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A Quick Question November 25, 2007

Recently, I’ve been in a war with myself, and some of those around me; not a physical war, but you could consider it a spiritual one. This war doesn’t exist outside the bounds of it’s battles, there is no downtime, because if there isn’t a battle, the war doesn’t exist. This war is one of our existence.

Now, it’s not fighting for our existence against some other-worldly being, but it’s a war to prove our existence, and it’s funneled around some questions that can make you think.

1. If you were born without senses (i.e. touch, smell, sight, taste, and hearing) then how would you find the grounds to prove you exist?

Seems like a simple enough question, you could use the classic statement by Rene Descartes; “I think, therefore I am.” which was used as his grounds of his existence, to which he moved on to solve this and that and become the “father of modern philosophy”.
Descartes’ premise for this search for a proof of existence began with his belief that the senses lied to you, and therefore could not be trusted. This works well with a person who has no senses, because it leaves no way for them to lie to you, it also however gives their non-existence new meaning, perhaps them not-lying to you is itself an oxymoron, and is a lie of it’s own.
Next we come to Descartes’ firm belief that he does indeed “think”. Now, of the people I have asked, and most likely of you too, everybody thinks in a language, generally their primary language of use, for example, as an English speaker, when I think to myself, I think in English, whereas a fried who speaks Chinese in his personal life is inclined to think mostly in Mandarin. This leaves way to wondering if it is possible to think, if you have gained no language skills. That is to say, since language depends on the experiences of your life, especially the auditory components, if you never experienced anything (through lack of senses from birth) can you think? And through connection, can you justify an existence?

My next all-seeing question, comes from the first and is as follows:

2. If you were to lose your senses after having established them previously (through age) how would you now justify your existence?

Most commonly, the justification I get for this would be “you don’t” a wholly pittyful excuse for avoiding the question, and avoiding my incessant moaning about life. I do, however, feel a need that this is answered, for if you can’t experience anything, what justifies your purpose, and existence? Descartes’ basis of “I think therefore I am” now fits in quite well so this part of my question is very closely linked to answering the first, and when considered by itself, seems wholly useless. Nonetheless, it’s useful to bring up the assumption that after a prolonged period of time, we still experience thought. If for instance, there is no need for something, we can forget of it, take a physical trait for example, tails. According to the Darwinian theory of evolution, and the removal of uneeded “wind-dings” our bodies created but no longer have a use for, our tails eventually were dismissed; as a species, there was no longer a need, so we could do without them. The same may fit along with though, if you have no experiences, or reason to think, then who is to say that thought is needed? And, if you give up on the need for thought, and stop thinking all together, then by Descartes’ reasoning, you may not exist, for you are missing a vital part of his thesis.

Lastly my questions end with a final one, that again follows:

3. If our senses can be removed, or deceive us, and that a single senses can’t be wholly experienced with the other senses we are capable of, how do we know if we have lost a sense that has never been acquired in the first place?

That is to say, if you never had a sense of sight, how would you know you don’t have it? People could tell you about it yes, or you might perceive another person’s reaction, but that still won’t give you full sense of knowing you lost a sense. To give an example, someone who dosen’t like tacos, could be told that they “don’t know what they’re missing” but could that be perceived as you not having a 6th sense that is solely used to experience tacos? Most likely not, and this does a fairly sound job of giving an example about “incomplete perception” as I have called it.

Hopefully, one day, I can stop troubling myself and get to think of something else, like whether or not it’s really worth it to eat taco’s, but for now, I can continue to ask myself the question of whether or not we can ever justify our existence.