Part 1 - Cogito, Ergo Sum
March 2019
Let’s start off by asking why wonder about Life, the universe and everything else?
Bertrand Russell answered in the following way:
"Philosophy is to be studied, not for the sake of any definite answers to its questions, since no definite answers can, as a rule, be known to be true, but rather for the sake of the questions themselves; because these questions enlarge our conception of what is possible, enrich our intellectual imagination and diminish the dogmatic assurance which closes the mind against speculation; but above all because, through the greatness of the universe which philosophy contemplates, the mind is also rendered great, and becomes capable of that union with the universe which constitutes its highest good."
Cogito, Ergo Sum
To begin I’d like to take you on a slight philosophical tangent about Rene Descartes.
René Descartes is famous for the Latin saying Cogito, ergo sum. It is usually translated into English as "I think, therefore I am". The phrase originally appeared in 1637 in French as je pense, donc je suis in Descartes’ Discourse on the Method. The concept is also sometimes known as “the cogito”.
However, I think Descartes is a couple of “I thinks” short. Descartes’ point is that he is thinking and therefore he must exist. But how does anyone know they are actually thinking at this moment or that what they are experiencing is reality. Let me give you some examples.
1) The Simulation theory – this is a theory that we are all kind of human battery hens in some vast experiment whereby our brains and bodies are hooked into a giant computer which is simulating reality for us. If you have seen The Matrix then you know what I mean. The energy from the people’s bodies is siphoned off – although if you see The Matrix then I think they would need more energy to run all the machines than could be supplied by the human bodies and it doesn’t really say what the energy is being siphoned off for, however, the premise is that no one really knows what is happening and they all think their world is real.
2) I am sure you have all had dreams. The dreams can seem vivid and real at the time. So how do you know that you are not dreaming this now? We could all be characters that you know in your waking life? How do you know if you have not just dreamed up this situation and the rest of us don’t exist? Or how do you know if you are not all imaginary characters in my dream and none of you really exist?
3) How do you know you are not in a coma and are just re-living your life? A bit like the cop show a few years back “Life on Mars” where (spoiler alert) the policeman in the show goes back to the 1970s.
4) How do you know you haven’t been captured by aliens? At this very moment you could be strapped to a table in the mother ship orbiting about the earth. They could have a special extra-terrestrial memory extractor helmet on you which is displaying all your memories on a big screen and this is just where you have gotten up to so far.
The point is that you can’t know those things so I suggest that Descartes needs to be tweaked a little. I suggest that the cogito becomes I think I think therefore I think I am - Cogito, cogito ergo cogito sum.
However, and there is always a big however and this is the first of many, even though I cannot disprove any of these things I do not go around my daily life thinking or believing I am an imaginary character in someone else’s dream or that the aliens have got me.
As far as I am concerned this is real - I am me, you are you and this is now and it is on that basis that I will proceed.
So, having established from our little philosophical foray that we believe we are here, let’s move on to Part 2 – What’s the matter?