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Cogito Ergo Sum / John Furnival., 1981

 Item
Identifier: CC-10903-11113

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Scope and Contents

The drawings are taken from newspaper articles, medical literature, books of Robert Fludd, Gray's "Anatomy" and botanical renderings. The latter employs a double entendre, wort signifying "word" in German and plant in Anglo-Saxon. This was exhibited in "Contemporary Screens" curated by Virginia Fabbri Butera. She wrote "Filled with hundreds of sentences, Cogito Ergo Sum is a standing book that impels us, with Cartesian urgency, to read and to think to confirm our existence."Wkipedia: Cogito ergo sum (French: "Je pense donc je suis"; English: "I think, therefore I am") is a philosophical Latin statement proposed by René Descartes. The simple meaning of the phrase is that someone wondering whether or not he or she exists is, in and of itself, proof that something, an "I", exists to do the thinking. However, this "I" is not the more or less permanent person we call "I". It may be that the something that thinks is purely momentary, and not the same as the something which has a different thought the next moment. The phrase became a fundamental element of Western philosophy, as it was perceived to form a foundation for all knowledge. While other knowledge could be a figment of imagination, deception or mistake, the very act of doubting one's own existence serves to some people as proof of the reality of one's own existence, or at least that of one's thought. The statement is sometimes given as Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum (English: "I doubt, therefore I think, therefore I am"). A common mistake is that people take the statement as proof that they, as a human person, exist. However, it is a severely limited conclusion that does nothing to prove that one's own body exists, let alone anything else that is perceived in the physical universe. It only proves that one's consciousness exists (that part of an individual that observes oneself doing the doubting). It does not rule out other possibilities, such as waking up to find oneself to be a butterfly who had dreamed of having lived a human life.This screen is depicted in Furnival's "Lost For Words" (2011) page 49 with an incorrect caption in the book, e.g., Cogito Ero(sic) Sum. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

Dates

  • Creation: 1981

Creator

Extent

0 See container summary (1 standing screen (wood, ink, gesso)) ; 195 x 338 x 4 cm

Language of Materials

From the Collection: English

Physical Location

living room

Custodial History

The Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry, on loan from Ruth and Marvin A. Sackner and the Sackner Family Partnership.

General

Published: Woodchester Gloucester, England : [Publisher not identified]. Signed by: John Furnival (l.r.- fifth panel). Nationality of creator: British. General: About 1 total copies. General: Added by: CONV; updated by: KEELEY.

Repository Details

Part of the The Ruth and Marvin Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry Repository

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