That's a lot of words to claim that language has exist before thought can, which gets disproved in an instant when your audience points to the large number of fauna on earth that has no language and yet displays thought.
That's not what I'm arguing. The argument is that "cogito ergo sum" is invalid, which is part of an argument against the existence of a "mind" above and beyond what the brain does in a living body. The atoms are all there is.
I don't think I have a "mind" above and beyond my body, and I don't think you do, either. Animals can remember stuff, solve puzzles, and express pain, just like you or I do. We do all that with our brains, not with our "minds."
The problem with making universal assertions as opposed to existential assertions is that a single counterexample is all that is necessary to prove the assertion is incorrect or wrong.
> That's not what I'm arguing.
Okay; your argument is difficult to digest because, unlike most philosophy arguments, you neither lead nor end with the actual thesis; you present a book-length text as support for a thesis that is never stated.
> The argument is that "cogito ergo sum" is invalid, which is part of an argument against the existence of a "mind" above and beyond what the brain does in a living body. The atoms are all there is.
What's your thesis, then? "Cogito ergo sum is invalid" is hardly a thesis. Maybe you are asserting that there is no "mind" above and beyond the living brain, which will be a universal claim not an existential one.
If that is indeed your claim, then it's not a testable/falsifiable one anyway; you are going to require instead a sequence of premises that are each accepted by the audience you wish to sway, with intermediate conclusions that are likewise accepted by the audience, before you present your final conclusion based exclusively on the premises list.
A narrative is not a good way to present a philosophical argument, especially when it is a counter argument to an argument that was presented (even if only verbally at the time) in the standard logical format I described.
A better way to convince that any formally presented logic (as Cogito ergo sum was) is invalid (or unsound) is to attack the premises. It is not normal to ignore the premises of the original argument and present premises of your own.
(PS. It's been a long time since I was in a formal logic philosophy class and maybe things have changed, but they haven't (I hope!) changed so much that logic is completely thrown out the window in favour of narrative)
