Performative contradiction are performative contradictions in this context. Habermas claims that post-modernism's epistemological relativism suffers from a performative contradiction. Hans-Hermann Hoppe claims in his theory of argumentation ethics that arguing for any political position other than free-market anarchism results in a performative contradiction. Jaakko Hintikka more rigorously fleshed out the notion of performative contradiction in analyzing Descartes' famous "cogito ergo sum" argument, concluding that "cogito ergo sum" relies on performance rather than logical inference. Performative contradiction A performative contradiction () arises when the propositional content of a statement contradicts the presuppositions of asserting it. An example of a performative contradiction is the
Cogito, ergo sum for thought". In other words, "the only claim that is indubitable here is the agent-independent claim that there is cognitive activity present". The objection, as presented by Georg Lichtenberg, is that rather than supposing an entity that is thinking, Descartes should have said: "thinking is occurring." That is, whatever the force of the "cogito", Descartes draws too much from it; the existence of a thinking thing, the reference of the "I," is more than the "cogito" can justify. Friedrich Nietzsche criticized the phrase in that it presupposes that there is an "I", that there is such an activity as "thinking",