PHL - Epistemology Lesson

Epistemology

Je pense, donc je suis.

Cogito, ergo sum.

"I think, therefore I am."

This statement is nearly ubiquitous, but not always understood. The ability to think or more precisely reflect on ideas is the core of our humanity. Earlier in this course, we examined language as the seminal ability that created modern human beings. Language allows for communication, but it also allows for abstract thought. Our thoughts or knowledge create the reality in which we live and interact. This is the key to epistemology.

Epistemology: the study of knowledge and justified belief

An example of a justified belief would be that we exist, or so it would seem. And yet philosophers have been asking questions about proof of our existence at least since Aristotle 2,350 years ago. The following three quotations concern the notion that thinking is the essence of our existence. Read carefully.

But if life itself is good and pleasant... and if one who sees is conscious that he sees, one who hears that he hears, one who walks that he walks and similarly for all the other human activities there is a faculty that is conscious of their exercise, so that whenever we perceive, we are conscious that we perceive, and whenever we think, we are conscious that we think, and to be conscious that we are perceiving or thinking is to be conscious that we exist...

- Aristotle (from Nichomachian Ethics)

Once upon a time, I, Chuang Chou, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness as a butterfly, unaware that I was Chou. Soon I awaked, and there I was, veritably myself again. Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man. Between a man and a butterfly there is necessarily a distinction. The transition is called the transformation of material things.

- Chuang Chou (from The Zhuangzi)

If I doubt, I think, therefore I am. "But I have convinced myself that there is absolutely nothing in the world, no sky, no earth, no minds, no bodies. Does it now follow that I, too, do not exist? No. If I convinced myself of something [or thought anything at all], then I certainly existed. But there is a deceiver of supreme power and cunning who deliberately and constantly deceives me. In that case, I, too, undoubtedly exist, if he deceives me; and let him deceive me as much as he can, he will never bring it about that I am nothing, so long as I think that I am something. So, after considering everything very thoroughly, I must finally conclude that the proposition, I am, I exist, is necessarily true whenever it is put forward by me or conceived in my mind."

- René Descartes (Meditations on First Philosophy)

View the video below to explore the philosophical concepts in the film The Matrix.

The questions that concern the investigation into epistemology are often asked about theoretical situations. Philosophers often pose these scenarios to examine the validity of their theories on our ability to possess knowledge.

A famous example of a scenario exploring a question in epistemology is called the "Flying Man" or "Floating Man." This situation was first described by Ibn Sina.

If a person were created in a perfect state, but blind and suspended in the air but unable to perceive anything through his senses, would he be able to affirm the existence of his self?

Suspended in such a state, he cannot affirm the existence of his body because he is not empirically aware of it, thus the argument may be seen as affirming the independence of the soul from the body, a form of dualism. But in that state, he cannot doubt that his self exists because there is a subject that is thinking, thus the argument can be seen as an affirmation of the self-awareness of the soul and its substantiality.

This argument does raise an objection, which may also be leveled at Descartes: How do we know that the knowing subject is the self?

 

 

 

Self-Assessment and Practice

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