Existing or Living

So as if keeping up with this semester wasn't tough enough, I've let this journal go stale. Allow me to try to catch up a bit.

I lost interest somewhere around the time of Descartes. His verbosity and lack of any resolution leaves little to talk about; it one of those read-it-and-digest-it kind of things. His basis for existence, "I think therefor I am," leaves much to be desired as far as my faith in humanity goes. Everyone, to an arguable extent, thinks, but I'd hate to think that many of these "thinkers" would call what they do existing. Unless, of course, we make a distinction between existing and living, allowing existing to be entirely passive. Here, I may agree that everyone exists if they think, but would also venture to say there's no point in existing without living. Here, living can be the active counterpart to existing.

And, here, I seem to have stepped in a pile of existentialism. After a mind-numbing dose of Descartes, I will stand behind anyone who challenges existence, insisting that it must acquire definition as we live. Living and existing shouldn't be so far removed from each other, they depend on one another to survive. I tend to think of it in terms of importance; it is much more important to do things that constitute as living than to spend all of that time trying to find proof of existence. Whether or not that proof exists, it is true that we are born and we die, hence making our conscious time finite.

In other words, I get the impression that Descartes wastes a lot of time. Perry wastes quite a bit as well. I tend to side with Sartre as I seek to do things that are meaningful and important to living so as to not passively exist. Yikes.