Knowing the Words
October 19th, 2008, search relatedRelated posts :: What Does the Knowing Brain Know? :: Knowing the Words :: *The Evidence for the Physical Universe is the Physical Universe.* :: Knowing the Words
The Experiento: Allegations of Demolition 1: Knowing the Words
Thinking vs Experiencing
>[Joe]: for ease of reference, I use ‘Experiento’ as the proper name of
>the sentence, ‘I experience; therefore, I am’.
>Jud: NO! You overreach yourself ontologically - *to think* is an
>volitional objective act - *to experience* is a subjective state. It is
>possible to simply lie somewhere, sense the pressure of whatever it is
>that supports your body and not *think* of anything - least of all
>think that you are experiencing something.
remember that, for Descartes, thinking is a name for the entire class of
subjective experiences including thinking (in the narrow sense),
doubting, understanding, affirming, denying, willing, imagining and
sensing. [see meditation 2].
even assuming that ‘thinking’ in the narrow sense of thinking rationally
and deliberately is an active ‘doing’, a volitional act, sensing as in
seeing or hearing is clearly passive.
that’s why I prefer ‘I experience’ over ‘I think’. ‘to experience’ is
delightfully middle voiced.
Neil Levy, does not acutally use the phrase ‘middle voice in his recent
JCS article, he accurately captured the essence of it when he wrote:
I realize, it strikes me, I recognize, I comprehend. These words, which
we use to refer to our coming to understand something or to appreciate
its significance, are poised between activity and passivity. [Levy,
Neil. (2005). Libet’s Impossible Demand. Journal of Consciousness
Studies. 12(12):67-76 @73]
Joe
–
Philosophy is, after all, done ultimately in the first person for the
first person. — H-N Castaneda
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http://what-am-i.net
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