 If this notion is going to precede, it will be able to serve no useful purpose other than recognition that there is a particular antecedent from which the soul may later elicit a consequence: namely, that it is self-aware. The reasoning will go as follows. I know that I know something: whatever knows, exists: therefore I exist (nosco me aliquid noscere, et quicquid noscit est, ergo ego sum). (AM: II.1075) 