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In 1976 Antoine Léonard Thomas wrote paraphrasing Rene Descartes:

I doubt, therefore I think, therefore I am.

My question is, is there anything else, built on such basic concepts, that has been established by pure logic as an absolute truth like the above phrase?

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    Even this phrase (known as "cogito") is neither established, nor by pure logic. There is no such thing as establishing anything "by pure logic". For various criticisms of cogito see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cogito_ergo_sum#Criticisms Many believe in absolute truths but so far not one successful candidate has been exhibited.
    – Conifold
    Commented May 6, 2016 at 0:11
  • @Conifold well what about synthetic a priori facts?
    – user6917
    Commented Jun 5, 2016 at 16:40
  • reddit.com/r/philosophy/comments/19445g/… may be useful
    – user6917
    Commented Jun 5, 2016 at 16:48
  • @MATHEMETICIAN Synthetic a priori were plausible in Kant's time, but not after now commonplace realization that the meaning of concepts is tied to language, and the latter is learned empirically. Nothing expressed in it is therefore a priori, indeed Descartes clearly borrows the meanings of "I", "think", "am" from his empirical experience (and we wouldn't understand him otherwise). The same goes for "'I don't exist' is false" you linked, or anything else. "Pure logic" is damned by the necessity to be understood.
    – Conifold
    Commented Jun 29, 2016 at 22:54
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    @MATHEMETICIAN Intros just try to give an idea of what people think/thought they might look like. My sense is that after neo-Kantians and positivists it became common to implicitly relativize "a priori" to conceptual/linguistic schemes, and/or make them historically mutable, except when talking about Kant specifically. So in examples they are not truly prior to experience, but rather prior to a mature stage of it as enabling and ingrained presuppositions, "pure logic" of the day.
    – Conifold
    Commented Jun 30, 2016 at 2:26

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Logic is not the source of content; it is only a means by which we may verify the validity of our reasoning. Descartes' argument, "I think therefore I am," represents his effort to find a source of content within the "light of reason" about which he could be certain. However, he recognized that the light of reason is not a source of truth capable of instilling the same degree of certainty as God's revealed truth:

"But above all else we must impress on our memory the overriding rule that whatever God has revealed to us must be accepted as more certain than anything else. And although the light of reason may, with the utmost clarity and evidence, appear to suggest something different, we must still put our entire faith in divine authority rather than in our own judgement." (Principles of Philosophy, Part 1, sec.76, AT VIII-1, 39; CSM I, 221)

Not everyone recognizes the Holy Scriptures as a source of absolute truth, but Descartes pointed out that by grace the its divine authority may be revealed to us:

"Now although it is commonly said that faith concerns matters which are obscure, this refers solely to the thing or subject-matter to which our faith relates; it does not imply that the formal reason which leads us to attend to matters of faith is obscure. On the contrary, this formal reason consists in a certain inner light which comes from God, and when we are supernaturally illumines by it we are confident that what is put forward for us to believe has been revealed by God himself. And it is quite impossible for him to lie, this is more certain than any natural light, and is often even more evident because of the light of grace." (AT VII 147/CSM II 105)

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  • Thanks for you´r answer, I liked a lot the first sentence.
    – Fernando
    Commented Mar 3, 2018 at 21:14

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