So I have learned that the belief “I think. Therefore I am” is heretical because it assumes man only exists if he is thinking, which can lead to relativism. JPII is one of the people who condemn this philosophy.
Don’t get confused with what JPII Says about modern philosophy mainly surrounding what started under Descartes. They rejected many of the metaphysical realities, mainly argued by Aristotle and latter by many other people but most importantly Aquinas. These philosophers make many big errors, and most of them stem from their starting point. Practically we can’t trust anything the world is. Hume thinks we are just in a movie theater and nothing we actually touch, see, hear, taste, etc. actually exists. We are deceived by what we see. Kant is very much the same way, pretty much saying our minds inform what we are seeing. I’m seeing a computer screen, not because what is actually out there is a computer screen, rather my mind is informing that reality and I’m in a sense telling myself that it is a computer screen.
But to the point you brought up.
This was actually used by Aquinas to prove why we must exist. There is nothing heretical about this argument, it is basic a posteriori (I think) argument to prove why we can’t be so deceived that we don’t even exist. Descartes asked the question if God is the great deceiver, can I know anything for certain. He logically deduces that because I think, therefore I exist. Nothing can deceive me of this, this shows that we do exist if we are thinking. He is in no way saying that only if we think we exist. Rather it is impossible for me to be deceived that I exist when I really don’t exist, if I think.
It appears there are even some non-Christian philosophers that don’t agree with this belief.
Be very careful with this, most of these guys are pure skeptics. It logically follows that if I think therefore I’m existing. You don’t have to presume that you are a thinking being, by the very fact you are thinking proves you are a thinking thing.
I’ll put it this way
I’m a being that thinks because I experience myself thinking.
Descartes takes this very basic reality, and follows it to it’s logical conclusion
because I’m a being that thinks I must exist, because if I didn’t exist than it is impossible for me to think.
They will say something like:
----“He is assuming there is an ‘I’”,
----“He is assuming that he knows what thinking is”,
They rely more on: "Thinking exists. Therefore thinking is"
that is not really that big of a jump as you are making it out to be.
I experience myself thinking, therefore I’m a thinking thing. What you said is just a redundant statement and isn’t really what is going on there. To reject descartes argument you have to be a pure skeptic, which you don’t want to be.
The Catholic belief seems to be “I am. Therefore I think.”, this implies that we need to exist before we can think.
that doesn’t logically follow at all. A dog is, but does it think? It isn’t logically necessitated.
I think I’ll give you a chance to think this over, before I get into how to argue against Kant Descartes and Hume. I have to review as well.
The main problem with these thinkers is not Descartes argument, rather it is where it leads them to. Descartes main problem is that he doesn’t trust our own perception of reality, he never fully disproves why it is wrong to think that we are being deceived by reality. Kant and Hume and many thinkers after this, think this way.
That apple I’m eating is really an apple, my mind isn’t playing tricks on me to make me think it isn’t
