Does The Hard Problem defeat Cogito Ergo Sum?

Think of the self as a knife and thought as the act of cutting something.

The cutting cannot happen if the knife didn't exist in the first place.

Similarly, thought is impossible without the existence of a mind.

Reply to intrapersona What do you understand by thinking, by being aware, by existing, by being self-conscious?

Sound common sense - the nemesis of serious philosophy - would seem to suggest that you can indeed lack awareness (e.g. dreamless sleep, anesthesia), at least temporarily, and still exist.

Further, why can't we say that we're aware even if the process of how this comes about remains mysterious? I may have misunderstood your point, but that seems similar to suggesting that a person who's completely ignorant about how their bodily mechanisms function can't possibly breathe, digest food, etc.

Finally, what or who is this 'I am', this self whose existence is in jeopardy here? Does it exist in the same way as a table or a tree? Is it a tangible thing whose existence can be pointed to as an object amongst others? If that's the case, then I'd say the self does not exist. Is it more like an activity than a thing?

I'm admittedly not extremely well-versed in these modern skeptical matters, but I am curious about the underlying assumptions which give rise to them in the first place. If they're seen as self-evident concepts given to experience, unworthy of serious consideration, then none of them IMO are as self-evident as the fact that you do exist, that you are in the sense that you stand in a relationship to what is, to being.

Thanks in advance.

Quoting intrapersona

You can not think about anything at all and still exist

Descartes said "I think, therefore I am", not "I am, therefore I think", so this claim seems misplaced.

how can you say you exist because you are aware if at the same time you can't understand how that awareness emerges from consciousness. Unless you know the validity of what self-awareness or consciousness is, you can't use it to infer you exist no matter how apt it feels. It is akin to the blind men and the elephant

In short, you may not exist at all.

You don't need to know how awareness emerges from consciousness for the argument to work. It's simple modus ponens:

1. If I'm aware then I exist
2. I'm aware
3. Therefore I exist

Of course, you can always take issue with 1 or 2, but I don't think that not knowing how awareness arises from consciousness is evidence against either.

Intrapersona:In short, you may not exist at all.

According to whom?

The parable of the blind men and the elephant is another thing altogether. It is about the tendency of pundits (philosophers) who cannot see the big picture and who theorise on the basis of partial knowledge. Blind men are sent to examine an elephant. The blind man who feels the tusk says the elephant is 'hard and sharp', the one who feels the ear says it's 'big and soft', and so on. They're both right, but neither is actually 'seeing the elephant'. That is the point of the parable.

(Nowadays what you would do is apply for a grant on either the 'big-and-soft' nature of everything, or the 'hard-and-polished' nature of everything, and set up competing theories of softness and hardness which battle it out in peer-reviewed journals as the 'theory of everything'.
Still without having seen the elephant!)

Reply to intrapersona Meh! If I didn't exist they'd have to invent me!

First, I wouldn't say that the cogito employs some narrow sense of "think" so that simply being aware wouldn't be sufficient to count as thinking.

Secondly, "I am aware" isn't simply being aware; it's thinking even in a narrower sense of thinking.

Finally, I've always disagreed that the cogito implies anything ontologically other than the fact that phenomenal thought occurs, thus it must exist, whatever it turns out to be (a property of), exactly.

So no, not knowing or understanding something on a noumenal level isn't going to impact the cogito at all.

Also, we have to pretend that the "hard problem" is a problem in the first place, hard or not. ;-)

I don't see what the problem is. From the ground the earth looks flat, from orbit round, from far away a dimensionless point, and from the other side of the universe its as if it had never existed thanks to the Hubble Horizon. A context without any content and vice versa is a demonstrable contradiction, while any context and content will demonstrably transform into one another. I think therefore I am because sometimes I'm unconscious!

Awareness and knowledge are indivisible complimentary-opposites and you can't have either one without faith in the other.

Reply to intrapersona
Wittgenstein would assert Moore's 'Here is one hand' argument to radical skepticism. It goes like this:

Here is one hand,
And here is another.
There are at least two external objects in the world.
Therefore, an external world exists.

This commonsensical approach negates the need for exact definitions that constitute the entirety of facts that would be required to fulfill epistemological criteria required by skeptics to warrant the truth of a proposition that supposes the existence of consciousness or a conscious entity (notice that 'conscious' and 'entity' are practically synonymous by all means and purposes) own assertions about existing irrespective of whether such a conscious entity is an all-knowing God or a simple ant. You can reword it to suit your needs, like:

I know that I think because I have no grounds to doubt.
Therefore, I think.
I think asserts that I exist.
I think, therefore I am.

If one doesn't buy into P3, then if one really feels like it, they can assert solipsism; but, that still doesn't negate the fact that to think and existing are not mutually independent. Or rather, there are no grounds to assert otherwise unless you believe in p-zombies.

Descartes proves self existence from extreme skepticism.
He assumes that all he knows is subject to doubt including his own existence.

In order to even doubt that you exist requires that you do in fact exist.
That is to say that if you do not exist then your doubts would also be non-existent.
Therefore if you doubt your existence, you must exist.

This argument got watered downed into "cogito ergo sum."

The hard problem does not say that we can doubt without any existence so the hard problem does not challenge the Descartes method.

You see Descartes argues that the absence of existence would be the absence of doubt as well so that where there is doubt there must also be existence.

So we can be sure we do in fact exist, that is unless you want to argue that non-existent things can have doubt.

Yin-yang dynamics rule the universe indicating a recursive systems logic must apply to everything imaginable and be so simple a child can understand with everything revolving around what's missing from this picture. In other words, I am not unconscious, therefore I think. The content of the universe including any truths can be said to revolve around the void with a black hole merely providing one extreme example. It means consciousness and awareness would express the same self-organizing systems logic that everything else would and science would never be able to prove whether we have free will or not. Whether our lives are fated or we have free will or anything else would always remain context dependent with everything eventually turning out to be self-contradictory.

Quoting intrapersona

You can not think about anything at all and still exist

Only if you'd be a solipsist, but a solipsist does not publish.

Quoting TheMadFool

Think of the self as a knife and thought as the act of cutting something.

The cutting cannot happen if the knife didn't exist in the first place.

Similarly, thought is impossible without the existence of a mind.

That is perfectly sound and valid but it has nothing to do with my OP. My OP assumes this already and is dealing with how one can prove he exists apriori by the fact that he thinks. We already know we think and we already know we are dependant on a brain but that doesn't help the fact that we can't prove we exist by the fact that we are self-aware in the same light as you can't proof brains or anything else in the physical world exists just because you have sensory information about them.

Quoting Erik

Sound common sense - the nemesis of serious philosophy - would seem to suggest that you can indeed lack awareness (e.g. dreamless sleep, anesthesia), at least temporarily, and still exist.

But you are not aware of it, so therefor "you" don't exist but the body you inhabit does. I would go further in saying if you are not aware of the body then you can't know it exists at all.

When you sleep, you simply cease to be. You can't claim you arrive when you aren't aware of it, that is illogical.

Quoting Erik

Further, why can't we say that we're aware even if the process of how this comes about remains mysterious? I may have misunderstood your point, but that seems similar to suggesting that a person who's completely ignorant about how their bodily mechanisms function can't possibly breathe, digest food, etc.

That is a good point, but slightly misunderstood. I am trying to prove my bodily mechanisms exist. I can't prove they exist just by the fact that they function or even 'appear' to function... in the same way I can't prove my self-awareness validates the realness of my existing.

Quoting Erik

none of them IMO are as self-evident as the fact that you do exist, that you are in the sense that you stand in a relationship to what is, to being.

That is what makes it so irksome. Because it seems to appeal to common sense so much to say you exist but the fact is, as you say, there is no you that exists... just an awareness which you can't place ownership over... and leading from this, how do you prove that you are aware? Just by being aware? That doesn't cut it. How do you even know what awareness is? How can I guarantee I am experiencing something right now? Or you for that matter?

Quoting Michael

1. If I'm aware then I exist
2. I'm aware
3. Therefore I exist

Yes but that is a faulty second premise and makes it unsound but still valid. I am trying to say that you can't prove that you aware by the fact that you feel you are.

Quoting Michael

Descartes said "I think, therefore I am", not "I am, therefore I think", so this claim seems misplaced.

I know but I was saying "I think, therefore I am" is not quite correct because you don't have to think in order for you to be aware of your own existing. I think perhaps what he ment by "think" is awareness itself and not "hearing words in your head". Then my arguments lead on from that. So I don't feel it is misplaced for that reason.

Quoting Wayfarer

According to whom?

I am not a dictator... According to the reasoning supplied in my OP... :-O

I think you're crossing the line in your responses to the position of saying that nothing whatever can be known by anyone, in which case, discussion is pointless.

Quoting Wayfarer

The parable of the blind men and the elephant is another thing altogether.

Not at all. I was using it as a metaphor for how no one can "feel" the truth of what consciousness/self-awareness is and how we are all groping about in the dark to try and make sense it. You can't dispute that. It is relevant because my position is positing that you need evidence of what the full picture of the elephant is in order to call it an elephant. Likewise, you need a full picture of consciousness in order to prove it exists in the way we think it does.

I am really at a loss to see how you couldn't see that? It really is an elemental analogy.

Quoting Wayfarer

I think you're crossing the line in your responses to the position of saying that nothing whatever can be known by anyone, in which case, discussion is pointless.

Perhaps you are right. I am just trying to say that it feels like I exist because I feel I am self aware BUT trying to prove I exist just by the fact that I am aware is not rational.

I mean I don't doubt I am aware, which is what I think you are thinking I am doing.

Quoting Terrapin Station

I've always disagreed that the cogito implies anything ontologically other than the fact that phenomenal thought occurs, thus it must exist

Sorry, why must it exist? And where is your proof that phenomenal thought occurs? Is the proof in the awareness of the thoughts? Because that is what I am disputing.

Reply to intrapersona I don't think you understand the purpose of the argument. It is simply that, in order to think, doubt, or say anything, there must be someone who thinks, doubts, and says. You can entertain the idea that you're a brain in a vat or that existence is a dream or hallucination, but you can't doubt that you're having that experience, even if the experience is a delusion.

in fact the argument was anticipated by Augustine, centuries previously:

But who will doubt that he lives, remembers, understands, wills, thinks, knows, and judges? For even if he doubts, he lives. If he doubts where his doubts come from, he remembers. If he doubts, he understands that he doubts. If he doubts, he wants to be certain. If he doubts, he thinks. If he doubts, he knows that he does not know. If he doubts, he judges that he ought not rashly to give assent. So whoever acquires a doubt from any source ought not to doubt any of these things whose non-existence would mean that he could not entertain doubt about anything."

(Augustine, On the Trinity 10.10.14 quoted in Richard Sorabji Self, 2006, p.219).

Quoting Wayfarer

in order to think, doubt, or say anything, there must be someone who thinks, doubts, and says

But we already no that that is dictated by the unconscious and the conscious mind is just an observer.

Quoting Wayfarer

You can entertain the idea that you're a brain in a vat or that existence is a dream or hallucination, but you can't doubt that you're having that experience, even if the experience is a delusion.

I already stated that I don't doubt that I have awareness of my experience. Did you miss that?

I am saying that I can't prove that my awareness exists just because it exists. That is circular reasoning.

Reply to intrapersona It's not circular reasoning, it is called apodictic truth, i.e. a truth which it is not feasible to doubt. The fact that you're able to argue the case, defeats any argument you might wish to advance, because the fact that you can argue about it means that you exist.

Now, granted, in this case, it is feasible, although highly unlikely, that this thread has been created by a computer algorithm - so I can actually doubt whether this thread was actually generated by a person. But that concerns a different kind of claim to the one at issue.

So whoever acquires a doubt from any source ought not to doubt any of these things whose non-existence would mean that he could not entertain doubt about anything."

I agree with Augustine. If I didn't exist, I could not doubt anything. So in the same way perhaps I am not doubting at all and it just feels like I am because it feels like I exist even though I don't because there is no I. This is the crux of my argument, that you can't prove you exist just by the fact that you are self-aware. Like Augustine you might say to that, "if you didn't exist how could you have the feeling of self-awareness?" Again, perhaps I am not doubting at all and it just feels like I am because it feels like I exist even though I don't because there is no I.

Quoting Wayfarer

It's not circular reasoning, it is called apodictic truth, i.e. a truth which it is not feasible to doubt. The fact that you're able to argue the case, defeats any argument you might wish to advance, because the fact that you can argue about it means that you exist.

I am just going to swap some words around in that comment to say how flawed it sounds

"It's not circular reasoning, it is called absolute religious truth, i.e. a holy truth which it is not feasible to doubt. The fact that you're able to argue the case against god, defeats any argument you might wish to advance about god, because the fact that you can argue god existence means that he exists"

That is completely circular.

And for the record I don't doubt Apodictic truth exists, I just don't think the proof of consciousness via awareness alone forms part of it.

Reply to intrapersona Well, what would? Hit me with an apodictic truth, and I'll see if I can doubt it.

incidentally, adding entirely new concepts to something you have quoted from another contributor is not 'swapping words around'.

Reply to Wayfarer Are you saying this because you have no other argument against what I said? This seems like a bit of a non-sequitur... Chicago is larger than Omaha is apodictic truth, however calling in to question whether chicago actually exists on the basis that it has activity on it's roads and buildings is termed "problematic proposition"

Quoting Wayfarer

Well, what would?

Oh right sorry, I didn't see you where actually asking "what would constitute proof of consciousness" and not " what would be considered Apodictic truth.

What would constitute proof of consciousness, as I outline in my OP, would be a full awareness of what self-awareness/conscious is. I assume this is impossible to attain because we are limited to a finite brain and its subjective constraint. Therefor, we must all walk around with acknowledging the truth, that we may not exist at all.

Seems absurd doesn't it? Probably because we use common sense too much for our own good in regards to proving we exist... that is why majority of the population STILL THINKS THEY CONTROL THERE OWN F*CKING ACTIONS!!!

Quoting wuliheron

A context without any content and vice versa is a demonstrable contradiction, while any context and content will demonstrably transform into one another. I think therefore I am because sometimes I'm unconscious!

Nice post! Are you saying that experience is the context and reality the content or are you saying experience is the content and reality the context? Either way if you only had one it wouldn't be considered a contradiction. Can't you imagine a prehistoric earth with no organisms existing on it? The wind softly blowing, rocks not moving, waves crashing etc. Seems pretty sound to me and that is just purely content.

So your statement becomes "I think therefore I am because I am always acting unconsciously even though I am aware and confuse this awareness with being an agent of will that proves it's own existence by the fact that it is aware itself".

Quoting wuliheron

Awareness and knowledge are indivisible complimentary-opposites and you can't have either one without faith in the other.

Really? so robots can't possess knowledge without being aware? That is not proven yet but forms part of a good argument for https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_information_theory

I hope that theory is TRUE because it would mean all systems in flux are conscious, like your mobile or PC or the internet itself.

Quoting Question

Here is one hand,
And here is another.
There are at least two external objects in the world.
Therefore, an external world exists.

This commonsensical approach negates the need for exact definitions that constitute the entirety of facts that would be required to fulfill epistemological criteria required by skeptics to warrant the truth of a proposition that supposes the existence of consciousness or a conscious entity

Wow, what a mouthful of sentence that is. Let me try and re-word it to make it smaller and see if I still have the meaning correct.

"This approach does not need to be fully defined in order for it to fulfill the criteria that would make valid the proof of consciousness"

Premise 3 doesn't lead to the conclusion. It says nothing of the proof of external world just that there is the perception of two hands in it.

Quoting Question

I know that I think because I have no grounds to doubt.
Therefore, I think.
I think asserts that I exist.
I think, therefore I am.

If one doesn't buy into P3, then if one really feels like it, they can assert solipsism; but, that still doesn't negate the fact that to think and existing are not mutually independent. Or rather, there are no grounds to assert otherwise unless you believe in p-zombies.

I have seen no valid arguments against solipsism yet and personally a lot of good evidence for it in my own life (continuity gaps in social environments, undeniably intelligent synchronicities and then some)

Back to the point though, premise one is faulty because we have established there is reasons to doubt it which is that we can't find ownership of our actions, that we seem to just be an awareness stuck in a body and that awareness can't validate its own existence because that would be circular as discussed with wayfarer previously.

All that is logical to say is:

I think or I am aware

but not

I am or I exist

Quoting Question

to think and existing are not mutually independent.

If they are not mutually independent then they are dependant on one another. Where is the evidence of this? Where is it found that brain processes are synonymous with self-awareness (ie. sleep walking, the inability to prove self-awareness in animals.)

Quoting m-theory

Descartes proves self existence from extreme skepticism.
He assumes that all he knows is subject to doubt including his own existence.

In order to even doubt that you exist requires that you do in fact exist.
That is to say that if you do not exist then your doubts would also be non-existent.
Therefore if you doubt your existence, you must exist.

This argument got watered downed into "cogito ergo sum."

The hard problem does not say that we can doubt without any existence so the hard problem does not challenge the Descartes method.

You see Descartes argues that the absence of existence would be the absence of doubt as well so that where there is doubt there must also be existence.

So we can be sure we do in fact exist, that is unless you want to argue that non-existent things can have doubt.

Fair enough, but I am saying that there is no "you" or "I" to claim exists. There is an awareness that no ownership can be placed over.

I agree with you that if I didn't exist, I could not doubt anything. So in the same way perhaps I am not doubting at all and it just feels like I am because it feels like I exist even though I don't because there is no I. This is the crux of my argument, that you can't prove you exist just by the fact that you are self-aware. Again, perhaps I am not doubting at all and it just feels like I am because it feels like I exist even though I don't because there is no I.

Quoting jkop

Only if you'd be a solipsist, but a solipsist does not publish.

Is that clever? I am sick to death of cleverness. Everybody is clever nowadays. You can’t go anywhere without meeting clever people. The thing has become an absolute public nuisance. I wish to goodness we had a few fools left. But do I hear you ask what do they talk about? about the clever people, of course! What fools!

The hard problem of existence (what cogito ergo sum purports to satisfy) is a bit different than the hard mind-body problem, which is in one sense the "mechanism" or "causal force itself" behind the relationship that exists between bodies and minds. We do not need to know the fundamental source or nature of a phenomenon before we can conclude that it "exists". Rationally the existence of a given phenomenon (like falling apples or crop circles) precedes the investigative processes seeking to determine it's function, mechanism, source, purpose, nature, etc...

Even in a dream state, cogito ergo sum still applies; the dream exists in the thoughts of the dreamer, the dreamer exists..

"Cogito ergo sum" does not give us any useful information about the nature of existence, all it does is confirm that something is there, for certain (purportedly), to begin with.

Maybe we're just images flowing from a projector, if so, the images still exist... Cogito ergo sum does not help in solving the hard mind body problem, nor does the hard body-mind problem invalidate "cogito ergo sum". If it did, then the argument would look like "We do not understand how this thinking experience thing works or is created, therefore we/it might not exist at all", which seems to contradict itself.

Quoting VagabondSpectre

We do not need to know the fundamental source or nature of a phenomenon before we can conclude that it "exists"

So how does one know whether hallucinations are real or not? Or real life for that matter?

Quoting VagabondSpectre

"Cogito ergo sum" does not give us any useful information about the nature of existence, all it does is confirm that something is there, for certain (purportedly), to begin with.

I never said it gave us info about the nature of existence. I am saying that it does NOT confirm that something is there.

Quoting VagabondSpectre

Maybe we're just images flowing from a projector, if so, the images still exist... Cogito ergo sum does not help in solving the hard mind body problem, nor does the hard body-mind problem invalidate "cogito ergo sum". If it did, then the argument would look like "We do not understand how this thinking experience thing works or is created, therefore we/it might not exist at all", which seems to contradict itself.

When you construct an argument, you normally follow through with reasons supporting your claims. So far you have the opening statements but nothing to back it up.

All you have said is that it would seem to contradict itself with no reasoning behind why you feel that way. "We do not understand how this thinking experience thing works or is created, therefore we/it might not exist at all", which seems to contradict itself." It seems totally valid to me, but I am listening to you if you want to continue...

"A picture cannot picture itself, or something along those lines Wittgenstein would say. I think that would be apt in reference to saying anything about that which cannot be said will lead to non-sense." - Question

The reason why the statement contradicts itself is that it's first premise "There is a phenomenon called "thinking" ", is mutually exclusive from it's conclusion "The phenomenon called "thinking" does not exist".

Crop circles exist but the popular myth about their source is false. In the same manner that I would demonstrate that crop circles exist, I would demonstrate that "thoughts" exist (falsifiable observations), and in neither case need we learn anything more about their inherent source or "true nature" to alleviate doubt as to whether or not they exist. This is the difference between the problem of existence and the problem of "consciousness" (whatever it is) from matter.

Perhaps "cogito ergo sum" enshrines a brute fact which has no explanation yet is plainly and prevailingly true. Non-existence, even if it were our current situation, would change nothing from our perspective; the experiences we have would remain the same and referring to demonstrably existent phenomenon as "non-existent" would be incoherent when we actually need to interact with them.

How could it be possible that we do not exist and yet are having this conversation?

Quoting intrapersona

I am trying to say that you can't prove that you aware by the fact that you feel you are.

That's not how he justifies his claim. He starts with the fact that he's doubting and then argues that because doubt requires thought, he thinks. And then from that that he exists. So his point is that the skeptical hypothesis can only get you so far. It doesn't make sense to doubt one's existence.

Quoting intrapersona

Is that clever? . . .

A solipsist doesn't publish, but you do. Therefore, you're not a solipsist. The existence of a speaker is not questioned by his/her speech but silence.

Reply to intrapersona Quoting intrapersona

You can not think about anything at all and still exist, so it is more apt to say 'I am aware, therefor I am' but how can you say you exist because you are aware if at the same time you can't understand how that awareness emerges from consciousness. Unless you know the validity of what self-awareness or consciousness is, you can't use it to infer you exist no matter how apt it feels. It is akin to the blind men and the elephant

In short, you may not exist at all.

Consciousness and awareness are the same thing. Awareness/Consciousness are about things, not the things themselves. When I am aware of my mother, I am not being my mother. There is an aboutness of my Mother that is different than the aboutness of me. My awareness includes certain components that are always present, particularly a perspective - where the visuals, auditory, tactile, gustatory, etc. all appear around a central location - my head. There is also a component we call attention - where certain things are amplified or given more importance over the other things depending on the present goal in the mind. My mother may appear in my visual field but there may be more important things to attend to at the moment and I ignore my Mother for a time until I achieve my present goal. In other words, my mother isn't me because my mother can often time not be important in a particular moment. But my present goal and my awareness that allows me to achieve it is always present.

Quoting intrapersona

I already stated that I don't doubt that I have awareness of my experience. Did you miss that?

I am saying that I can't prove that my awareness exists just because it exists. That is circular reasoning.

This doesn't make any sense. First you say you don't doubt that you have awareness but then say that you can't prove that your awareness exists. How do you go about proving anything? What is proof or evidence? Isn't awareness/consciousness a necessary component of proof or evidence? Isn't being aware or conscious how you go about establishing proofs and evidence?

Reply to intrapersona Experience is a river that remains the same by constantly changing. There are many lesser truths, which are both contents and contexts in different situations and, then, there is the One Greater Context of the One Greater Truth... that the Truth determines everything!

Reply to intrapersona Without awareness robots possess no knowledge, only incomprehensible data.

Reply to intrapersona
Its called the law of contraposition in logic and mathematics.

If there is no existence of you or I then any doubt you or I have does not exist.

Calling doubt a feeling does not change the law.

If there is no you or I then any feelings or illusions of doubt that you or I have do not exist.
It is like saying "My unicorn is in pain but my unicorn does not exist."
Well then by definition I can argue that your unicorn's pain is not existent either.

The feelings or illusions are contingent upon existence.
Something must exist for feelings or illusions about doubt to exist.
If nothing existed there would be an absence of every and all things, including doubts, feelings, illusions etc.
We can be sure something exists by method of doubt, where there is doubt something must exist, even if all that exists is that doubt.
By definition if there was nothing, then there would be no doubts as well.

So again what you put forward does not challenge the Descartes method.

True, all your comments are true. I guess I must've missed that lol!

I was just trying to investigate if there is not a category mistake with My Experience, Self-Awareness, Myself, Me, I.

Just like in how people confuse ownership of their thoughts with the unconscious mind that IS NOT theirs, I thought perhaps people might be confusing an awareness/consciousness with actually existing but I guess as you all say that doesn't make sense.

Quoting intrapersona

Sorry, why must it exist? And where is your proof that phenomenal thought occurs? Is the proof in the awareness of the thoughts? Because that is what I am disputing.

Wait, why would the focus be on proofs, first off?

Reply to Terrapin Station That is like saying to a biologist, why do you need to prove cells use oxygen for ATP, let's just believe it exist because it's a nice theory.

The focus is always on proofs, not just how good the logic seems. It still seems sound to me to say that you can't prove awareness exists by your feeling of awareness existing alone but from what people have said in this forum it makes sense when you use it comparatively with it's contrary state (nothingness or non-existence). I guess at best all my arguments could be proven to say is that awareness may not be what you think it is.

Reply to intrapersona Descartes cogito ergo sum was the first un-doubtable truth that he came to (IIRC) in his process of attempting to doubt everything (and thereby come to certain knowledge). As such the conclusion is normally taken to be in the very limited sense of "existence", lest it stray too far and lay claim to something which doubt could demolish.

As far as the question you seem to have been asking goes, which is "what is the true nature of consciousness (and by extension, our existence)?", we simply do not know.

We're scientifically "certain" that the conscious mind is seated in the brain, and that the mechanics of the brain determine it's activities, but beyond that and some of the low level mechanics which facilitate that functioning, we simply do not know.

We cannot defeat solipsism yet, perhaps as a consequence of not comprehending the true nature of consciousness. All we can do is appeal to experience, the prevailing consistency of causality, and the predictive power of our theories.

We're not necessarily left in any existential lurches though. Consider this: we currently do not know the true nature of consciousness. If we somehow discovered the truth what might change from our experience based perspective? Would pain be less painful and pleasure less pleasurable?

Even if we are but pixels or lines of code being run on a quantum Hewlett Packard of the future, that we are not "real" and have no "free will", what would change from our perspective? While exceedingly tantalizing, these potential undiscoverable truths, even if discovered, might have little to no impact whatsoever on the lives of human beings.

For instance, some people believe that our "realness/existence" is tied into our "free will" such that if determinism was true, they would assent to a linguistically similar position as the thrust of this thread: "we do not actually exist". Confronting this aspect of determinism involves the same sort of obstacles of cognitive dissonance as does solipsism and many other hypotheticals; when the way we cognitively (in reflection for example) value experience itself is based on something that can be so casually doubted, we are left calling into question the value of everything given that it all flows through conscious experience.

The solution to this dilemma, in my humble opinion, is to value experiences directly and for what they are as you perceive them rather than appealing to a more base foundation in search of elusive and supposedly ultimate truths. "Drop a heavy television onto your foot" is an old line that I'm unable to forget, because as a thought experiment it cuts straight to the strength of experience based values and the weakness of metaphysical values which would suggest that dropping a television on your foot is meaningless, inconsequential, not real, or otherwise unobjectionable.

Hopefully this is the content that interested you originally, and hopefully it is helpful!

Cheers!

Quoting intrapersona

The focus is always on proofs

Empirical claims are not provable. That's Science Methodology/Philosophy of Science 101.