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Single Idea 7112
[filed under theme 11. Knowledge Aims / B. Certain Knowledge / 5. Cogito Critique
]
Full Idea
We must remember that all authors who have described the Cogito have presented it as a reflective operation, i.e. as second-order. This Cogito is performed by a consciousness directed towards consciousness, which takes consciousness as its object.
Gist of Idea
The Cogito depends on a second-order experience, of being conscious of consciousness
Source
Jean-Paul Sartre (Transcendence of the Ego [1937], I (B))
Book Ref
Sartre,Jean-Paul: 'The Transcendence of the Ego' [Routledge 2004], p.10
A Reaction
Sartre is raising the nice question of whether the Cogito still works for first-order consciousness, which attends totally to external objects. He claims that it doesn't. Contrast Russell, who says (Idea 5380) that it only works when it is first-order!
Related Idea
Idea 5380
In perceiving the sun, I am aware of sun sense-data, and of the perceiver of the data [Russell]
The
57 ideas
from Jean-Paul Sartre
22232
|
Authenticity is taking responsibility for a situation, with all its risks and emotions
[Sartre]
|
20760
|
Sincerity is not authenticity, because it only commits to one particular identity
[Sartre, by Aho]
|
22228
|
Sartre's freedom is not for whimsical action, but taking responsibility for our own values
[Sartre, by Daigle]
|
22227
|
For Sartre there is only being for-itself, or being in-itself (which is beyond experience)
[Sartre, by Daigle]
|
6151
|
Sartre says consciousness is just directedness towards external objects
[Sartre, by Rowlands]
|
6164
|
Sartre rejects mental content, and the idea that the mind has hidden inner features
[Sartre, by Rowlands]
|
7074
|
Man is a useless passion
[Sartre]
|
20743
|
Appearances do not hide the essence; appearances are the essence
[Sartre]
|
22233
|
Love is the demand to be loved
[Sartre]
|
6687
|
Man is the desire to be God
[Sartre]
|
20755
|
Fear concerns the world, but 'anguish' comes from confronting my self
[Sartre]
|
22231
|
We flee from the anguish of freedom by seeing ourselves objectively, as determined
[Sartre]
|
21240
|
The truth about events always comes from the oppressed and disadvantaged
[Sartre, by Bakewell]
|
6868
|
'Existence precedes essence' means we have no pre-existing self, but create it through existence
[Sartre, by Le Poidevin]
|
3842
|
Existence before essence (or begin with the subjective)
[Sartre]
|
3844
|
Existentialism says man is whatever he makes of himself
[Sartre]
|
3843
|
There is no human nature
[Sartre]
|
20764
|
In becoming what we want to be we create what we think man ought to be
[Sartre]
|
20762
|
There are no values to justify us, and no excuses
[Sartre]
|
20754
|
It is dishonest to offer passions as an excuse
[Sartre]
|
20763
|
When my personal freedom becomes involved, I must want freedom for everyone else
[Sartre]
|
3845
|
Without God there is no intelligibility or value
[Sartre]
|
3846
|
Man IS freedom
[Sartre]
|
22229
|
Existentialists says that cowards and heroes make themselves
[Sartre]
|
6571
|
When a man must choose between his mother and the Resistance, no theory can help
[Sartre, by Fogelin]
|
3847
|
Man is nothing else but the sum of his actions
[Sartre]
|
3848
|
Cowards are responsible for their cowardice
[Sartre]
|
3851
|
If I do not choose, that is still a choice
[Sartre]
|
3852
|
If values depend on us, freedom is the foundation of all values
[Sartre]
|
20491
|
States have a monopoly of legitimate violence
[Sartre, by Wolff,J]
|
24016
|
Consciousness always transcends itself
[Sartre]
|
24013
|
An emotion and its object form a unity, so emotion is a mode of apprehension
[Sartre]
|
24017
|
Emotion is one of our modes of understanding our Being-in-the-World
[Sartre]
|
24014
|
Emotions are a sort of bodily incantation which brings a magic to the world
[Sartre]
|
24015
|
Emotions makes us believe in and live in a new world
[Sartre]
|
22226
|
Since we are a consciousness, Sartre entirely rejected the unconscious mind
[Sartre, by Daigle]
|
7106
|
The Ego is not formally or materially part of consciousness, but is outside in the world
[Sartre]
|
7125
|
A consciousness can conceive of no other consciousness than itself
[Sartre]
|
7107
|
Intentionality defines, transcends and unites consciousness
[Sartre]
|
7109
|
If you think of '2+2=4' as the content of thought, the self must be united transcendentally
[Sartre]
|
7111
|
Consciousness exists as consciousness of itself
[Sartre]
|
7108
|
The eternal truth of 2+2=4 is what gives unity to the mind which regularly thinks it
[Sartre]
|
7110
|
If the 'I' is transcendental, it unnecessarily splits consciousness in two
[Sartre]
|
7115
|
Maybe it is the act of reflection that brings 'me' into existence
[Sartre]
|
7116
|
When we are unreflective (as when chasing a tram) there is no 'I'
[Sartre]
|
7117
|
How could two I's, the reflective and the reflected, communicate with each other?
[Sartre]
|
7113
|
Phenomenology assumes that all consciousness is of something
[Sartre]
|
7114
|
The consciousness that says 'I think' is not the consciousness that thinks
[Sartre]
|
7112
|
The Cogito depends on a second-order experience, of being conscious of consciousness
[Sartre]
|
7119
|
Is the Cogito reporting an immediate experience of doubting, or the whole enterprise of doubting?
[Sartre]
|
7124
|
The Ego never appears except when we are not looking for it
[Sartre]
|
7122
|
We can never, even in principle, grasp other minds, because the Ego is self-conceiving
[Sartre]
|
7123
|
Knowing yourself requires an exterior viewpoint, which is necessarily false
[Sartre]
|
7120
|
It is theoretically possible that the Ego consists entirely of false memories
[Sartre]
|
7121
|
The Ego only appears to reflection, so it is cut off from the World
[Sartre]
|
22225
|
My ego is more intimate to me, but not more certain than other egos
[Sartre]
|
22230
|
Sartre gradually realised that freedom is curtailed by the weight of situation
[Sartre, by Daigle]
|