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标题: "基点" [打印本页]

作者: xw     时间: 2021-2-3 22:23     标题: "基点"

日没西山阿
旋东升,环球代序
这明显的事实
都会弄颠倒

笛卡尔陷入沉思
陈旧的观念
感觉,情理与常识
全不可以凭信

全部摒弃 - 构筑
全新工事
“我思,故我在”
大厦需立基

顽固如阿基米德点
用自我,理性
支撑起地球,
宇宙,全能上帝

12/23/18

===
读笛卡尔的第一哲学沉思,在纳闷日绕地到底是地绕日的错觉后走向彻底的怀疑主义
一生勤思,重立西方理性哲学,成为西方现代哲学之父。再有他创立了解析几何的坐
标系,为牛顿数理垫立了坚厚的肩膀。吟一首小诗感赞之下。

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作者: 廖康     时间: 2021-2-28 14:23
久违了,这几年在写个英文长篇。象罔更是少见,近年可好?贴一篇相关的旧文凑热闹:

庄周梦蝶与“我思,故我在”

廖康


庄周梦蝶后醒来,不知自己身在何处。他问自己:究竟是我做梦化蝶了,还是我在蝴蝶的梦中?很多人都觉得这个问题很傻,答案很明显嘛,当然是他做梦化蝶了!其实这个问题并不像它表面看上去那么简单,而是一个非常重要、非常基本的哲学问题。问题的实质就是:我怎么知道我的存在是真实的?既然我可以梦到自己化为蝴蝶,在梦中我也觉得很真实,为什么蝴蝶不可能梦到我呢?我怎么才能知道我不是蝴蝶梦中的幻影?也许我们都是蝴蝶梦中的幻影,我怎么知道不是呢?很多人觉得这也太绕弯了,简直是痴人说梦,不再深入思考。也许是我们的祖先不爱好逻辑思辨,也许是我孤陋寡闻,我不知道有谁曾严肃地回答过庄子的问题。据我所知,关于如何才能知道自身存在这个问题,要直到将近两千年后,才在法国,由笛卡尔(Rene Descartes,1596-1650)做出了回答。

“我思,故我在”大概是最常为人引用的西哲名言之一,大概也是最常为人误解的引语。我最初接触哲学时,就误解了。因为我读到的书误解了笛卡尔的话,我接触到的哲学老师也误解了。以前,在中国,这句话通常被解释为:我思想,所以我才存在。接着就是对主观唯心主义的批判,说笛卡尔本末倒置了,应该是:我存在,所以我思想。存在先于意识嘛,没有人,哪儿来的思想?那时我少不更事,也没有什么书看,得到的只是一家之言,当然觉得我们的唯物主义哲学家说得对了。但心中总还是有那么一丝疑虑:人家笛卡尔好歹也是西方公认的现代哲学之父,他怎么会那么傻?

后来念了书,才知道笛卡尔在说什么。“我思,故我在”是他在一六三七年发表的《方法论》中的名言,原话为法文:“Je pense, donc je suis.”后来译为拉丁文:Cogito, ergo sum,广为流传。 他这句话又源于略长的说法:Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum. “我疑,故我思,故我在。”他为什么怀疑呢?与庄子不同,笛卡尔不是怀疑他自己究竟是人还是蝴蝶。他的怀疑更根本,他怀疑自己是否真正存在。然而,导致他怀疑的不是梦,而是魔鬼,或者说是当时流行的怀疑论:我们自以为的存在,也许并不真实,也许只是魔鬼让我们产生的幻觉。如果连我们自身的存在都不能确定,那世上的万物,包括我们信仰的上帝,也可能不存在,也靠不住了。

笛卡尔需要一块基石,存在的基石,宇宙的基石,哲学的基石,认识万物的基石。他需要一个明确无误、不言而喻、无需证明、确凿无疑的前提。他说:“阿基米德要求给他一个支点,他便能够移动整个地球;我也仅仅需要找到一个确定无疑的东西,无论它多么渺小,我就可以大有作为。”他终于找到了,并在《方法论》第四章中奠定了这块基石。他由怀疑到思考,终于领悟了,只要我在思考,就表明我存在,这是最简单明了,最清晰无误的方法,表明我的确存在。我听到的话语可能有误,我看见的影像可能是假的,我闻见的香味也许是臭气,我摸到的物体也许是虚幻的,有人可以说我并不存在,说我是魔鬼制造的影子……但是当我思想的时候,我便知道我存在了。

为什么呢?因为我既然能够怀疑,就说明我已经存在了。虽然我可以怀疑其它一切事物的存在,但我既然在思想,这思想的主体,也就是我自己,就必然存在。幻影是不会思想的,不存在的人是不会思想的。思考,就是人的本质。心智,就是人与其它动物的区别。猫看到镜子里自己的影像未必知道那是什么;但是人,无需任何工具,只要动动脑筋,就知道自己存在了。“我思,故我在”的含义并不是:由于我思考,所以我存在。这句名言的意思是:我思考,从而知道我存在。我自身的存在确定了,才能够确信我感知的万物是真实的。有了这块基石,我们才对这世界的真实性有了把握,我们才有了认识论和现代哲学。

当然,笛卡尔并不是在直接回答庄子的问题。也许,他根本不知道庄子是谁。但在天国,这两位哲人相遇时,如果还用口舌交流,大概会有如下的对话:
庄子:“我梦,疑我在。”
笛卡尔:“我思,故我在。”
他们定然抚掌大笑,如果他们还有手掌。
那时,他们也许只是灵魂,只是思维,已无形体,如果真有天国。

果真如此,我不在,岂不是照样思?更现实一点,将来,如果人脑可以被扫描成图象,思维可以像软件那样被全真复制,下载到计算机里,“我思”在没有肉身的情况下也可以产生,那我还在吗?如果在,又有那么多复制件,到底谁是“我”呢?肉身的“我”与电脑中同样能思维,也许更善于思维的“我”, 到底谁更真实?我们甚至还可能造出具有人工智能的机器人,它是否也会有自我意识?到那时,它是否也会提出庄子蝴蝶梦的问题?四百年前笛卡尔做出的回答,可能又会面临严重的挑战。

2007年11月22日
作者: xw     时间: 2021-3-5 18:41
廖康好!这些年辛苦周折,总算熬出来了。这一贴还真呼应,我也在是在写一小篇笛卡尔交差作文之余拼凑出来几句。杜撰一首诗就比文章轻易多了。刚刚回翻了当年咖啡讨论那一线,一来已是十四年了。一切还好?
作者: xw     时间: 2021-3-5 18:43
The Great Project

        The passage which I will write my essay on is taken from Descartes’ Meditation on First Philosophy No.1, section 9 the ‘Cartesian doubt.’ “Having no answer to these arguments, I am driven back to the position that doubts can properly be raised about any of my former beliefs. I don’t reach this conclusion in a flippant or casual manner, but on the basis of powerful and well thought-out reasons” (AT VII 21.23). It seems that Descartes finally turned himself finally into a nihilist in despair. Later in this meditation, he explains honestly that he has to conquer the habit of lazily assenting to the habitual customs, therefore, “I had better switch right around and pretend (for a while) that these former opinions of mine are utterly false and imaginary.” Although Descartes comes off as a skeptic, he is actually fighting to it until he has something solid like Archimedes’ firm point, showing that we can know some for certain.
Descartes opens the first Meditation with his personal reflection on his life project. He claims that he will rely on the rigorous use of his own faculty of reason, accepting nothing as true that cannot be verified from within his own conscious mind. Then he starts the “quest for certainty,” rebutting the skeptic. He determines to start his grand project as “once in life everything out to be completely overturned, and out to be completely rebuilt from the first foundations.” The upper excerpt acts as “clear the way” preamble to the seeking of a new foundation for the future;
Physics, Astronomy, Medicine, and all other sciences dealing with things that have complex structures are doubtful; while arithmetic, geometry and other studies of the simplest and most general things – whether they really exist in nature or not – contain something certain and indubitable.”
As a Math Genius, Descartes likes to rely on logic and mathematics to construct his complete new philosophical edifice.       
In this meditation, all the reasons are given as to why he doubts everything, especially the material things. Although it is not clear that this doubt is useful, still it frees us of all prejudices and paves a rational path leading the mind away from the senses. Finally, it’s impossible to doubt further those things that shall be true. The key step, as is well-known, lies in the role played by the evil genius. Descartes points out that however powerful this evil demon is, while he is being deceived, it is at least true that he exists. “I am, I exist,” whenever he thinks he asserts it. Doubts are calmed, and the philosopher stone is found. With this, he wants “to build anything firm and lasting in the science” - his once-in-a-life project.
Traditional meditation practice, especially the Eastern ways start with detachment. This mirrors Descartes’ philosophical catharsis, using his mind power to doubt and examine, moving from sensation to mind, to science and mathematics, to theology. He begins by rejecting the commonsense epistemological principles on which everything he formerly believed rested. Like a lunatic, he presents himself in despair on the endeavoring path, reflecting for a revolutionary change. He will recognize the reflexive, and corrective power of the will, discover the law of reduction as a principle to validate arguments. Ascending from psychology to ontology, he will reconstruct the substantial world and knowledge within the Self and the God.
I appreciate and agree with his grand work of rebuilding the foundations for the modern philosophy, mathematics, and sciences. For a longtime the Western science (2nd century BC -16th century AD) was stagnant due to the inability of reasoning, to the confused, and messed up knowledge systems. Here I will put Aristotle's naturalist approach and his overly-relying upon common sense as the bellwether, with perhaps some Christian clichés. The world needs to rekindle Plato's rational sense again. Descartes' general approach to knowledge and truth inherited more from Pythagoras, Plato. Newton claimed that “What Descartes did was a good step…If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.” Descartes' goals are very reasonable, brave, and self-confident. He is the first man of high philosophic capacity whose outlook is profoundly affected by the new physics and astronomy. It is feasible that natural laws and knowledges need to be systematized based on math and logic. As an explorer, he communicates his discoveries in a passionate, amateur way, but of high quality.
However, some may not accept his extreme ways of seasoning. Why do philosophers like to go crazy? This is also showed in another philosopher, David Hume - his later opponent, a pure empiricist. From my scientific background and personal experience, pure math and the theoretic physics are usually extreme. The strong power of the truth and mind push the discoverers not well-balance in the society. However, in abstract thinking, intellectual memory is different from perceptual memory, that pure science and math are independent of common sense. The law of noncontradiction in math and logics, the simple vivid truth and beautiful formula are independent of the context of application. Descartes was taught the geocentric model of the Solar system by Jesuit school; he was keenly aware of the observations Galileo made that conflicted the geo-centric in favor of the helio-centric. If people could be wrong about something as simple as the Sun rising and setting, what else could they be sure about?
The move from sensation, perceptions to the physical world, to physics, to math, then to logic and, finally, to theology is a movement from confusion to precision and clarity. Following a typical Platonic way of abstraction, Descartes’ project is gaining power, stable truths, and knowledge. He set up his mind through a skeptical beginning has been affected by the mind power of a free will, whose operations are beyond understanding. As a pioneer and noble amateur, Descartes has a dualism between contemporary science and traditional scholasticism. This led him into inconsistencies, but more importantly it made him richer in fruitful ideas than any others, embracing both schools of thinking.
Descartes is considered the father of modern philosophy. This is justifiable due to firstly, his break with the Aristotelian tradition prevalent at his time; and secondly, to his works on the new mechanistic sciences. He addressed the first issue via his method of doubt. His insistence on the beauty of pure math, simple model, natural laws harmonized like music continues the effort from Pythagoras, Archimedes, Galileo, and leads to Newton, Gauss, Einstein, and on. As a rationalist thinker, he accomplished his life project. Also, his great invention of the cartesian coordination system with analytic math, his basic scientific research, especially his rational methods and mediations paved the road for the later comings. The great project he built with methods and meditations benefit mankind a lot; even up to now it is widely practiced in all the fields of natural sciences and extended to the model of social sciences.




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