does "I think" refer to the experiential whole?

Are you supposing that the Evil Demon cannot manipulate our experience of time? — Leontiskos

I don't think so.

My line of thinking here is if we know something, then at least in that respect we are not deceived. I think the change in outcomes with respect to the thought experiment has to do with emphasizing doubt over certainty -- rather than looking for a certainty that I cannot doubt, and so cannot be decieved by even the evil demon the process of looking for certitude requires I already know things that are uncertain.

To kind of do an inversion here on that line: In some sense we could say that if we accept the certitude of the cogito then we must also accept the certitude of the before-after, and so the self is not this indivisible point-particle that thinks.

The Cogito is: I think, I am. Maybe we could show that change is integral to thought. Is that Sartre's point? — frank

I think his point is to argue for a tripartite division of time which the cogito seems not to require. But mostly I'm riffing from the text here while thinking about skepticism and the philosophical self.

To doubt is to doubt. It is somewhat contrary to suggest we 'rely on' doubt. What cannot be questioned cannot be appreciated. That is all there is too it. — I like sushi

I don't think we rely upon the cogito, exactly. This isn't really a pragmatic question. When we doubt some statement or other there's a huge web that the judgment is embedded within. Here, though, the philosophical concepts are cut new to demonstrate some point or other, and so the doubt isn't that kind of doubt, but the radical kind of doubt often associated with Descartes.

I think the appeal to the Augustinian exploration of self was done as a safe place as leverage against the
Scholastic schools who dominated the discussion of nature at the time. So, not about skepticism at all. — Paine

Yeah -- though I can see how the ideas taken out of context can easily lead one to a skeptical conclusion.

One of those ideas I think the argument is targeting is the notion that the self is an indivisible point-like unity.

For purposes of this thread I think I'd like to simply stipulate the difference rather than get down into the exegesis of whether or not Descartes was really a skeptic or not.

Taking Descartes at face value in the Meditations we end with knowledge of self, God, and world. So the doubt is surely methodical rather than radical.

For the Pyrrhonist I'd stipulate that the purpose of their philosophy is to remain in a state of suspended judgment. With respect to Sartre's argument that's permissible because he's relying upon a more full-throated notion of doubt that Descartes uses which the Pyrrhonist escapes by noting they're the ones not interested in belief so have no need to defend it, but are forced to do so by those who insist on having them. For them belief is a disease to be cured.

I think stipulating what the evil demon can and cannot do is a part of the game, in a way. By stating what the evil demon is or isn't limited by you begin to pick out a foundation, be it certitude or something else.

Even the instantaneous cogito?

We don't see the skeptic Sartre is responding to in the OP. I find it difficult to tell exactly what radical doubt he's responding to. — fdrake

He's not responding to a skeptic here really, but using Descartes as a foil and it seems to me to fit a certain conception of the self as popularized in The Matrix, and so serves as a certain disentangling of concepts -- the topic he's writing about here is the structure of temporality after a bunch of other stuff. Mostly I've been looking for quotes that could be decontextualized and this is one of the first that struck me as a good entry into an old topic.

If an account of the argument can be given without use of the specific transcendental concepts Sartre is using, how can we say his analysis of necessary preconditions follows? Since the argument can be conceived otherwise. — fdrake

The way Sartre is talking isn't quite like having necessary preconditions, though the critique of Descartes relies upon that notion. But since it's Descartes that sets up the problem by using doubt it's not Sartre's necessary preconditions but Descartes' starting point (which is why it kind of reads like a deconstruction to me).

I don't think he intends this against a skeptic as much as I could see how his reflection on the cogito mirrors pop-understandings of the self as an instantaneous moment. At the moment he is describing the structure of temporality -- what I have in mind with the cogito here has more to do with The Subject, in elevator word terms, but I thought Sartre's text provided a nice entry way into that thought topic. As well as being something new to throw into the mix of thoughts here.

This is almost a troll reading, but I want to give it anyway - no further resources are needed to talk about the validity of "I think, therefore I am" than seeing if, in the circumstance of the utterance, predicating an entity entails it exists. In normal circumstances it does. Therefore the argument ought to be understood as valid by competent speakers of English. — fdrake

I'm fine with this approach. The quote is an entry-point, not a barrier.

I see a problem though. Descartes wrote "I think, therefore I am", and Descartes does not exist. He's dead.

What isn't a troll reading about it - Sartre's commentary is transcendental, a reading of the necessary preconditions of Descartes' ability to argue, judge, doubt ensuring the truth of the claim it seeks to demonstrate. That the doubter exists. The above account involves only norms of language, and specifically talks about predicability rather than any phenomenological, a-priori or transcendental structure.

Right. My interpretation so far would emphasize the phenomenological method more than the other bits. In a lot of ways there's a certain dissolution going on of transcendental structures through the phenomenological description that doesn't just waffle around in a circle like Heidegger.

At least so far.

I mostly just wanted to throw this in the thread to see what happens. — fdrake

Keep at it, I say! :D -- I brought in the skeptic because it's another topic that I think on, and the description here reminded me of The Matrix, and how that can easily lend itself into -- if you do not accept Descartes' solution -- thinking the only thing certain is the repetition of the cogito at the moment.

Doesn't Descartes explicitly court the suspension of judgment? It seems to me that Descartes thinks he can descend even below the level of Pyrrhonism and nevertheless re-surface with certain knowledge. — Leontiskos

Yeah, but it's very different -- methodical doubt is a process for finding a certain foundation for knowledge in Descartes. He's using it as a tool to dig out the foundations from the confusion.

Also, since he finds his certainty, he's no longer a skeptic at all by the end of the meditations. Whereas the Pyrrhonian wants to sustain the attitude of suspension of belief to the point that supposing someone came up with a persuasive argument then it would be the Pyrrhonian skeptic's task to invent another way to dissolve that belief.

When Socrates asks for a definition of a term that he and all the interlocutors believe is important but disagree about, he is surely trying to find the view from nowhere, the place where we transcend doxa and perhaps, eventually, dianoia as well, and can see the Good itself... — J

The beauty of Plato is that it's in the form of a dialogue. Socrates in the dialogue believes, perhaps, that there's an answer but that's not the view from nowhere. "the view from nowhere" is a more modern term, I think, though maybe I'm wrong there.

I'd go as far as to say that Plato's philosophy believes in The Forms, but that The Forms have a place.

Going with the Wiki here:

The Forms are expounded upon in Plato's dialogues and general speech, in that every object or quality in reality—dogs, human beings, mountains, colors, courage, love, and goodness—has a form. Form answers the question, "What is that?" Plato was going a step further and asking what Form itself is. He supposed that the object was essentially or "really" the Form and that the phenomena were mere shadows mimicking the Form; that is, momentary portrayals of the Form under different circumstances.

This gets along with the analogy of the cave, though it's hard for me to discern if the forms are the puppets making shadows or the sunlight above the puppet-masters.

But see how the analogy has a place, rather than being a "view from nowhere"?

I think Biden would have won a second term if he hadn't done so bad in the debate.

And it's noteworthy that the United States was willing to elect a black man, and not a black woman.

I don't have data, but that's my gut instinct -- there was a change and it was to a woman so vote for the penis-haver.

Hawt damn. Looks like it was worth all the posts after all :D

OK, yes, same question. Nevermind to my above.

Right.

But is there anything more to it than the difference in the shapes of the letters?

Oh, yes. Very much. The topics are related but I'm trying to remain on target with @NotAristotle here.

Cool. We agree there.

So when we start using things like "P" to represent any proposition whatsoever this relies upon substitution. Without a notion of substitution we'd not be able to make sense of variables.


Or, what's probably a better way of stating this, informal substitution is subject to more criteria than formal substitution is. Informally substitution is usually reserved for mathematics and statements of that form -- which is what formal logic is very much like.

But since A -> ~A uses symbols it's more appropriate to call this a formal construction of material implication, which we can write the truth-tables out for and easily conclude it's valid, but unsound, as said.

You can of course say that there is no difference and that "informal logic" and formal logic are infinitely separated, but I think that is to put the cart before the horse. Something which has nothing to do with human reasoning is not logic, and so I would say that if someone is talking about something which is wholly separate from human reasoning then they are not talking about logic (and besides that, they are not paying any attention to the historical development and motivations behind formal logics). — Leontiskos

I think there's a difference and I've committed to indications for the difference -- in the recent posts substitution has been the criteria I've been using.

I don't think that makes them entirely separable.

You are talking in terms of the first premise of a modus ponens, and that is what the material conditional is in many logics. If there is a difference between modus ponens and disjunctive syllogism, then there is a difference between A→B and ¬A∨B. — Leontiskos

The difference is the shape of the little squiggly marks.

Right.

So I'm asking -- what else is there? What does the full meaning say?

I'm sympathetic to informal logic taking priority over formalization, though it gets difficult because of the inherent ambiguity in informal logic. When I say "If I touch the stove then my hand will burn" I'm not talking in terms of material implication or disjunction at all, but a causal relationship between action and event.

But cashing out that causal relationship into the formalization is not in any way easy. Which is why we usually rely upon the informal.

But once we start introducing symbols and substitution I tend to believe we're not really talking about this imprecise, though more frequently utilized, informal reasoning.

1. Right, I mean P entails Q. The logical equivalence (not-P or Q) is an implication of the conditional, not having the same meaning as the conditional. — NotAristotle

What on earth would the meaning of P -> Q be such that it differs from not-P or Q? It's not like P -> Q is in any way a natural language sentence. We're already relying upon substitution (with the variables P and Q) so what prevents us for substituting "not-P or Q" for "P-> Q" when they are logically equivalent?

I'm tempted now to say that the "trap" that science (or "physics") must avoid falling into is not philosophy but sophistry, and that it's better to see science also as a type of ongoing reasoned discussion (or "logic"). (Talking about the lab and the field, as I did, might be just an intuition pump, suggesting that scientists need only share the knowledge they acquired using their special techniques, rather than seeing science as a type of discussion.)

Which means science is only in the same position as philosophy. — Srap Tasmaner

I think it's reasonable to say that science and philosophy are in a similar position with respect to whatever a "highest" discourse is.

I think of them as different, but independent. The appeal to science is a move one can make in philosophy as much as one can make an appeal to coherency and beauty in science -- clearly philosophical words. But neither is "higher" than the other.

Though I'd also say the same about science as I did about philosophy -- there's a practical part that's important to consider (at a minimum, if philosophy is literature, then it seems we should read and discuss hte literature to say we are doing philosophy -- just as an example, I do believe there's more to it than this)

Yeah I'm not sure there. I can say I really enjoyed it though. Made me think about logic in totally new and different ways.

* For argumentation, I suggest studying both informal and formal logic. Informal for practical guidance; formal for appreciation of rigor. I don't have particular texts in informal logic to recommend. — TonesInDeepFreeze

I really like this book for informal logic:

https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/arguments-about-arguments/27835C37D9CEDFA6BE9EFD11CA2DA5A3

Cool.

I see the difference flipped about. I'm tempted to say we're doing philosophy and thereby blah blah blah, but that seems kind of cheap too -- around the merry-go-round type comment.

I'm not sure what you mean here. If you mean that metaphysical attitudes can influence how folk think about ecological, economic and political issues then i agree. — Janus

I suppose I'm speaking in favor of philosophy so I really do mean it the other way about: that philosophy doesn't influence but is the beginning of those thoughts, and so metaphysics and all the rest cannot be dismissed as a game else all the rest is a game.

I'm not sure how to convince, but I do think there are stakes in philosophy -- even in the esoteric topics. The ecological, economic and political issues fold into the metaphysics, from my perspective.

But, by the way I view things, that makes you a player in the metaphysic while you express it in terms of the ecology, economic, or political.

Or no?

That's probably why I call it a curse -- I enjoy the reflection and the wondering, and I know it annoys others and so try not to do it when it does so.

It can, but usually it just irritates others :D

And, again, on the other hand...

From an anthropological view there is the case of people attending church on special occasions, celebrating the Christian holidays with its imagery and meaning, follow the scriptures as an ethical guide because of the deep truths contained in the text, and for all that don't believe the text is literal.

I'd be inclined to call people who observe the various rights and rituals of any religion by that name, anthropologically, because it's hard to make a distinction between the two "from the outside" -- it appears to be an internal debate of some kind.

lol you're right. My accent coming through in the writing.

More to the question of the OP: I think that the belief in the resurrection is pretty important. At least it's on this basis that I argue that Mormans, for all their idiosyncrasies, are still basically Christian: They really do believe Christ died on the cross for our sins and that we can be saved by baptism by immersion and following the rules, while acknowledging we'll fall short because we are not the Christ and so will need forgiveness (grace).

They do it different, but at least for the Mormans who really believe in the theology it's hard for me to separate them from Christianity because of the belief that Christ was risen from the dead and he conquers death and sin, as @Leontiskos said.

But, also, while I have my two cents I'd prefer to leave this adjudication to thems who want to be Christian.

Well, I suppose it's sort of like asking: "can I be a 'Marxist' while rejecting dialectical materialism and the workers' ownership of the means of production, and while embracing neoliberal economic policies, voting for Donald Trump, and idolizing Reagan and Thatcher?" — Count Timothy von Icarus

Definitely maybe. I've sort of thought of the neo-cons as Marxists who gave up on class struggle -- where there's nothing primitive about primitive accumulation.

But it'd be an odd duck who committed to such notions rather than cynically used them.

When it comes to financial crises, governments stepped in. They gave gamblers giant amounts of other people's money. Was that a good thing? — Clearbury

You're ignoring what I said to point out a bad thing governments did. I'm fully on board with governments being bad. They suck.

I'm not fully on board with companies providing state services -- sounds like another state.

Generally speaking: The minarchists constantly reinvent the state, but at an even higher price. And, given that the state still exists, are not anarchists.

The more the government is pulled-back, the more apparent it will become that it is unnecessary and actually counter-productive: that it facilitates the very things we - the people - think it's needed to prevent. — Clearbury

If it's a gradual process then I think the 2008 financial crises is a hard event for you to reckon with. The 2008 financial crises occurred because of a gradual pulling-back of the government on financial regulation.

That's usually how this goes, in my experience.

And, regardless, you've ignored the point I've made about firms enforcing rights -- even if we "gradually" get there your reliance upon private property and contracts makes it such that the state will be reinvented. How else do you enforce contracts other than threatening jailtime?

Interestingly, a literature of literature sounds more promising, or at least a literature about literature. — J

The state's power rests in the hands of individuals and in the misguided idea that we 'need' it. To overcome that, people need to see that the government is a) unjust by its nature and b) does an appalling job at everything. — Clearbury

Let's suppose we're all in agreement here.

What then?