Cogito Ergo Sum is Bunk

The ResolutionMy opponent doesn't seem to understand what the resolution of this debate means. He insists that it falls to me to prove "we can have reasonable doubt of our own existence", but the resolution of this debate, which both parties agreed to, clearly says, "The argument "I think, therefore I am" fails to prove its conclusion." I have shown conclusively that it does, but rather than contend this fact, Con has taken it upon himself to argue for a different resolution all together. For the record, it is not my burden to build a ground-up argument denying that we can prove our own existence to ourselves. My job is to show that, as the resolution clearly states, "I think" fails to prove the conclusion "I am". It may very well be possible to prove your own existence, but "I think" does not and can not lead to the conclusion "Therefore I am". When it comes to a debate, the resolution defines the conditions for which you win or lose, not whatever Con feels like it ought to be in a given round. You cannot re-define the parameters of a debate ex post-facto just because you're losing. It's ironic that Con insists I haven't dealt with the argument directly, when his entire effort is to circumvent this debate's resolution and substitute his own. Dropped ArgumentsThere are no dropped arguments on my end. Oddly enough, the quotes Con provides of himself as evidence of arguments I've ignored are actually quotes I used and directly responded to just one round above. I responded to all of them, but my response was usually showing that the quoted argument was a non-sequitur and therefore irrelevant to this debate's resolution. By "Pro didn't respond to this argument", what Con really means is "Pro didn't grant legitimacy to this argument." These are two very different things. I responded to all of Con's arguments, he just doesn't like that my responses didn't acknowledge his arguments as relevant and/or threatening to my case -- because they weren't. Kierkegaard Con claims that Kierkegaard backs him up on the purpose of the argument "Cogito ergo sum", but upon further investigation, this is yet another thing Con is sorely wrong on. Firstly, he provides no evidence of his claim (yet again). He sites a page from a book in his sources section, but once again he ensured the page is not linked so we cannot confirm his claim. No matter, because I can show right now what Kierkegaard actually had to say about this topic."Søren Kierkegaard's critique The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard provided a critical response to the cogito. Kierkegaard argues that the cogito already presupposes the existence of "I", and therefore concluding with existence is logically trivial. Kierkegaard's argument can be made clearer if one extracts the premise "I think" into two further premises: "x" thinksI am that "x"Therefore I thinkTherefore I am Where "x" is used as a placeholder in order to disambiguate the "I" from the thinking thing. Here, the cogito has already assumed the "I"'s existence as that which thinks." [1]As you can see, not only does Kierkegaard not support my opponent in this debate, but his position on the argument is literally exactly the same as mine. Once again, Con's own words undermine his argument. Another FormulationHere Con gives yet another formulation he's ripped directly out of someone else's work without proper citation. Please note that Con got this from a forum post, not and authoritative source. Also note that even this random person Con is using to argue for his position readily admits that the argument "I think, therefore I am" is inadequate to prove the conclusion, and that the argument requires additional premises that, in turn, require additional justifications not given. And even then, he still admits that this is only trivially true (because it's circular) [2]. Once again, Con defeats his own position. On Reasonable DoubtCon criticises my given definition of reasonable doubt on the grounds that it's a legal definition instead of a philosophical one or a scientific one. This is an absurd criticism for 4 reasons.1. Con never gave a definition of "reasonable doubt" (he still hasn't), so it was left to me to assume what he was even talking about.2. "Reasonable doubt" is a legal term, so naturally we'd use the legal definition as the assumed default.3. There is no "philosophical or scientific" definition of "reasonable doubt". It's a legal term, after all.4. This is a debate. Debates are analogous to court-room disputes. We have the prosecution and the defence, and we even use a jury of our peers to determine the result of our dispute. So, it's appropriate to use the legal-definition of this term.In short, Con shouldn't set standards of evidence for himself that he cannot meet. He was the one who brought up this whole "reasonable doubt" bit, after all. It seems Con wanted "reasonable doubt" to mean 'whatever level of doubt he personally thinks is reasonable', and didn't realize this term has an actual definition. Truth TableThe purpose of a truth-table is to show "a breakdown of a logic function by listing all possible values the function can attain." [3]. The significance of this is that it allows us to determine if an argument is true regardless of the veracity of its premises, if it's false regardless of the veracity of its premises, or if it's indeterminate. in this case, Con's argument is truth-functionally indeterminate. This is because it's a circular argument. It's only true if you already assume the conclusion is true, and it's false if you demand a higher-standard than circular logic to find an argument convincing. As such, the truth-table reveals the argument can only be said to be true 50% of the time (when you assume the conclusion is already true). Since 50% is less than 98%, logically speaking, this argument fails to meet the criteria of reasonable doubt. My opponent could have made this easier for himself and only opted to argue "on the balance of probabilities", and then he'd have a fighting chance. He'd still be wrong, because the argument is still circular, but he could at least then argue probabilities. Since my opponent has set the standard for himself to be "reasonable doubt", he's shot himself in the knees, and lost the debate as the result. No RefutationCon claims I've given no refutation of his formulation. That's because it's not his formulation. He copied it and then incorrectly sourced it. He gave no real explanation of what it meant, nor could he, because it doesn't make any sense in the context of the rest of his argument. I can't argue against it because there is no argument here. He just pasted it, insisted it proved his claim, dropped a bunch of names, accused me of copying and misplacing logic (ironically enough), then just moved on to my computer-argument.There is no argument here. He's just quoting generic passages on what 'inference' is from a textbook on logic. It has no bearing on his actual argument. It would be like if I smashed my fists into the keyboard, posted it, then later complained that Con never properly refuted my argument. You can't refute something that never made sense in the first place, all you can do is show that it's irrelevant and move on.ComputersWe both agreed on a definition of thinking, which goes as follows -- The process of using rationality and/or logic to come to conclusions.Computers do this [4], so we have an example of something that thinks, but contains no "I" (consciousness). Since I've shown that thinking doesn't prove existence, I've shown that the argument "I think, therefore I am", fails to prove its conclusion. This is a logically inescapable conclusion given the definitions of these terms both parties agreed to prior to the start of this debate. Again, Con will insist that the Cogito was never meant to prove the "I", but he's alone here:"Cogito ergo sum, ("I think, therefore I am") is a philosophicalproposition by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the Latin phrase is that thinking about one’s existence proves—in and of itself—that an "I" exists to do the thinking; or, as Descartes explains, "[W]e cannot doubt of our existence while we doubt …" [5]There you have it, the Cogito is an attempt to prove the "I" exists via thought. Since it fails to do so, cogito ergo sum is bunk.ConclusionThe Cogito is a circular argument and therefore fails to prove its conclusion. Despite what my opponent will try to tell you, this is exactly what this debate is about, as the resolution of this debate directly states. He's wasted his time trying to subvert this debate's resolution rather than trying to actually argue his position, and therefore has failed to uphold his defence of the Cogito. You may or may not actually exist, that's not what this debate is about. This debate is about if thinking proves consciousness. It does not. Case closed.Arguments: Con's were irrelevant. They argued for a different resolution than the one this debate is about.Sources: I provided more and better quality sources than Con. Most of his were not readily available, and Con made no effort to denote which arguments came from which sources. Also, one of Con's only readily-available sources is from a forum.Conduct: Due to Con's lazy sourcing, it is needlessly difficult to tell which arguments are his and which are lifted from other works. He 'sort of' sources the arguments that aren't his, but does everything in his power to make determining what's his and what isn't as hard as possible for the rest of us. This is about as close to plagiarism as you can possibly get without straight-up stealing arguments. Thank you for your timeVOTE PROSources1. http://en.wikipedia.org... 2. http://www.sciencechatforum.com... 3. http://whatis.techtarget.com... 4. http://www.computerhistory.org... 5. http://en.wikipedia.org...