Think of the self as a knife and thought as the act of cutting something.

The cutting cannot happen if the knife didn't exist in the first place.

Similarly, thought is impossible without the existence of a mind.

What do you understand by thinking, by being aware, by existing, by being self-conscious?

Sound common sense - the nemesis of serious philosophy - would seem to suggest that you can indeed lack awareness (e.g. dreamless sleep, anesthesia), at least temporarily, and still exist.

Further, why can't we say that we're aware even if the process of how this comes about remains mysterious? I may have misunderstood your point, but that seems similar to suggesting that a person who's completely ignorant about how their bodily mechanisms function can't possibly breathe, digest food, etc.

Finally, what or who is this 'I am', this self whose existence is in jeopardy here? Does it exist in the same way as a table or a tree? Is it a tangible thing whose existence can be pointed to as an object amongst others? If that's the case, then I'd say the self does not exist. Is it more like an activity than a thing?

I'm admittedly not extremely well-versed in these modern skeptical matters, but I am curious about the underlying assumptions which give rise to them in the first place. If they're seen as self-evident concepts given to experience, unworthy of serious consideration, then none of them IMO are as self-evident as the fact that you do exist, that you are in the sense that you stand in a relationship to what is, to being.

Thanks in advance.

You can not think about anything at all and still exist — intrapersona

Descartes said "I think, therefore I am", not "I am, therefore I think", so this claim seems misplaced.

how can you say you exist because you are aware if at the same time you can't understand how that awareness emerges from consciousness. Unless you know the validity of what self-awareness or consciousness is, you can't use it to infer you exist no matter how apt it feels. It is akin to the blind men and the elephant

In short, you may not exist at all.

You don't need to know how awareness emerges from consciousness for the argument to work. It's simple modus ponens:

1. If I'm aware then I exist
2. I'm aware
3. Therefore I exist

Of course, you can always take issue with 1 or 2, but I don't think that not knowing how awareness arises from consciousness is evidence against either.

In short, you may not exist at all. — Intrapersona

According to whom?

The parable of the blind men and the elephant is another thing altogether. It is about the tendency of pundits (philosophers) who cannot see the big picture and who theorise on the basis of partial knowledge. Blind men are sent to examine an elephant. The blind man who feels the tusk says the elephant is 'hard and sharp', the one who feels the ear says it's 'big and soft', and so on. They're both right, but neither is actually 'seeing the elephant'. That is the point of the parable.

(Nowadays what you would do is apply for a grant on either the 'big-and-soft' nature of everything, or the 'hard-and-polished' nature of everything, and set up competing theories of softness and hardness which battle it out in peer-reviewed journals as the 'theory of everything'.
Still without having seen the elephant!)

Meh! If I didn't exist they'd have to invent me!

First, I wouldn't say that the cogito employs some narrow sense of "think" so that simply being aware wouldn't be sufficient to count as thinking.

Secondly, "I am aware" isn't simply being aware; it's thinking even in a narrower sense of thinking.

Finally, I've always disagreed that the cogito implies anything ontologically other than the fact that phenomenal thought occurs, thus it must exist, whatever it turns out to be (a property of), exactly.

So no, not knowing or understanding something on a noumenal level isn't going to impact the cogito at all.

Also, we have to pretend that the "hard problem" is a problem in the first place, hard or not. ;-)

I don't see what the problem is. From the ground the earth looks flat, from orbit round, from far away a dimensionless point, and from the other side of the universe its as if it had never existed thanks to the Hubble Horizon. A context without any content and vice versa is a demonstrable contradiction, while any context and content will demonstrably transform into one another. I think therefore I am because sometimes I'm unconscious!

Awareness and knowledge are indivisible complimentary-opposites and you can't have either one without faith in the other.

Wittgenstein would assert Moore's 'Here is one hand' argument to radical skepticism. It goes like this:

Here is one hand,
And here is another.
There are at least two external objects in the world.
Therefore, an external world exists.

This commonsensical approach negates the need for exact definitions that constitute the entirety of facts that would be required to fulfill epistemological criteria required by skeptics to warrant the truth of a proposition that supposes the existence of consciousness or a conscious entity (notice that 'conscious' and 'entity' are practically synonymous by all means and purposes) own assertions about existing irrespective of whether such a conscious entity is an all-knowing God or a simple ant. You can reword it to suit your needs, like:

I know that I think because I have no grounds to doubt.
Therefore, I think.
I think asserts that I exist.
I think, therefore I am.

If one doesn't buy into P3, then if one really feels like it, they can assert solipsism; but, that still doesn't negate the fact that to think and existing are not mutually independent. Or rather, there are no grounds to assert otherwise unless you believe in p-zombies.

Descartes proves self existence from extreme skepticism.
He assumes that all he knows is subject to doubt including his own existence.

In order to even doubt that you exist requires that you do in fact exist.
That is to say that if you do not exist then your doubts would also be non-existent.
Therefore if you doubt your existence, you must exist.

This argument got watered downed into "cogito ergo sum."

The hard problem does not say that we can doubt without any existence so the hard problem does not challenge the Descartes method.

You see Descartes argues that the absence of existence would be the absence of doubt as well so that where there is doubt there must also be existence.

So we can be sure we do in fact exist, that is unless you want to argue that non-existent things can have doubt.

Yin-yang dynamics rule the universe indicating a recursive systems logic must apply to everything imaginable and be so simple a child can understand with everything revolving around what's missing from this picture. In other words, I am not unconscious, therefore I think. The content of the universe including any truths can be said to revolve around the void with a black hole merely providing one extreme example. It means consciousness and awareness would express the same self-organizing systems logic that everything else would and science would never be able to prove whether we have free will or not. Whether our lives are fated or we have free will or anything else would always remain context dependent with everything eventually turning out to be self-contradictory.

You can not think about anything at all and still exist — intrapersona

Only if you'd be a solipsist, but a solipsist does not publish.

Think of the self as a knife and thought as the act of cutting something.

The cutting cannot happen if the knife didn't exist in the first place.

Similarly, thought is impossible without the existence of a mind. — TheMadFool

That is perfectly sound and valid but it has nothing to do with my OP. My OP assumes this already and is dealing with how one can prove he exists apriori by the fact that he thinks. We already know we think and we already know we are dependant on a brain but that doesn't help the fact that we can't prove we exist by the fact that we are self-aware in the same light as you can't proof brains or anything else in the physical world exists just because you have sensory information about them.

Sound common sense - the nemesis of serious philosophy - would seem to suggest that you can indeed lack awareness (e.g. dreamless sleep, anesthesia), at least temporarily, and still exist. — Erik

But you are not aware of it, so therefor "you" don't exist but the body you inhabit does. I would go further in saying if you are not aware of the body then you can't know it exists at all.

When you sleep, you simply cease to be. You can't claim you arrive when you aren't aware of it, that is illogical.

Further, why can't we say that we're aware even if the process of how this comes about remains mysterious? I may have misunderstood your point, but that seems similar to suggesting that a person who's completely ignorant about how their bodily mechanisms function can't possibly breathe, digest food, etc. — Erik

That is a good point, but slightly misunderstood. I am trying to prove my bodily mechanisms exist. I can't prove they exist just by the fact that they function or even 'appear' to function... in the same way I can't prove my self-awareness validates the realness of my existing.

none of them IMO are as self-evident as the fact that you do exist, that you are in the sense that you stand in a relationship to what is, to being. — Erik

That is what makes it so irksome. Because it seems to appeal to common sense so much to say you exist but the fact is, as you say, there is no you that exists... just an awareness which you can't place ownership over... and leading from this, how do you prove that you are aware? Just by being aware? That doesn't cut it. How do you even know what awareness is? How can I guarantee I am experiencing something right now? Or you for that matter?

1. If I'm aware then I exist
2. I'm aware
3. Therefore I exist — Michael

Yes but that is a faulty second premise and makes it unsound but still valid. I am trying to say that you can't prove that you aware by the fact that you feel you are.

Descartes said "I think, therefore I am", not "I am, therefore I think", so this claim seems misplaced. — Michael

I know but I was saying "I think, therefore I am" is not quite correct because you don't have to think in order for you to be aware of your own existing. I think perhaps what he ment by "think" is awareness itself and not "hearing words in your head". Then my arguments lead on from that. So I don't feel it is misplaced for that reason.

According to whom? — Wayfarer

I am not a dictator... According to the reasoning supplied in my OP... :-O

I think you're crossing the line in your responses to the position of saying that nothing whatever can be known by anyone, in which case, discussion is pointless.

The parable of the blind men and the elephant is another thing altogether. — Wayfarer

Not at all. I was using it as a metaphor for how no one can "feel" the truth of what consciousness/self-awareness is and how we are all groping about in the dark to try and make sense it. You can't dispute that. It is relevant because my position is positing that you need evidence of what the full picture of the elephant is in order to call it an elephant. Likewise, you need a full picture of consciousness in order to prove it exists in the way we think it does.

I am really at a loss to see how you couldn't see that? It really is an elemental analogy.

I think you're crossing the line in your responses to the position of saying that nothing whatever can be known by anyone, in which case, discussion is pointless. — Wayfarer

Perhaps you are right. I am just trying to say that it feels like I exist because I feel I am self aware BUT trying to prove I exist just by the fact that I am aware is not rational.

I mean I don't doubt I am aware, which is what I think you are thinking I am doing.

I've always disagreed that the cogito implies anything ontologically other than the fact that phenomenal thought occurs, thus it must exist — Terrapin Station

Sorry, why must it exist? And where is your proof that phenomenal thought occurs? Is the proof in the awareness of the thoughts? Because that is what I am disputing.

I don't think you understand the purpose of the argument. It is simply that, in order to think, doubt, or say anything, there must be someone who thinks, doubts, and says. You can entertain the idea that you're a brain in a vat or that existence is a dream or hallucination, but you can't doubt that you're having that experience, even if the experience is a delusion.

in fact the argument was anticipated by Augustine, centuries previously:

But who will doubt that he lives, remembers, understands, wills, thinks, knows, and judges? For even if he doubts, he lives. If he doubts where his doubts come from, he remembers. If he doubts, he understands that he doubts. If he doubts, he wants to be certain. If he doubts, he thinks. If he doubts, he knows that he does not know. If he doubts, he judges that he ought not rashly to give assent. So whoever acquires a doubt from any source ought not to doubt any of these things whose non-existence would mean that he could not entertain doubt about anything."

(Augustine, On the Trinity 10.10.14 quoted in Richard Sorabji Self, 2006, p.219).

in order to think, doubt, or say anything, there must be someone who thinks, doubts, and says — Wayfarer

But we already no that that is dictated by the unconscious and the conscious mind is just an observer.

You can entertain the idea that you're a brain in a vat or that existence is a dream or hallucination, but you can't doubt that you're having that experience, even if the experience is a delusion. — Wayfarer

I already stated that I don't doubt that I have awareness of my experience. Did you miss that?

I am saying that I can't prove that my awareness exists just because it exists. That is circular reasoning.

It's not circular reasoning, it is called apodictic truth, i.e. a truth which it is not feasible to doubt. The fact that you're able to argue the case, defeats any argument you might wish to advance, because the fact that you can argue about it means that you exist.

Now, granted, in this case, it is feasible, although highly unlikely, that this thread has been created by a computer algorithm - so I can actually doubt whether this thread was actually generated by a person. But that concerns a different kind of claim to the one at issue.

So whoever acquires a doubt from any source ought not to doubt any of these things whose non-existence would mean that he could not entertain doubt about anything."

I agree with Augustine. If I didn't exist, I could not doubt anything. So in the same way perhaps I am not doubting at all and it just feels like I am because it feels like I exist even though I don't because there is no I. This is the crux of my argument, that you can't prove you exist just by the fact that you are self-aware. Like Augustine you might say to that, "if you didn't exist how could you have the feeling of self-awareness?" Again, perhaps I am not doubting at all and it just feels like I am because it feels like I exist even though I don't because there is no I.

It's not circular reasoning, it is called apodictic truth, i.e. a truth which it is not feasible to doubt. The fact that you're able to argue the case, defeats any argument you might wish to advance, because the fact that you can argue about it means that you exist. — Wayfarer

I am just going to swap some words around in that comment to say how flawed it sounds

"It's not circular reasoning, it is called absolute religious truth, i.e. a holy truth which it is not feasible to doubt. The fact that you're able to argue the case against god, defeats any argument you might wish to advance about god, because the fact that you can argue god existence means that he exists"

That is completely circular.

And for the record I don't doubt Apodictic truth exists, I just don't think the proof of consciousness via awareness alone forms part of it.

Well, what would? Hit me with an apodictic truth, and I'll see if I can doubt it.

incidentally, adding entirely new concepts to something you have quoted from another contributor is not 'swapping words around'.