Cartesian Other Cartesian Other In philosophy, the Cartesian Other, part of a thought experiment, is any other than the mind of the individual thinking about the experiment. The Other includes the individual's own body. According to the philosopher Descartes, there is a divide intrinsic to consciousness, such that you cannot ever bridge the space between your own consciousness and that of another. This "other" is in essence theoretical, since one cannot ever be empirically shown such an "other." Put differently, Descartes concluded "cogito ergo sum", "I think, therefore I am," that is, that the presence of a self of which to speak
Cogito, ergo sum but insofar as I am, I am "moribundus". The "MORIBUNDUS" first gives the "SUM" its sense." The Scottish philosopher John Macmurray rejects the "cogito" outright in order to place action at the center of a philosophical system he entitles the Form of the Personal. "We must reject this, both as standpoint and as method. If this be philosophy, then philosophy is a bubble floating in an atmosphere of unreality." The reliance on thought creates an irreconcilable dualism between thought and action in which the unity of experience is lost, thus dissolving the integrity of our selves, and destroying any connection