"I Exist" in the Second Meditation
The following is an essay I wrote for class. To avoid plagiarism, I will not be putting up the prompt, just my personal findings. There were footnotes as well, but they don't show up in a copy-paste edit. “I Exist” In The Second Meditation Descartes argues that “I exist” is necessarily true. He writes, “...if I convinced myself of something then I certainly existed.” Being convinced of something implies there is someone real to be convinced. If there was no person existing to be convinced, then the thoughts don’t exist for us to be considering. But they are being considered, so there is a person existing. Descartes formulates the argument in a modus ponens, but can also be understood in the modus tollens way that I gave as they are materially equivalent. The conclusion that “I exist” is significant in the Meditation because it comes in the context of a severe skepticism. Skepticism in this sense is not the rejection of beliefs as actually being false, but only that we do...