Affiliation:
1. University of Groningen, NL
Abstract
Consciousness is connected with the fact that a subject is aware and open to the manifestation of whatever appears. Existence, by contrast, is used to express the fact that something is given in experience, is present, or is real. Usually, the two notions are taken to be somehow related. This chapter suggests that existence is at best introduced as a metaphysical (or meta-experiential) concept that inevitably escapes the domain of conscious experience. In order to illustrate this claim, two case studies are considered. The first case is provided by Descartes’s famous treatment of consciousness and existence in his Meditations on First Philosophy. The second case is meant to contrast the Cartesian approach by taking the opposite route, as delineated by Emanuele Severino (1929–2020) in his ‘fundamental ontology’.
Reference24 articles.
1. Adriaenssen, Han T. 2017. Representation and Scepticism from Aquinas to Descartes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
2. Carraud, Vincent. 2022. Causa sive ratio. La raison de la cause, de Suarez à Leibniz. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.
3. Christofidou Andrea. 2022. “Descartes’s Flash of Insight: Freedom, the Objective World, and the Reality of the Self.” The European Legacy 37 (3–4): 251–68.
4. Descartes, René. 1964–19742 (1897–1913). Oeuvres, éditées par Charles Adam, et Paul Tannery, édition révue par Joseph Beaude, Pierre Costabel, Alan Gabbey, et Bernard Rochot (“AT”). Paris: J. Vrin.
5. Descartes, René. 1984–1991. The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, volumes 1–2, edited and translated by John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff, and Dugald Murdoch (“CSM”); volume 3, edited and translated by John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff, Dugald Murdoch, and Anthony Kenny (“CSMK”). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.