back to ideas for this text


Single Idea 13003

[from 'New Essays on Human Understanding' by Gottfried Leibniz, in 11. Knowledge Aims / B. Certain Knowledge / 5. Cogito Critique ]

Full Idea

To say 'I think therefore I am' is not really to prove existence from thought, since 'to think' and 'to be thinking' are one and the same, and to say 'I am thinking' [je suis pensant] is already to say 'I am' [je suis].

Gist of Idea

The Cogito doesn't prove existence, because 'I am thinking' already includes 'I am'

Source

Gottfried Leibniz (New Essays on Human Understanding [1704], 4.07)

Book Reference

Leibniz,Gottfried: 'New Essays on Human Understanding', ed/tr. Remnant/Bennett [CUP 1996], p.411


A Reaction

This is the objection which was offered by A.J. Ayer, and I take it to the one of the two principle objections to the Cogito (i.e. that it may be a tautology), along with the objection about the assumption of the continuity of the same thinker.