Question
Isnt the statement quotI think therefore I am.quot by Rene Descartes fundamentally flawed ?
Isnt the statement quotI think therefore I am.quot by Rene Descartes fundamentally flawed because, either a,it is incomplete as it jumps from thinking to being or existing without specifying the metaphysical nature of either, or b, it makes a metaphysical quotcategory mistakequot deducing or inducing from something mental, thinking, to something physical, existing . How can a specific thought, which has as of yet, an unexplained nature, become sufficient evidence for asserting the physical existence of a human being?
Answer
Yes, Descartes assertion is flawed, but not for the reasons you specify. Your option a the jump from thinking to being is not a logical flaw unless you equate being with substance which is, indeed, what Descartes does. The first word is I, and this implies that the thought, as a whole, is selfreferential. It is possible that the self is not substantial meaning it is not an identity that endures over time, but since the thought references a self implied in the I, there is a limit to how wrong the assertion can be.brbrThe issue is rooted in the nature of language. Words only have meanings in relation to a network of other terms. There simply is no I that has any meaning that is not part of a language game to borrow a phrase from Wittgenstein in which there are rules for the proper use of the term. In other words, I only has meaning because it plays a role in a web of linguistic terms, and this web of linguistic terms implies a system of rules. Something cannot play a role or imply rules unless it exist in some sense. It does not have to be a substance or any sort of physical thing, but it does need to have some ontological status which is the philosophers way of saying that it makes some sort of difference in the universe.brbrSome entity x exists if, for any two identical worlds w and w, the addition or subtraction of x to one world, but not the other, causes the two worlds to no longer be identical. I think we can safely say that if w has an I and w does not, then w cannot be identical to w. There for the I exists. It might not be a substantial self, or a physical entity, but it does, at the very least, exist in some sense.brbrDescartes could have stayed on firmer ground if he has simply said something like I think, therefore, there is being. This being is the ontological ground of the thinking. The being does not have to be something that produces the thought, the being could simply BE the thought, and this being need not necessarily endure over time, but here things get even more tricky because the network of meanings that make the thought meaningful would all have to conspire to make it appear as though the being endured over time, even though it does not. This is a logical possibility just like God could have created the universe years ago, but made it seem to be billion years old, but the whole thing seems so contrived and farfetched that most philosophers wont bother arguing about it.brbrSo Descartes argument is successful in grounding being, but it does not guarantee substantial thinking substance, which is what he really wanted.
