SELF AND BEYOND

So this joke came up in a conversation yesterday. On Descartes' famous argument, Cogito Ergo Sum, that is, ‘I think, therefore, I am’.

Descartes walks into a bar. The bartender walks up to him and says, "Would you care for a drink?" Descartes replies, "I think not," and disappears!!!

Joke aside, there are obvious problems with this argument. Does it really solve the problem of proving one's existence, philosophically speaking that is? Let me step back for a moment and quickly introduce Descartes' philosophical method, known as the Cartesian Method, which he meant to use in meta-physics (meaning: beyond physics), to establish a sound basis of knowledge/truth and to prove the existence of things, including those that are beyond matter, such as the existence of God and Soul.

Cartesian Method starts from a 'methodical doubt' about everything you previously believed in, including the laws of science, mathematical principles, and moral principles, even the belief (yaqeen) in your own existence. This method demands that you start from zero. Starting off at this point of nothing-ness, Descartes sought to prove his own existence by arguing that he knows for sure that he thinks. Even when he is in doubt, he is thinking. And an existence is required to do this thinking. Therefore, he must exist.

The obvious problem with Descartes' argument is that he assumes his own existence in the premise, that is, in the very first proposition of his argument. Let me quote a passage here from Shaheed Baqir Sadr's wonderful book, Our Philosophy (here), where Sadr makes a compelling critique of this argument, using Ibn Sina's (Avicenna) work.

"To begin with, we must know that the fundamental principle on which Descartes based his doctrine and philosophical certitude, 'I think, therefore, I exist', was criticized in Islamic philosophy a few centuries prior to Descartes' time. Ash-Shaykh ar-Ra'is, Ibn Sina, presented it and criticized it as being unfit as a method of scientific evidence for the existence of the human thinker himself.

A human being cannot prove his existence by means of his thought. This is so, because if by saying, 'I think, therefore, l exist', he wishes to prove his existence by means of his specific thought only, then he proves his specific existence at the outset and admits his existence in the very first phrase.

If, on the other hand, he wishes to make the absolute thought as an evidence of his existence, he is at fault, because an absolute thought asserts the existence of an absolute thinker, not a specific thinker.

Thus, the specific existence of every thinker must be known to him in a primary manner, regardless of any considerations, including his doubt and his thought."

Source: Our Philosophy by Baqir Sadr. Trans. Shams C. Inati. Part I, Chap 2 "The Value of Knowledge."

Later, Shaheed Sadr argues that even within the limitations of his logic of Methodical Doubt, Descartes couldn't have made a valid connection between his thought and his existence, without already believing in causality. That is, the simple and most fundamental principle that says that you need a cause to produce an effect. For the thinking (effect) to happen, you need a cause (a thinking being), Descartes assumed. But how could he take this principle for granted, if he is starting off at point zero, at nothing-ness? Hence, Shaheed Sadr argues that his Cartesian Method cannot take him a single step beyond this nothing-ness, unless he starts off with believing in a priori knowledge or self-evident truth of some fundamental principles.

Although a failed epistemology in itself, the Cartesian Method, more specifically the ‘methodical doubt,’ has inspired the thinking of many among the later theorists, not only in the fields of metaphysics and moral philosophy but also in philosophy of science, scientific research method, and even social sciences and humanities. The ‘methodical doubt’ leads to a kind of skepticism, or agnosticism if you will, if it remains unresolved. Of course, the politics of the time, that is, the 'Dark Ages' preceding the 'enlightenment movement', in which the Church suppressed free thinking and scientific knowledge, also had its influence on the preference for this mode of thinking (see Shaheed Mutahhari's related article(s) here on the causes of materialism in the west). I will write more on this and also quote a few passages from Our Philosophy in the following posts.

Here I want to emphasize on the following point: The theory of knowledge is at the roots of some of the very fundamental questions that we ask about our existence: a) Who am I? b) How do I see the world around me? c) What is the meaning of life? In other words, these questions refer to the knowledge of self, of the world, its Creator, the meaning and purpose of life, how should we interact with each other, what is the best social system to organize our societies, on what principles.

Shaheed Sadr recognizes the importance of theory of knowledge in Our Philosophy. His introduction entitled, “The Social Issue”, tells the reader that he is interested in addressing the social problems of society, but which, he thinks, cannot be solved in a meaningful manner without solving the problem of knowledge. Shaheed Sadr intended to solve this in Our Philosophy, which was meant to be the first of (at least) three books series, the second of which was Our Economics. Unfortunately, due to Saddam Hussein’s persecution and circumstances of the time Shaheed Sadr was never able to publish the third one, Our Society.

An important implication to consider is this: If Cartesian Method of Doubt or Hume’s Empiricist Epistemology or Dialectical Materialism (all of these are discussed/criticized by Shaheed Sadr in the same book) become the basis of our scientific and philosophical knowledge, they have their effects in shaping our social reality in a certain manner (which is what we are seeing today, as in, for e.g., the secular vs. religious divide in the scientific outlook and moral reasoning as seen in our textbooks. More on this in some post later on, inshallah).

The place to start therefore would be to develop alternative basis of knowledge, to discover such basis within our Islamic tradition and in benefiting from the philosophies of other civilizations. It would be a knowledge base that could effectively bridge the modern divides between secular and religious, rational and emotional, material and spiritual, and so on. Mulla Sadra and Allama Tabatabai's works could be seen as representatives of the tradition of Irfan, which seeks to bring together philosophy and spiritual experiences in the quest for knowledge and truth. Mulla Sadra and Allama Tabatabai's works could be seen as representatives of this tradition. Allama Tabatabai is the author of the famous Al-Mizan, a wonderful exegesis of the Quran, and the book 'Usool Falsifae va Ravish-e-Realism' (The Principles of Philosophy and the Method of Realism). Shaheed Mutahhari, who was Allama Tabatabai's student, later added his hashiyeh or notes to this book.

Both Shaheed Sadr and Shaheed Mutahhari presented a Rational/Realistic theory of knowledge, formulated in opposition to an idealistic/fatalistic worldview on the one hand and a purely materialistic worldview on the other. Their theory of knowledge informed their analysis of many philosophical as well as social problems, as seen in, for example, their works on Human Free Will, on Hamasa (struggle for social justice) and Irfan, and on History and Social Change. Mutahhari: 'Man and His Destiny', 'Man and Universe', and Sadr: 'Trends of History in Quran', on the Realistic worldview, see Part Two, Chap One of Our Philosophy.