Cogito ergo Non Sum: Costard's Syndrome and the Discontinuities of Ego

Abstract

This essay proposes an analysis of the relationships between one of the most salient concepts of modern philosophical thought such as that of the so-called Cartesian ego and one psychiatric condition first described by French physician Jules Cotard toward the end of the 19th century. While Descartes and those following on his steps tend to sustain that the self-transparent existence of subjectivity represents the first foundation of modern philosophy, patients suffering from Costard's syndrome think that they don’t exist with a similar degree of evidence, clarity, and distinction. The essay finishes up by signaling how Costard's delusion and other psychopathological delusions represent the dissolution of the cartesian hypostasis of the idea of self and point to a conception of the notion of ego plagued by anomalies and discontinuities.