Thesis: ‘I Think, Therefore I exist.

Body Sections
Section I
Claim: The mere fact of us questioning our own existence leads to the fact that we exist.
Evidence: logical appeal
 Even if we assume a higher power makes us believe that we do not exist, the mere
fact of us questioning such makes it evident that we exist. For there is no way one
could question unless one existed in order to question.

Section II
Claim: A person is capable of saying and thinking that ‘I am, I exist.’
Evidence: logical appeal
 Even so, without being sure of whether you are awake or dreaming, this situation
would leave open the possibility that some truths, such as mathematical axioms,
could be known, though not through the senses.
 Each of us can think or say: “I am, I exist”, and while we are thinking or saying it
we cannot be wrong about it.

Section III
Claim: Knowledge that I am thinking is bound up with the knowledge of my existence.
Evidence: logical appeal
 We are able to gain knowledge even in the uncertainty and certainty of things.
 Even if we start from the strongest possible skeptical position, doubting
everything, we can still reach knowledge.
 Knowledge is through being conscious to something, and leads to us be-ing.

Section IV: Dealing with the Opposition

1st Opposing View: How could one possibly know that there is a thinker who is a single
unified consciousness doing such thinking?
Strategy for Response: If one believes a world wherein thoughts exist but a thinker does
not, then the statement would have no solid ground. However, if it is indeed true that
thinkers do not exist, then reasoning would be impossible. But since reason exists, then
we could conclude that there is a thinker.

2nd Opposing View: In the fiction world, in the play of Shakespeare, the character
Hamlet thought of a great deal, but since we know it is fiction it is evident that the
character does not exist.
Strategy for Response: It is true that Hamlet exists in the fictional world, however it is
also in this world where he thought of a great deal. So far as the argument that he doesn’t
exist, he didn’t in the real world, but he did exist in the fictional world. Whether or not
Hamlet was thinking, and can be proven existed, in a fictional world or the real world, we
cannot be unsure about ourselves.

Conclusion:

While we are thinking or saying, ‘I am, I exist’, we cannot be wrong about it. There is
one belief that one surely cannot doubt and that is his belief in his own existence.

Thesis: ‘Man is a machine.’

Body Sections:
Section I: One exists because of the substance that is the body.
Evidence: logical appeal (deductive)
 We know that a man exists. Man has a body. Therefore anything that has a body
exists.

Section II: Everything has a physical aspect, therefore, existing in the universe.
Evidence: logical appeal (deductive)
 Everything that we can perceive within the universe has a body. Something that is
corporeal, we know exists. Therefore everything that is in the universe exists.

Section III: A human being is entirely physical.

Evidence: logical appeal (reasoning, deductive)
 A body called animal spirits dictates, and is responsible for most human and even
animal activity. These animal spirits move around the body, carrying with them
and passing on information.
 A human exists because of his body. Another body called animal spirit then
controls a corporeal body. Therefore humans are purely physical and are therefore
no more than a biological machine.

Section IV: Dealing with the Opposition

1st Opposing View: The concept of physicality seems to be applied on the concept of
physical spirits to God and other entities found in religion, such as angels.

Strategy for Response: The divine nature of God’s attributes is not something that
 the
human mind is capable of fully understanding, therefore the term “incorporeal” is the
only one that recognizes and also honors the unknowable substance of God.

2nd Opposing View: Human beings are conceived as purely physical and are therefore no
more that a biological machine, however this is the case, the problem about the mental
nature rises.
Strategy for Response: Make no attempt to give an account of how the mind can be
explained. Simply offer a rather sketchy account of what we thought science would
eventually reveal to be the case.

Conclusion:
Man is purely physical for one exists in the universe because of a corporeal body, and
through spirit animals that we are able to move, carrying with them and passing on
information.

Thesis: ‘God causes everything.’

Body Sections:
Section I: There exists only one substance and everything is made of this substance.
Evidence: logical appeal (reasoning, deductive)
 Everything is made up of different properties and aspects. A substance is anything
that has properties. Therefore everything, with different properties, is made of off
that substance.
 Since there is only one such substance, there can, in fact, be nothing but that
substance, and everything else is in some sense a part of it.

Section II: The substance is ‘God’ or ‘nature’.

Evidence: logical appeal
 The two attributes of a substance (physicality & mentality) a human could
perceive is seen under the attributes of body and mind, which is seen as a form of
God.
Section III: It provides everything in our universe with its formation, purpose, shape and
matter.
Evidence: logical appeal
 The world is God, but that God is more than the world. The world is not a mass of
material and mental stuff but rather the world of material things in which a form
of a God as perceived under the attribute of extension and the world of mental
things is that same form of God as conceived under the attribute of thought.
 All things find their explanation to the cause of all things through God.

Section IV: Dealing with the Opposition

1st Opposing View: When something undergoes a tremendous change, how is it that an
object stays the same when it undergoes change?
Strategy for Response: It is important to pose and prompt a question: what are we
referring to. Since it can change in every way that we can perceive, the thing must also be
something beyond its perceptible properties – this unchanging thing is called the
substance.

2nd Opposing View: Pantheism is often criticized by theists, who argue that it is little
more than atheism by another name.
Strategy for Response: Reiterate that pantheism is the belief that God is the world, and
that the world is God.

Conclusion:

 All objects, whether animal, vegetable or mineral, have a mentality. Both their
bodies and their mentalities are a part of God, who is greater than all the world’s
physical and mental attributes.

Thesis: ‘Everything we know is gained from experience.’

Body Sections:
Section I: There are no truths found in everyone at birth.
Evidence: logical appeal
 Truth can be established through the ability of applying reason to the information
we gather from the experiences of our senses. Since a human baby doesn’t have
any other experience aside from the very moment he comes out of a mother’s
womb, and doesn’t have the ability for such cognitive thinking, then we can
conclude that truth cannot be established at birth.

Section II: There are no universal ideas found in people of all cultures at all times.
Evidence: logical appeal
 Even if we have ideas or concepts found out to be held common, it doesn’t have
any solid, firm grounds as to why these ideas are concluded innate. There are
complex factors that could explain the universality with one being the experiences
of the human around him, which is something we all must share.

Section III: The concept that human beings are born with innate ideas is incoherent.
Evidence: logical appeal
 An idea to be considered an idea must have been present at some point in
somebody’s mind. But an idea that is claimed to be innate must also be claiming
to precede any form of human experience. Therefore the very notion of innate
ideas is incoherent.

Section IV: Dealing with the Opposition

1st Opposing View: Since God is not capable of being so unfair as to hand these ideas
only to a select group of people, then God must have been the one to put concepts and
ideas that are universal. If such ideas are universal then we can conclude that innate ideas
are true.
Strategy for Response: Establish the understanding that the incorporeal substances
could only be touched by religion and someone’s faith. However, if it is indeed true, there
isn’t still any firm ground for concluding that they were also innate.

2nd Opposing View: If the mind of a baby is truly a blank tablet or a new sheet of paper
then how is it possible that they have the innate concept of identifying a dog as a dog?
Strategy for Response: We are born with our minds like ‘unscribed tablets’ and any
ideas that we gain can only be received through our senses. The moment we recognize
the qualities that the dogs have in common, we slowly build up the concept of what
dogginess is; it is by observing how it is manifested in the world around us that we learn
about it.

Conclusion:
Through our experiences we are able to learn new ideas, concepts and knowledge and it
is through applying reason to these experiences that we may be able to find the truth.