It has been a traditional claim that Descartes sought to construct a deductive scientific system in which everything could be deduced from a priori truths. I shall call this thesis strong a priorism. In view of the overwhelming amount of evidence that Descartes thought experience to be a necessary part of his method, the traditional interpretation has undergone several transformations. One interpretation resulting from this transformation holds that Descartes sought to prove the first principles of (...) natural philosophy in an a priori manner. I will call this interpretation weak a priorismk.My task in this paper is to show that the thesis of weak a priorismk is false. With a view to proving this, I will show that one of the very general principles of Cartesian natural philosophy, namely, the claim that the essence of matter is extension, could not have been, and was not meant to be, established in a purely a priorik way. (shrink)

It has been a traditional claim that Descartes sought to construct a deductive scientific system in which everything could be deduced from a priori truths. I shall call this thesis strong a priorism. In view of the overwhelming amount of evidence that Descartes thought experience to be a necessary part of his method, the traditional interpretation has undergone several transformations. One interpretation resulting from this transformation holds that Descartes sought to prove the first principles of (...) natural philosophy in an a priori manner. I will call this interpretation weak a priorismk.My task in this paper is to show that the thesis of weak a priorismk is false. With a view to proving this, I will show that one of the very general principles of Cartesian natural philosophy, namely, the claim that the essence of matter is extension, could not have been, and was not meant to be, established in a purely a priorik way. (shrink)

'Those most capable of being moved by passion are those capable of tasting the most sweetness in this life.'Descartes is most often thought of as introducing a total separation of mind and body. But he also acknowledged the intimate union between them, and in his later writings he concentrated on understanding this aspect of human nature. The Passions of the Soul is his greatest contribution to this debate. It contains a profound discussion of the workings of the emotions (...) and of their place in human life - a subject that increasingly engages the interest of philosophers and intellectual and cultural historians. It also sets out a view of ethics that has been seen as a radical reorientation of moral philosophy.This volume also includes both sides of the correspondence with Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia, one of Descartes's keenest disciples and shrewdest critics, which played a crucial role in the genesis of The Passions, as well as the first part of The Principles of Philosophy, which sets out the key positions of Descartes's philosophical system.ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Martin Heidegger and OntologyEmmanuel Levinas (bio)The prestige of Martin Heidegger 1 and the influence of his thought on German philosophy marks both a new phase and one of the high points of the phenomenological movement. Caught unawares, the traditional establishment is obliged to clarify its position on this new teaching which casts a spell over youth and which, overstepping the bounds of permissibility, is already in vogue. For (...) once, Fame has picked one who deserves it and, for that matter, one who is still living. Anyone who has studied philosophy cannot, when confronted by Heidegger’s work, fail to recognize how the originality and force of his achievements, stemming from genius, are combined with an attentive, painstaking, and close working-out of the argument—with that craftsmanship of the patient artisan in which phenomenologists take such pride. In this study, it is important for us to understand, above all, the true intentions of our author, to illuminate what he thinks really needs to be said, and to surmise what is most critical for him.To get to the heart of Heidegger’s system, it seems fitting to begin with a problem that is generally familiar. We choose the problem of knowledge, a deeper understanding of which takes us to the very threshold of Heidegger’s thought. For this problem, central to modern philosophy, is one of the main obstacles of modern philosophy that Heidegger wishes to surmount. Neo-Kantianism, which takes knowledge as the philosophical problem of the first rank, is the movement against which Heidegger rebels with all his strength. We have, thus, every chance of gaining access to his thought by the main door, so to speak. Once inside the system we will try to trace its outlines, 2 reserving, for a second part of our work, the determination of Heidegger’s place in the history of ideas, especially in the phenomenological movement, as well as of his relations with the philosopher to whom he owes so much—Edmund Husserl. 31In its most general form, the problem of the theory of knowledge has a critical significance. It consists in delineating a domain where knowledge can be certain and in determining the criteria for the legitimate scope of knowledge. But this problem, as normal and as simple as it may appear, has deeper roots. That knowledge should need a criterion at all presupposes that truth is not identical to all that is known and that the course [End Page 11] of things can fail to correspond with the course of thought. “How does knowledge correspond to being?” is a more profound formulation of the problem of knowledge.But we are not going to touch anymore on the primordial phenomenon that generates the problem. The problem of correspondence between thing and thought presupposes a free activity of thought and its isolation in relation to the object. It is precisely this presupposition which renders their harmony and even their contact problematic. “How does the subject take leave of itself to attain the object?” is what the problem of knowledge, in the last analysis, boils down to. Its true source is thus the concept of “subject” as elaborated by modern philosophy. The cogito presided over the subject’s birth. The cogito was the affirmation of the privileged nature of the subject’s immanent sphere, of its unique place in existence; hence, the cogito was the specificity of the subject’s connection to the rest of reality, the sui generis nature which opens up the passage from immanence to transcendence, the passage from ideas contained in the thinking substance to 4 their “formal existence.”The concept of the subject, understood as a substance having a specific position in the entire domain of being, presents us with difficulties of two kinds. First, how do we understand this leave-taking from the self which the thinking substance brings about and which displays an entirely original aspect? Indeed, we could say that thought, in reaching out toward objects, does not actually take leave of itself, since its objects—considered as ideas and contents of thought—are, in a certain sense, already within it. In order to make sense of this paradox, Descartes... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 39.1 (2001) 49-75 [Access article in PDF] Sensible Ends:Latent Teleology in Descartes' Account of Sensation Alison Simmons One of Descartes' hallmark contributions to natural philosophy is his denunciation of teleology. It is puzzling, then, to find him arguing in Meditation VI that human beings have sensations in order to preserve the union of mind and body (AT VII 83). 1 This (...) appears to be just the sort of teleological explanation that he proscribes. Descartes' Anglo-American commentators have had little to say about the teleological overtones of his claims about sensation. His French commentators acknowledge these overtones, but seem largely untroubled by them. 2 It is worth pausing to be troubled, for a closer analysis reveals that Descartes' famous proscription against teleology is not as simple as it is generally thought to be. In the first half of this essay, I argue that Descartes advocates a genuinely teleological conception of the senses. My aim is not to charge Descartes with employing illicit teleology, but to argue that there is a place for teleology even in his revisionist natural philosophy. Accordingly, in the second half of this essay, I argue that Descartes' assault on teleological explanation is [End Page 49] not a sweeping assault on finality, but a more directed attack on particular uses of ends in natural philosophy. Descartes' assault leaves standing a form of teleological explanation that proves crucial to his own treatment of sensation. 1. Descartes' Rejection of Teleological Explanation at a Glance A teleological explanation is one that purports to account for something in terms of its ends or its function relative to the ends of the system of which it is a part. Aristotle's physics provides many classic examples: plants produce leaves for the protection of their fruit; spiders spin webs in order to catch food; animals grow sharp front teeth and dull back teeth in order to facilitate biting and chewing respectively; eyes are for seeing. According to Aristotle, all natural phenomena are directed toward ends and no explanation is complete without a teleological component that specifies the end for the sake of which the phenomenon occurs. Indeed ends take explanatory priorityover other causes: "Both causes [the end and the matter] must be stated by the student of nature, but especially the end; for that is the cause of the matter, not vice versa." 3 And: [T]he causes concerned in natural generation are, as we see, more than one. There is the cause for the sake of which [the end], and the cause whence the beginning of motion comes [the efficient cause]. Now we must decide which of these two causes comes first, which second. Plainly, however, that cause is the first which we call that for the sake of which. For this is the account of the thing, and the account forms the starting-point.4In other words, Aristotle argues that natural substances have the matter they do, have the parts or organs they do, are organized as they are and act as they do for the sake of their ends. To explain why things are as they are, the natural philosopher must therefore explain the ways in which they contribute to ends.Among the late scholastic Aristotelians familiar to Descartes there is considerable debate concerning the causal efficacy of ends. Genuine final causation, in which something is said to be acted on by an end, is limited to the intentional behavior of rational agents who consciously recognize their ends: only something that recognizes an end can be "moved" by one. Even here the sort of causation involved is peculiar: a rational agent is "moved" by an end insofar as the end induces a "metaphorical motion" toward (or desire for) the end in the agent's will. 5 While these scholastic Aristotelians resist attributing final causation [End Page 50] to non-rational creatures, they nevertheless persist in attributing ends to them. When Toletus, Rubio, the Coimbrans and Suarez take up the question whether nature acts propter finem, each answers it affirmatively: natural... (shrink)

‘The Image of Thought’ could be considered to be the most important piece of writing in the entire Deleuzian corpus. This is the chapter of Difference and Repetition that several decades later, Deleuze claims is the ‘most necessary and the most concrete’ (Deleuze 1994: xvii) section of the book, and the one that provides a basis for his later work with Guattari. Here, Deleuze engages with two basic issues. First, he separates out his conception of thinking, and with it, (...) philosophy, from prior philosophical approaches, explaining why the difference of his philosophy from prior systems itself differs from the traditional relationship between philosophical positions. Second, he raises the question of how one should begin to philosophise. As we will see, philosophy often operates by the recognition of implicit presuppositions in prior thinkers, and their refutation. Descartes, for instance, criticises Aristotle for presupposing the transparency of categories such as rational and animal. Kant, in turn, criticises Descartes for presupposing the determinability of his own foundational moment, the cogito. If we see the development of philosophy as the unmasking and critique of presuppositions of prior systems, then the endpoint of philosophy will be a system entirely without presuppositions. This is the goal Hegel aims at with his system of absolute idealism. Deleuze’s claim is that such a model of the progress of philosophy itself operates within one overarching assumption: the good will of thinking. In this essay, I want to relate these questions of thinking and beginnings to the work of one of Deleuze’s predecessors. Deleuze writes of Ludwig Feuerbach that ‘Feuerbach is among those who have pursued farthest the problem of where to begin.’ (Deleuze 1994: 319) As we shall see, prefiguring Deleuze, Feuerbach accuses Hegel of operating within ‘an image of Reason’. While Feuerbach is famous as a precursor of Marx, and for his critique of traditional accounts of religion, I want to here focus on an early piece by Feuerbach, his Critique of Hegelian Philosophy. Here Feuerbach sets out the limitations of traditional philosophical accounts, and provides the groundwork for his own later materialism. Deleuze discovered Feuerbach through his friend Althusser’s translation of his work, published in 1960. While many of the intuitions behind Deleuze’s critique of the image of thought can be found within a broader pantheon of thinkers, including Nietzsche, Bergson, and Foucault, the specific mechanics of Deleuze’s criticism bear a striking resemblance to the formulation of the critique of philosophy in Feuerbach’s earlier thought. I want to explore this connection, first by looking at the dialectical interrelation of two thinkers, Descartes and Hegel, to get a sense for how criticism in philosophy typically operates. I then want to move on to look at Feuerbach’s critique of Hegel and philosophy more generally, drawing out several aspects that will be taken up by Deleuze himself. I will then look at some of the ways in which Deleuze goes beyond Feuerbach by recognising some of the limitations that persist in Feuerbach’s own analysis. I will conclude by showing how Deleuze’s desire to think the two common acceptations of aesthetics together (the artistic and the sensible) bring Feuerbach into relation with an unexpected figure: the playwright and poet, Antonin Artaud. (shrink)

: Malebranche famously objects to Descartes' argument that the nature of the mind is better known than the nature of body as follows: if we had an idea of the mind's nature we would know the possible range of modes of the mind, including the sensory modes, but we do not know those modes and thus can't have an idea of the mind's nature. I argue that Malebranche's objections are readily answerable from within the Cartesian system. This argument (...) involves examining the status of sensations in Descartes, innate ideas, and Malebranche's occasionalism. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 39.3 (2001) 440-442 [Access article in PDF] Reinhard Lauth. Descartes ' Konzeption des Systems der Philosophie. Stuttgart (Bad Cannstatt): Frommann-Holzboog, 1998. Pp. x + 227 pp. Cloth, DM 64.00. Reinhard Lauth's Descartes ' Konzeption des Systems der Philosophie is an interesting addition to the literature on Descartes. Written by a renowned scholar of German Idealism, it does not represent an (...) attempt to respond to scholars of Descartes, to take part in the debate regarding aspects of Descartes's philosophy, nor to explain the role of Descartes's thought in the tumultuous seventeenth century, but rather to explain to scholars of German Idealism why Descartes should be considered the first and one of the greatest transcendental philosophers. It is no accident that in the index we find close to 50 references each to Kant and Fichte, while Descartes's important "rationalist" comrades, Spinoza and Leibniz, receive half as much attention; nor is it an accident that the first and last philosopher mentioned in the book is Fichte.Lauth's book is in the tradition of Gueroult's monumental Descartes selon l ' ordre des raisons (Paris, 1968, 2nd edition) and, as the title indicates, the subject of the book is Descartes's philosophy as a system, not as a collection of independent theses about various philosophical problems. However, unlike Gueroult, who concentrated on an [End Page 440] analysis of the Meditations, Lauth draws extensively on the Rules for the Direction of the Mind, Discourse on Method, Meditations, and Descartes's correspondence. That Descartes viewed philosophy as ideally constituting a system of human knowledge should not come as news to anyone who recalls Descartes's claim in the Preface to the Principles of Philosophy that all of philosophy is like a tree whose roots are metaphysics, trunk physics, and branches medicine, mechanics, and morals, or his claim in the Preface to the Meditations that there is a clear order of argumentation or reasons and that his goal is to lay bare the foundations of philosophy. How exactly Descartes's philosophy is to constitute a system is the trickier question that is Lauth's concern.According to Lauth, the order of reasons that one finds expressed in Descartes's first philosophy is not simply a series of biographical events, filling a psychological need in Descartes (cf. Alquié, La Découverte métaphysique de l ' homme chez Descartes [Paris, 1966]), but rather the "systematic path of the cogito itself" (X). And Lauth attempts to show that there is something inexorable in the way that conclusions about the world from the point of view of the thinking subject are made and follow from one another. This takes him along the well-known path of the Meditations: from the existence of the self, to the nature of the self, to the existence and nature of God, to the external world, and finally to the relation of mind and body. And here two interesting observations on Lauth's part should be singled out. First, Lauth does an admirable job in intimating the tension regarding the places of the thinking subject and God as the supreme principles in Descartes's system. On the one hand, it would seem that the thinking subject should be the highest principle in Descartes's philosophy insofar as its existence is the first thing known; but, according to Lauth, it cannot be the highest principle because it does not contain the principle of its own existence (76). On the other hand, if we claim that God is the highest principle then we must recognize that a system following from this principle must fail insofar as genuine knowledge of God surpasses the bounds of our finite, human knowledge (99-100). Second, in claiming that Descartes was a "transcendental philosopher," Lauth reminds us of the extent to which Descartes is concerned with the bounds of human knowledge as determinable from the thinking subject itself.While this work contains many useful insights—especially for those scholars of German Idealism who are looking for new ways of reflecting on their subject—it has... (shrink)

The chapter focuses on attributions of the transparency of thought to early modern figures, most notably Descartes. Many recent philosophers assume that Descartes believed the mind to be “transparent”: since all mental states are conscious, we are therefore aware of them all, and indeed incorrigibly know them all. Descartes, and Berkeley too, do make statements that seem to endorse both aspects of the transparency theses (awareness of all mental states; incorrigibility). However, they also make systematic theoretical (...) statements that directly countenance “unnoticed” thoughts or mental states, that is, thoughts or mental states of which the subject is unaware and has no knowledge. Descartes, having identified the essence of mind with thought or representation, distinguishes bare states of mind from states of which we have reflective awareness, thereby providing a theoretical tool for understanding both his seeming endorsement of transparency and his actual denial of it: Descartes distinguished between a basic perceptual state, or a basic awareness, and reflectively conscious states that involve explicit noticing and cognizing on the part of the subject. Leibniz (as is better known) directly endorsed a similar distinction between bare perception and reflective consciousness, using the term “perception” for the first and “apperception” for the second. In these cases, bare perceptions are not transparently available to the subject, and so in fact the subject does not have knowledge, hence does not have incorrigible knowledge, of all its occurrent mental states. This chapter gives evidence to support these claims; elaborates the complex psychology of the subject found in Descartes and other early moderns; and notes some ways in which these early moderns contributed to the genesis of the modern subject. Finally, it compares McDowell’s conception of the Cartesian mind with the conceptions of mind found in the writings of Descartes, Berkeley, and Leibniz, finding that his characterization caricatures the positions of early modern philosophers. McDowell's characterization has four elements: consciousness as essence of mind; intentionality as exclusively mental; the veil of perception; and the transparency of mind. Only the second point, about intentionality, fully fits Descartes. As a consequence of his own misdirection, McDowell misses the actual basis of his difficulty in connecting mind with world, which arises from a point of agreement between him and Descartes: the removal of intentionality from material sensory systems. But whereas Descartes could relocate (nonconceptual) sensory intentionality in mental states, McDowell is left to account for it with his overly cognitivized scheme of perceptual content as exclusively conceptual. (Paper first given at the European Society for Early Modern Philosophy, 2007.). (shrink)

Biopolitics as a System of Thought takes seriously Foucault's claim that biopolitics is the primary technique of government, the means by which the organisation of our social relations operates. Engaging with modern political discussions such as black lives matter and Roe v Wade, Richards draws from jurists such as Pierre Legendre, Yan Thomas, and philosophers such as Agamben, Arendt, Esposito to explore how the same institutions that offer rights protection can easily and without much notice, take them away.

This unique collection of readings provides a resource of primary source material, affording a survey of the history and systems of psychology from pre-Socratic thought to the present. Selected for accessibility, the 24 selections are organized to offer a representation of the historical sweep of psychological interpretations. After presenting approaches to the scholarly study of psychology's history, through an excerpt from Thomas Kuhn, the readings introduce the major themes of psychological inquiry in chronological fashion. The selections include the works (...) of: Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Rene Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, Immanuel Kant, Wilhelm Wundt, Franz Brentano, William James, John Dewey, Sigmund Freud, Ivan Pavlov, John Broadus Watson, B.F. Skinner, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Carl Rogers. Features: Introductory essays for each group of readings provide important historical, social, and cultural background and context. Sample questions encourage critical reflection on the issues raised by the authors. Compatibility with most textbooks in the history and systems of psychology. (shrink)

A careful analysis of the rhetorical thought of René Descartes and of a distinguished group of post-Cartesians. Covering a unique range of authors, including Bernard Lamy and Nicolas Malebranche, Carr attacks the idea, which has become commonplace in contemporary criticism, that the Cartesian system is incompatible with rhetoric. Carr analyzes the writings of Balzac, the Port-Royalists Arnauld and Nicole, Malebranche, and Lamy, exploring the evolution of Descartes’ thought into their different theories of rhetoric. He constructs (...) his arguments, probing each author’s writings on rhetoric, persuasion, and attention, to demonstrate the basis for rhetorical thought present in Descartes’ theory of persuasion when it is combined with his psychophysiology of attention. (shrink)

To confront the philosophical system of Rene Descartes is to contemplate a magnificently laid out map of human cognitive endeavour. In following Descartes arguments, the reader is drawn into some of the most fundamental and challenging issues in all of philosophy. In this dictionary, John Cottingham presents an alphabetied guide to this most stimulating and widely-studied of philosophers. He examines the key concepts and ideas in Cartesian thought and places them in the context both of the (...) seventeenth-century intellectual climate and of subsequent interpretation. The entries range over a wide variety of areas including cosmology, physics, theology, psychology and ethics. The book is designed to appeal to the newcomer to Descartes, whether student or general reader, while also providing detailed critical comment and precise textual references for the more advanced reader. Also included are a general introduction describing Descartes' life and works, and bibliographic guide to the Cartesian texts and the mass of interpretative literature on Descartes. (shrink)

Towards the end of his life, Descartes published the first four parts of a projected six-part work, The Principles of Philosophy. This was intended to be the definitive statement of his complete system of philosophy, dealing with everything from cosmology to the nature of human happiness. In this book, Stephen Gaukroger examines the whole system, and reconstructs the last two parts, 'On Living Things' and 'On Man', from Descartes' other writings. He relates the work to the (...) tradition of late Scholastic textbooks which it follows, and also to Descartes' other philosophical writings, and he examines the ways in which Descartes transformed not only the practice of natural philosophy but also our understanding of what it is to be a philosopher. His book is a comprehensive examination of Descartes' complete philosophical system. (shrink)

The scale of persona of Rene Descartes, who was the founder of several trends of philosophical thought, often overshadows the intellectual life of the era and the environment that gave rise to Cartesianism. At the same time, we observe a unique situation, when the philosophical doctrine being seized by the secular educated society, rather than the intellectual elite. The key condition for such impact of the philosophical system consists in the fact that the philosophy should meet the (...) demands the era and the environment it is proliferated within. Therefore, the author places Rene Descartes and some aspects of his philosophy in a specific historical context, pursuing correlation with the thoughts and ideas of his contemporaries. This method indicates how the philosophy of Descartes completes and structures the mental transformation that have already taken place or were taking place in French society. Descartes’ perception of his mission, his appeal to future generations, should not deceive or allow to forget that Descartes is not just philosopher with whom the finest minds of the next centuries are engaged into a dialogue or debate, but also a nobleman of the XVII, who responded to the demands of his time. It were not the complicated philosophical tasks that he tried to solve, but the particular answers that influenced and formed the European mentality of the Modern Age without the fact that the perception of his philosophy by the contemporaries would of fully correspond to its essence, and the impact correspond to the letter. Affected by the philosophy of Descartes, the society develops new behavioral norms that underlie the subconscious of modern culture; and from this space of the unsconsious affect the life of modern society. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Descartes’s Theory of MindEnrique Chávez-ArvizoDesmond M. Clarke. Descartes’s Theory of Mind. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2003. Pp. viii + 267. Cloth, $49.95.Desmond Clarke, commentator on Cartesian natural philosophy, has now published an interpretation of Descartes's dualism, a theme which can hardly be said to be underrepresented in the literature. The monograph is divided into nine chapters concerned with explanation, sensation, imagination and memory, the passions, the (...) will, language, thought, substance, and property dualism—yes, property dualism.The book pushes forward a reading of Descartes's theory of mind, made from a perspective which Clarke has adopted over the last three decades or so, that maintains that Descartes was primarily (and willingly) a scientist and incidentally (and reluctantly) a philosopher. From this viewpoint, according to Clarke, natural philosophy provides the paradigm for genuine explanation in Descartes's metaphysics. Furthermore, given that Descartes rejects Scholastic substantial forms and real qualities as explanatorily infertile and since substances are equally unfruitful, substances play no explanatory role in his system of philosophy. Substance dualism is not at the center of Descartes's philosophy of mind; his account of explanation is. This makes Descartes not a substance dualist; but a property dualist. So argues, in very broad strokes, Clarke. [End Page 116]Unlike us, Descartes did not draw a sharp distinction between philosophy and science. For him, these two realms of enquiry were part of a unified realm of knowledge, what he deemed scientia or philosophy in the wider sense. Hence his use of the instructive metaphor of philosophy as a tree, whose roots are metaphysics, the trunk physics, and the branches the other sciences which he reduces to three principal ones, namely medicine, mechanics, and morals (Letter Preface to Picot, French translation of the Principles of Philosophy, Oeuvres de Descartes, ed. C. Adam and P. Tannery [Paris: Vrin, 1989], 14). However, Descartes did distinguish the roots from the trunk, that is, metaphysics (or "first philosophy") from physics (or "natural philosophy"). Commentators on Descartes's system of philosophy ignore his natural philosophy at their peril, for it does shed considerable light on his metaphysics. But, likewise, Descartes's philosophy greatly illuminates his science. It is for this reason that I want to cast doubt on Clarke's apparent scientific imperialism in which Descartes's methodological, epistemological, and metaphysical concerns are forced to play second fiddle to his scientific views. We cannot neatly fit Descartes's metaphysical views into Clarke's scientific mold, nor can we force them in, without incurring serious error. I do not think that one has to choose between one and the other as being primary, between the tree of knowledge and the inverted tree of knowledge. We need to keep in mind that in Descartes's system of philosophy, both science and philosophy are interconnected and that both parts elucidate each other.Clarke's attempt to eliminate substance from Descartes's account of mind is problematic. True, the term 'substance' is an extremely ambiguous one and Descartes's comments about it are often blurred and puzzling. On the one hand, one must concede that the concept of substance plays a small role in Descartes's natural philosophy, in which although the material universe is depicted in terms of extended substance or res extensa, physics is ultimately unwrapped by way of laws describing the behavior of particles in virtue of their size, shape, and motion. But, in contrast, substance plays a far more prominent role in his metaphysics, not to mention in his theology. This leads to a related point. Clarke overlooks the importance of theology for Descartes's philosophical project and the role of God in Cartesian natural philosophy.The level of argument drops considerably in the final chapter, where Clarke offers an uncritical and not very clear survey of naming and necessity, the identity theory, anomalous monism, and property dualism. This chapter seems in tension with his disapproval of anachronistic readings of Descartes (8-9) and contains some serious slips. Clarke's answer to his own question "Was Descartes, then, a substance dualist" is a mind boggling "Yes and no" (258), and his claim that Descartes was a property dualist, collapses under... (shrink)

A careful analysis of the rhetorical thought of René Descartes and of a distinguished group of post-Cartesians. Covering a unique range of authors, including Bernard Lamy and Nicolas Malebranche, Carr attacks the idea, which has become commonplace in contemporary criticism, that the Cartesian system is incompatible with rhetoric. Carr analyzes the writings of Balzac, the Port-Royalists Arnauld and Nicole, Malebranche, and Lamy, exploring the evolution of Descartes’ thought into their different theories of rhetoric. He constructs (...) his arguments, probing each author’s writings on rhetoric, persuasion, and attention, to demonstrate the basis for rhetorical thought present in Descartes’ theory of persuasion when it is combined with his psychophysiology of attention. (shrink)

The main topic of this essay is symbolic mathematics or the method of symbolic construction, which I trace to the end of the sixteenth century when Franciscus Vieta invented the algebraic symbolism and started to use the word ‘symbolic’ in the relevant, non-ontological sense. This approach has played an important role for many of the great inventions in modern mathematics such as the introduction of the decimal place-value system of numeration, Descartes’ analytic geometry, and Leibniz’s infinitesimal calculus. It (...) was also central for the rigorization movement in mathematics in the late nineteenth century, as well as for the mathematics of modern physics in the 20th century.However, the nature of symbolic mathematics has been concealed and confused due to the strong influence of the heritage from the Euclidean and Aristotelian traditions. This essay sheds some light on what has been concealed by approaching some of the crucial issues from a historical perspective. Furthermore, I argue that the conception of modern mathematics as symbolic mathematics was essential to Wittgenstein’s approach to the foundations and nature of mathematics. This connection between Wittgenstein’s thought and symbolic mathematics provides the resources for countering the still prevalent view that he defended an uttrely idiosyncratic conception, disconnected from the progress of serious science. Instead, his project can be seen as clarifying ideas that have been crucial to the development of mathematics since early modernity. (shrink)

"Margaret L. King has put together a highly representative selection of readings from most of the more significant—but by no means the most obvious—texts by the authors who made up the movement we have come to call the 'Enlightenment.' They range across much of Europe and the Americas, and from the early seventeenth century until the end of the eighteenth. In the originality of the choice of texts, in its range and depth, this collection offers both wide coverage and striking (...) insights into the intellectual transformation which has done more than any other to shape the world in which we live today. It is _simply the best introduction to the subject now available_."_ —Anthony Pagden, UCLA, and author of _The Enlightenment and Why It Still Matters_ Contents:_ Chronology, Introduction _Chapter One - Casting Out Idols: 1620–1697_ _Idols, or false notions: _Francis Bacon, _The New Instrument_ _I think, therefore I am: _René Descartes, Discourse on Method _God, or Nature: _Baruch Spinoza, _Ethics_ _The system of the world: _Isaac Newton, _Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy_ _He searched for truth throughout his life: _Pierre Bayle, _Historical and Critical Dictionary_ _Chapter Two - _The Learned Maid: 1638–1740 _A face raised toward heaven:_ Anna Maria van Schurman, _Whether the Study of Letters Befits a Christian Woman_ _The worlds I have made:_ Margaret Cavendish, _The Blazing World_ _A finer sort of cattle:_ Bathsua Makin, _An Essay to Revive the Ancient Education of Gentlewomen_ _I warn you of the world:_ Madame de Maintenon, _Letter: On the Education of the Demoiselles of Saint-Cyr_, and _Instruction: On the World_ _The daybreak of your reason:_ Émilie Du Châtelet, _Fundamentals of Physics_ _Chapter Three - _A State of Perfect Freedom: 1689–1695 _The chief criterion of the True Church:_ John Locke, _Letter on Toleration_ _Freedom from any superior power on earth:_ John Locke, _Second Treatise on Civil Government_ _A white paper, with nothing written on it:_ John Locke, _Essay Concerning Human Understanding_ _Let your rules be as few as possible:_ John Locke, _Some Thoughts Concerning Education_ _From death, Jesus Christ restores all to life:_ John Locke, _The Reasonableness of Christianity, as Delivered in the Scriptures_ _Chapter Four - All Things Made New: 1725–1784_ _In the wilderness, they are reborn:_ Giambattista Vico, _The New Science_ _Without these Names, nothing can be known,_ Carl Linnaeus, _System of Nature_ _All the clouds at last are lifted:_ Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, _The Successive Advancement of the Human Mind_ _A genealogical or encyclopedic tree of knowledge:_ Jean le Rond d’Alembert, _Preliminary Discourse_ _Dare to know! :_ Immanuel Kant, _What Is Enlightenment?_ _Chapter Five - Mind, Soul, and God: 1740–1779_ _The narrow limits of human understanding:_ David Hume, _Anof a Book Lately Published_ _The soul is but an empty word:_ Julien Offray de La Mettrie, _Man a Machine_ _All is reduced to sensation:_ Claude Adrien Helvétius, _On the Mind_ _An endless web of fantasies and falsehoods:_ Paul-Henri Thiry, baron d’Holbach, _Common Sense_ _Let each believe that his own ring is real:_ Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, _Nathan the Wise_ _Chapter Six - Crush That Infamous Thing: 1733–1764_ _This is the country of sects:_ Voltaire, _Philosophical Letters_ _Disfigured by myth, until enlightenment comes:_ Voltaire, _The Culture and Spirit of Nations_ _The best of all possible worlds:_ Voltaire, _Candide_ _Are we not all children of the same God?:_ Voltaire, _Treatise on Tolerance_ _If a book displeases you, refute it! :_ Voltaire, _Philosophical Dictionary_ _Chapter Seven - Toward the Greater Good: 1748–1776_ _Things must be so ordered that power checks power,_ Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu, _The Spirit of the Laws_ _Complete freedom of trade must be ensured:_ François Quesnay, _General Maxims for the Economic Management of an Agricultural Kingdom_ _The nation's war against the citizen: Cesare_ Beccaria, _On Crimes and Punishments_ _There is no peace in the absence of justice:_ Adam Ferguson, _An Essay on the History of Civil Society_ _Led by an invisible hand:_ Adam Smith, _An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations_ _Chapter Eight - Encountering Others: 1688–1785_ _Thus died this great man:_ Aphra Behn, _Oroonoko: or The Royal Slave_ _Not one sins the less for not being Christian: _Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, _Embassy Letters_ _Do you not restore to them their liberty?:_ Guillaume-Thomas Raynal, _Philosophical and Political History of European Colonies and Commerce in the Two Indies_ _Some things which are rather interesting:_ Captain James Cook, _Voyage towards the South Pole, and Round the World_ _The inner genius of my being:_ Johann Gottfried von Herder, _Ideas for a Philosophy of the History of Humankind_ _Chapter - Nine Citizen of Geneva: 1755–1782_ _The most cunning project ever to enter the human mind: _Jean-Jacques Rousseau, _Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Human Inequality_ _The supreme direction of the General Will:_ Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract _Two lovers from a small town at the foot of the Alps,_ Jean-Jacques Rousseau, _Julie, or the New Heloise_ _Build a fence around your child’s soul:_ Jean-Jacques Rousseau, _Emile, or On Education_ _This man will be myself:_ Jean-Jacques Rousseau, _Confessions_ _Chapter Ten - Vindications of Women: 1685–1792_ _No higher design than to get her a husband:_ Mary Astell, _Reflections on Marriage_ _The days of my bondage begin:_ Anna Stanisławska, _Orphan Girl_ _A dying victim dragged to the altar:_ Denis Diderot, _The Nun_ _Created to be the toy of man:_ Mary Wollstonecraft, _Vindication of the Rights of Woman_ _Man, are you capable of being just?:_ Olympe de Gouges, _Declaration of the Rights of Woman as Citizen_ _Chapter Eleven - American Reverberations: 1771–1792_ _I took upon me to assert my freedom:_ Benjamin Franklin, _Autobiography_ _Freedom has been hunted round the globe:_ Thomas Paine, _Common Sense_ _Endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights:_ Thomas Jefferson and Others, _Declaration of Independence_ _A safeguard against faction and insurrection:_ James Madison, _Federalist No. 10_ _An end to government by force and fraud:_ Thomas Paine, _The Rights of Man_ _Chapter Twelve - Enlightenment's End: 1790–1794_ _A partnership of the living, the dead, and those unborn:_ Edmund Burke, _Reflections on the Revolution in France_ _The future destiny of the human species:_ Nicolas de Condorcet, _A Sketch of a Historical Portrait of the Progress of the Human Mind_ Texts and Studies, Index. 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This is a review of Stephen Gaukroger's book Descartes's System of Natural Philosophy.

Western thought since the seventeenth century has been dominated by methodological solipsism (Krieger, 1991). The famous sound-bite of René Descartes 'cogito, ergo sum': 'I think, therefore I am', became the starting point for most discourse on the nature of things. This dictum does not advocate idealism. It does not assert that everything is necessarily a construct of the human mind. But it assumes that the world of things and beings is surveyed and interpreted from the point of view (...) of a single individual. Nowhere is this stance more entrenched than in the philosophy of science. To a remarkable degree the scientist is represented as studying the natural world as if alone in it, served only by mindless assistants who might as well be replaced by machines. Scientific theories are presented as systems of thought conjured up and tested by that same individual in a further series of single-headed operations. Research results are formulated and treated philosophically as the independent findings of lone explorers, each reporting the evidence of their own eyes and their rational inferences concerning the hidden mechanisms by which these personal percepts might be generated. Our epistemological role models are Robinson Crusoe and Sherlock Holmes, self-sufficient intellectuals to whom their human companions, Friday and Watson, are mere stooges. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.4 (2003) 558-559 [Access article in PDF] Stephen Gaukroger. Descartes' System of Natural Philosophy. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. viii + 258. Cloth, $60.00. Paper, $22.00. Stephen Gaukroger, author of a definitive biography of Descartes, has now written an excellent account of Descartes's natural philosophy as presented in his Principia philosophiae. Gaukroger claims that the roots of (...) modernity lay in the philosophies of Francis Bacon and René Descartes, both of whom regarded natural philosophy, rather than either moral philosophy or metaphysics, as the core of the philosophical enterprise. Whereas Bacon developed his ideas from a background steeped in the writings of the Renaissance humanists who emphasized moral philosophy, Descartes developed his ideas in the context of Scholastic philosophy, particularly the textbooks of the Jesuits that he had encountered at La Flèche and that located the foundations of philosophy in metaphysics.Regarding the unpublished early works, Le monde and L'homme, as suppressed parts of Descartes's mature project and taking seriously Descartes's stated intention of dealing with living things and humans along with the physical world in his natural philosophy, Gaukroger presents a detailed account of this "complete" version of the Principia philosophiae. In a series of six chapters, he explicates Descartes's views on the principles of knowledge, the principles of material objects, the visible universe, the Earth, living things, and man. In addition to Le monde and L'homme, Gaukroger draws on Les Passions de l'âme as an important source for Descartes's views on human nature.Gaukroger situates Descartes's natural philosophy in the context of the Scholastic textbook tradition in a chapter preceding his account of the Principa philosophiae. He delves into the history of medieval universities, the place of natural philosophy in the medieval curriculum, and the changing relationship between metaphysics and natural philosophy, particularly after the Condemnations of 1277. Difficulties in reconciling Aristotelian natural philosophy and Christian theology, which had been formulated in terms of Aristotelian metaphysics, continued into the sixteenth century and provided the immediate background to the Jesuit commentaries and textbooks to which Descartes was exposed as a student. In these works, Jesuit philosophers attempted to derive a coherently unified Christian Aristotelianism from first principles. Gaukroger reminds us that Descartes's Principia philosophiae was a deliberate attempt to replace these Jesuit textbooks with one based on mechanistic principles.Despite the strength of Gaukroger's book as a contextualized study of a major philosophical figure who is frequently treated in an entirely ahistorical way, the book is not without its problems. The main problem is one that plagues many studies of Descartes (and other canonical figures in the history of philosophy), to wit, the presumption that he is somehow unique. For example, Gaukroger writes at length about Descartes's views about the differences between animals and humans with regard to cognition, arguing that Descartes did not consider animals to be automata because they lack rational souls but rather that they actually experience some but not all of the more abstract or reflexive forms of cognition usually ascribed to humans. Gaukroger does not mention the fact that many other early modern philosophers held a view like this. For example, Descartes's contemporary and fellow mechanical philosopher Pierre Gassendi claimed that animals could know universals, as when a dog recognizes that it is a human that is approaching, but differ from humans in not being capable of contemplating the nature of universality per se. Descartes was part of a community of thinkers concerned with similar problems, and his natural philosophy can be illuminated by viewing him in that context as well as against the backdrop of Scholasticism.Gaukroger underplays the significance of theology for Descartes's philosophy. Although he discusses how God's attributes, especially immutability, provide the basis for Descartes's laws of motion, he does not explore the specific aspects of Descartes's theological presuppositions and the way they influenced his entire natural philosophical project. Gaukroger repeats the received view that "One of the principal tasks of a mechanistic natural philosophy... (shrink)

The problem of the person may be described as the crux of Descartes' philosophy in the fairly obvious literal sense that it is the point of intersection of the two chief axes of the system, the Philosophy of Nature and the Philosophy of Mind. The actual, if not professed aim of the former is the ousting of the occult powers and faculties of Scholastic-Aristotelian physics by the mechanical concept of force or action-by-contact. The chief tenet of the latter (...) is that mind, whose essence is thinking, is clearly and distinctly conceivable apart from matter, the essence of which is extension. From this, by an illicit inference which need not concern us further, Descartes concludes that the mind is “really distinct” from matter, that is, a substance capable of existing apart from body in its own right. Where these two lines of thought meet, the problem of the person constitutes itself in the following manner. (shrink)

This volume takes cue from the idea that the thought of no philosopher can be understood without considering it as the result of a constant, lively dialogue with other thinkers, both in its internal evolution as well as in its reception, re-use, and assumption as a starting point in addressing past and present philosophical problems. In doing so, it focuses on a feature that is crucially emerging in the historiography of early modern philosophy and science, namely the complexity in (...) the production of knowledge. The book explores the applicability of this approach to a long-considered armchair philosopher, namely René Descartes, who is now more and more understood as a full-blown scientist, networker, and intellectual éminence grise rather than as the mere philosopher of the cogito, as well as the originator of different ‘Cartesianisms’ which encompassed many ideas and approaches for long captured by dichotomic historiographical categories as rationalism and empiricism, or speculative and experimental philosophy. The essays gathered in the volume aim to address the ways in which Descartes’s philosophy evolved and was progressively understood by scientists, philosophers, and intellectuals from different contexts and eras, either by considering direct interlocutors of Descartes such as Isaac Beeckman and Elisabeth of Bohemia, early modern thinkers who developed upon his ideas and on particular topics as Nicolas Malebranche or Thomas Willis, those who adapted his overall methodology in developing new systems of knowledge as Johannes Clauberg and Pierre-Sylvain Régis, and contemporary thinkers from continental and analytic traditions like Emanuele Severino and Peter Strawson. (shrink)

In this work I defend, not the content, but, rather, the logical coherence of Descartes’s system by insisting on the ontological priority of substance over attributes in spite of the fact that Descartes seems, on occasion, to suggest otherwise. This, in turn, however, allows us to better grasp the nature of Descartes’ Augustinian conception of the soul, and what it might resemble should it be granted God’s concurrence, and, thus, eternal life. At the same time, I (...) demonstrate, by means of his Thomistic inheritance, the philosophically sound reasons why Descartes leaves these issues somewhat opaque. Finally, these reflections lead us to Nietzsche, and by contrasting the latter’s thoughts on science and freedom to those of Descartes we are led to what, for Nietzsche, would be the ultimate desideratum of such Cartesian longings for the ‘tranquility’ and ‘happiness’ of life-everlasting: a ‘will to nothingness.’. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 43.1 (2005) 1-19 [Access article in PDF] God's Immutability and the Necessity of Descartes's Eternal Truths Dan Kaufman Descartes's doctrine of the creation of the eternal truths (henceforth "the Creation Doctrine") has been thought to be a particularly problematic doctrine, both internally inconsistent and detrimental to Descartes's system as a whole. According to the Creation Doctrine, the eternal (...) truths, such as the truths of mathematics and those concerning true and immutable natures, are freely created by God.1 The Creation Doctrine has led several scholars to think that Descartes held (or was committed to) the view that the eternal truths are not necessary truths; in fact, there are no necessary truths if Descartes is correct.2 [End Page 1]In fact, however, Descartes held both of the following.The eternal truths are freely created by God.The eternal truths are necessarily true.That Descartes held (1) is uncontroversial; in fact, it is the characteristic thesis of his Creation Doctrine. However, his commitment to (2) is more controversial. I believe the controversy surrounding (2) arises precisely because Descartes' acceptance of (1) is so uncontroversial. That is, some have thought that his acceptance of (1) eliminates any possibility of accepting (2). This view is mistaken. In several texts, it is clear that Descartes believes that the eternal truths are necessarily true; this is especially noticeable in the 2 May 1644 letter to Mesland (AT IV 118; CSMK 235). The task, then, is to account for the necessity of the eternal truths within the confines of the Creation Doctrine; that is, to explain the fact that (2) is true, given that (1) is true.3 Unfortunately, Descartes says precious little about this issue. To make matters worse, there is a scarcity of treatments of this issue in the literature; and the literature that does address this issue tends to treat it quickly and vaguely, perhaps recognizing the difficulty of addressing it in any detail. In this paper, I attempt to remedy this unfortunate situation.I begin by examining the most prominent interpretation of Descartes's explanation of the necessity of the eternal truths: the Immutability Interpretation.4 This interpretation is given by Margaret Osler and most prominently by Edwin Curley.5 According to this interpretation, the eternal truths are necessarily true because they are created by God, and God's will is immutable. I will show that this interpretation is incorrect: It is either too weak to explain the necessity of the eternal truths or it is too strong in that it would commit Descartes to necessitarianism, [End Page 2] a view he does not hold.6 I also show that some suggestions for salvaging the Immutability Interpretation fall short. In the final section I present an alternative interpretation. My interpretation has a firm basis in Descartes's texts, does not have the shortcomings of the Immutability Interpretation, and has several virtues of its own. 1. Immutability Before examining the role, if any, that God's immutability actually plays in Descartes's explanation of the necessity of the eternal truths, it may be helpful to have a working account of God's immutability. To be immutable is not merely to be unchanging, but rather to be unable to change. That is: I1: x is immutable iff x is essentially unchanging.7We must recognize, however, that there are extrinsic and relational properties that a thing may acquire or lose without any real change in the thing; that is, there are so-called Cambridge changes that something may undergo without thereby being mutable. For example if x is five feet tall at t and x is five foot five at some later time t´, then x has really changed; but if x is not an uncle at t and x is an uncle at some later time t´, then x has not really changed in virtue of acquiring this property. The idea is that there are some properties which are, to use Edward Wierenga's and Nicholas Wolterstorff's term, "change... (shrink)

Central to Descartes’ philosophy is a view about immutable essences and eternal truths. After mentioning a Platonist account of recollection in Meditation V, Descartes declares that the ideas we have of mathematical notions “are not my invention but have their own true and immutable natures” (AT VII, 64/CSM II, 44).Descartes claims that other important philosophical notions, such as God, mind, body, and human free will (AT VII, 68; AT VIII-2, 348; AT III, 383; AT VII, 433, respectively), (...) also have immutable natures or essences. Although Descartes says a good many things about this view, nowhere does he offer definitive doctrine on the matter, and in fact frequently confuses his reader with apparently inconsistent pronouncements about immutable natures and eternal truths. In this essay, I focus on the immutable natures and propose a solution to two of the main problems associated with Descartes’ position, the metaphysical status of immutable natures and the purported indivisibility of their existence as ideas in the mind. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to suggest how the internal logic and dynamics of the development of Cartesian philosophy can be reconstructed by means of the historical-theoretical analysis of one of the most forgotten lines of reception of Cartesianism, leading through the philosophy of British thinkers minorum gentium: Arthur Collier, John Norris, Richard Burthogge etc. Such analysis of the particular stages of the evolution of post-Cartesian thought – within one intellectual-cultural context, makes it possible to situate Berkeley’s (...) class='Hi'>system (considered as a culminating point of the development of post-Cartesian British idealism) in the stream of the widely understood Cartesian thought. At the same time the analysis provides sufficient data to draw some general conclusions regarding the logic of the development of Cartesian-inspired philosophical systems. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Cartesian Philosophy and the Conduct of Life Putting the Pieces of Descartes's Ethical Writings Together: Cartesian Virtue Ethics Key Texts The “Perfect Moral System” and the Morale Par Provision Cartesian Virtue Descartes's Virtue Ethics and His Metaphysics and Epistemology, Revisited Conclusion Notes References and Further Reading.

My goal is to illustrate Descartes’ reliance on two quite different and competing interpretations of objective reality by explaining how each is used in defending his causal axioms. The initial criticism comes from Caterus (and is later taken up by Gassendi) who charges that Descartes makes it appear as if the thought in its objective aspect (the intentional entity) is really distinct from the thought qua modification of the mind (i.e., the thought in its formal (...) aspect). This implies that the object-of-the-thought is actually distinct from the thought-of-the-object in which case, (a) Descartes cannot account for the purported relation between the two, and (b) the intentional entity must exemplify properties which belong neither “immaterially” to mental substance nor concretely to physical substance. Descartes rejects Caterus’ assessment of his position: he has not introduced a fourth kind of real entity into the causal order distinct from the mind, its modifications, and the physical object thought of. However, in responding to Caterus, Descartes implicitly appeals to a Suarezian theory of intentionality in which reference to the ostensibly separate reality of the objective entity is reducible to the formal concept: the thought-of-the-object is not really distinct from the object-of-thought. Clearly, Descartes cannot explicitly use the Suarezian theory because it relies on a system of causal explanation (the doctrine of the species “flitting through the air”) which Descartes rejects on scientific grounds. I shall argue that Descartes is committed to a notion of the “form” of the mind, viz., a modification of mind, which should allow for a non-relational modeling of the thought qua modification of the mind and its intentional object, but that he cannot consistently attribute to mental acts enough structure to support his theory. (shrink)

My goal is to illustrate Descartes’ reliance on two quite different and competing interpretations of objective reality by explaining how each is used in defending his causal axioms. The initial criticism comes from Caterus (and is later taken up by Gassendi) who charges that Descartes makes it appear as if the thought in its objective aspect (the intentional entity) is really distinct from the thought qua modification of the mind (i.e., the thought in its formal (...) aspect). This implies that the object-of-the-thought is actually distinct from the thought-of-the-object in which case, (a) Descartes cannot account for the purported relation between the two, and (b) the intentional entity must exemplify properties which belong neither “immaterially” to mental substance nor concretely to physical substance. Descartes rejects Caterus’ assessment of his position: he has not introduced a fourth kind of real entity into the causal order distinct from the mind, its modifications, and the physical object thought of. However, in responding to Caterus, Descartes implicitly appeals to a Suarezian theory of intentionality in which reference to the ostensibly separate reality of the objective entity is reducible to the formal concept: the thought-of-the-object is not really distinct from the object-of-thought. Clearly, Descartes cannot explicitly use the Suarezian theory because it relies on a system of causal explanation (the doctrine of the species “flitting through the air”) which Descartes rejects on scientific grounds. I shall argue that Descartes is committed to a notion of the “form” of the mind, viz., a modification of mind, which should allow for a non-relational modeling of the thought qua modification of the mind and its intentional object, but that he cannot consistently attribute to mental acts enough structure to support his theory. (shrink)

My goal is to illustrate Descartes’ reliance on two quite different and competing interpretations of objective reality by explaining how each is used in defending his causal axioms. The initial criticism comes from Caterus (and is later taken up by Gassendi) who charges that Descartes makes it appear as if the thought in its objective aspect (the intentional entity) is really distinct from the thought qua modification of the mind (i.e., the thought in its formal (...) aspect). This implies that the object-of-the-thought is actually distinct from the thought-of-the-object in which case, (a) Descartes cannot account for the purported relation between the two, and (b) the intentional entity must exemplify properties which belong neither “immaterially” to mental substance nor concretely to physical substance. Descartes rejects Caterus’ assessment of his position: he has not introduced a fourth kind of real entity into the causal order distinct from the mind, its modifications, and the physical object thought of. However, in responding to Caterus, Descartes implicitly appeals to a Suarezian theory of intentionality in which reference to the ostensibly separate reality of the objective entity is reducible to the formal concept: the thought-of-the-object is not really distinct from the object-of-thought. Clearly, Descartes cannot explicitly use the Suarezian theory because it relies on a system of causal explanation (the doctrine of the species “flitting through the air”) which Descartes rejects on scientific grounds. I shall argue that Descartes is committed to a notion of the “form” of the mind, viz., a modification of mind, which should allow for a non-relational modeling of the thought qua modification of the mind and its intentional object, but that he cannot consistently attribute to mental acts enough structure to support his theory. (shrink)

La critique cartésienne de la logique est souvent reconduite à celle du syllogisme et d’une dialectique dont l’Organon aristotélicien fournit l’exposé canonique. On veut montrer ici, en resituant le propos cartésien dans son cheminement initial , que cette critique vise aussi, sinon en premier lieu, une conception alternative d’inspiration lulliste qui tend à s’imposer dans la Schulmetaphysik allemande contemporaine, et par le biais de laquelle celle-ci, déjà, prétend pouvoir se constituer en système encyclopédique du savoir. Le point culminant de cette (...) critique ne se trouve nullement dans le rappel de l’humaine finitude, et la dénonciation d’une vaine prétention à l’omniscience, car l’universalité de la méthode cartésienne lui permet tout aussi bien de viser la connaissance de toutes choses, même les plus « cachées » et les plus « éloignées ». Il se trouve en revanche dans une théorie des « natures simples » , qu’on peut juger lacunaire et inachevée au vu de l’incapacité apparente de Descartes à en établir la nomenclature exacte. Mais le statut propre de la logique cartésienne est indissociablement lié à celui de ces « natures simples » et au refus motivé d’en établir une liste exhaustive.Descartes’ criticism of logic is often reduced to criticism of syllogism and to the dialectic which can be perfectly represented and illustrated in Aristotle’s Organon. Going back to the very roots of Descartes’ thought , this article tries to demonstrate that above all else, his criticism also includes an alternative representation of logic widely diffused in contemporary German Schulmetaphysik which asserts itself as an encyclopaedic knowledge system. The climax of this criticism does not consist in the idea of human finitude nor in the pretension of universal knowledge. In fact universality of Descartes’ method can be applied to everything, even the « deepest » and « most distant » ones. This climax lies in the theory of « simple natures » which can be judged as incomplete as regards Descartes’ apparent inability to establish an exact list and description. Nevertheless, the exact status of Descartes’ logic is precisely linked to the status of these simples natures and to Descartes’ conscious refusal to establish a list. (shrink)

John Cottingham explores central areas of Descartes's rich and wide-ranging philosophical system, including his accounts of thought and language, of freedom and action, of our relationship to the animal domain, and of human morality and the conduct of life. He also examines ways in which his philosophy has been misunderstood. The Cartesian mind-body dualism that is so often attacked is only a part of Descartes's account of what it is to be a thinking, sentient, human creature, (...) and the way he makes the division between the mental and the physical is considerably more subtle, and philosophically more appealing, than is generally assumed. Although Descartes is often considered to be one of the heralds of our modern secular worldview, the 'new' philosophy which he launched retains many links with the ideas of his predecessors, not least in the all-pervasive role it assigns to God (something that is ignored or downplayed by many modern readers); and the character of the Cartesian outlook is multifaceted, sometimes anticipating Enlightenment ideas of human autonomy and independent scientific inquiry, but also sometimes harmonizing with more traditional notions of human nature as created to find fulfilment in harmony with its creator. (shrink)

The Cartesian concept of nature, which has determined modern thinking until the present time, has become obsolete. It shall be shown that Hegel's objective-idealistic conception of nature discloses, in comparison to that of Descartes, new perspectives for the comprehension of nature and that this, in turn, results in possibilities of actualizing Hegel's philosophy of nature. If the argumentation concerning philosophy of nature is intended to catch up with the concrete Being-of-nature and to meet it in its concretion, then this (...) is impossible for the finite spirit in a strictly a priori sense – this is the thesis supported here which is not at all close to Hegel. As the argumentation rather has to consider the conditions of realization concerning the Being-of-nature, too, it is compelled to take up empirical elements – concerning the organism, for instance, system-theoretical aspects, physical and chemical features of the nervous system, etc. With that, on the one hand, empirical-scientific premises are assumed (e.g. the lawlikeness of nature), which on the other hand become (now close to Hegel) possibly able to be founded in the frame of a Hegelian-idealistic conception. In this sense, a double strategy of empirical-scientific concretization and objective-idealistic foundation is followed up, which represents the methodical basic principle of the developed considerations. In the course of the undertaking, the main aspects of the whole Hegelian design concerning the philosophy of nature are considered – space and time, mass and motion, force and law of nature, the organism, the pro-blem of evolution, psychic being – as well as Hegel's basic thesis concerning the philosophy of nature, that therein a tendency toward coherence and idealization manifests itself in the sense of a (categorically) gradually rising succession of nature: from the separateness of space to the ideality of sensation. In the sense of the double strategy of concretization and foundation it is shown that on the one hand possibilities of philosophical penetration concerning actual empirical-scientific results are opened, and on the other hand – in turn – a re-interpretation of Hegel's theorem on the basis of physical, evolution-theoretical and system-theoretical argumentation also becomes possible. In this mutual crossing-over and elucidation of empirical and Hegelian argumentation not only do perspectives of a new comprehension of nature become visible, but also, at the same time – as an essential consequence of this methodical principle – thoughts on the possibilities of actualizing Hegel's philosophy of nature. (shrink)

In Principia Philosophiae I 9, Descartes defines “thought” as follows: “By the name ‘thought’ I understand all that which happens in us such that we are conscious of it, insofar as there is consciousness of it in us”. I inquire how to read the "insofar as" in this definition.

The authors find East Asians to be holistic, attending to the entire field and assigning causality to it, making relatively little use of categories and formal logic, and relying on "dialectical" reasoning, whereas Westerners, are more analytic, paying attention primarily to the object and the categories to which it belongs and using rules, including formal logic, to understand its behavior. The 2 types of cognitive processes are embedded in different naive metaphysical systems and tacit epistemologies. The authors speculate that the (...) origin of these differences is traceable to markedly different social systems. The theory and the evidence presented call into question long-held assumptions about basic cognitive processes and even about the appropriateness of the process–content distinction. (shrink)

Epistemic interactivism, an aspect of the epistemology of representation, is a cognitive intercourse between the subject and person-object of knowledge that underlies the conception of a person in Esan thought. Traditional theories of representation (especially as presented by Descartes and Locke) separated the subject from the object of knowledge, and classified persons and non-persons as object of knowledge. This separation and classification ignored the cognitive and moral values of persons, disengaged the subject from the world and burden the (...) self with solitude and isolation, and created propositional knowledge that dehumanised the relationship between the subject and person-object of knowledge. Within the theoretical framework of Hegel's epistemic interactivism (meliorated by Bowne's personalism) and Esan epistemology (in African philosophy), this book exposes the epistemic interactivism of Esan thought which unified the subject and person-object of knowledge on cognitive and moral grounds; thus providing adequate basis for personhood and resolving the dehumanised relationship between the subject and person-object of knowledge in the traditional theories of representation. Within the context of epistemic injustices, this book analyses the interactivist epistemology of indigenous Esan thought as an alternative epistemological conception of the person-object of knowledge which resolves the deficiency of the traditional theories of representation. (shrink)

Gregorio Baldin’s book, La croisée des savoirs, concerns the intellectual relations among Hobbes, Mersenne, and Descartes. The study is limited to the time between 1634 and 1648, starting when Hobbes first met Mersenne in Paris and ending when Mersenne died. It covers three main topics. Part i is devoted to the relations maintained by Hobbes with the circle of Mersenne during 1634–1636, which Baldin thinks are essential for the development of Hobbes’ scientific thought. Part ii develops the theme (...) of the “hidden” influence of Mersenne on Hobbes’ thought, highlighting points of contact between the two authors, such as mechanism, research in optics, and their approach to epistemology. Part iii concerns Hobbes’ influence on Mersenne’s thought. It addresses several themes, starting with Mersenne’s interest in Hobbes’ system, the attitudes of Mersenne, Gassendi, and Hobbes toward Cartesian metaphysics, and ending with scientific themes debated in Mersenne’s circle during the 1640s. (shrink)

Cottingham aims to present Descartes' philosophy in a way that makes "the issues reasonably accessible to students who may be approaching the Cartesian system for the first time". He also aims to do "justice to the complexities of argument involved". There is a potential conflict here: making the issues accessible can lead one to oversimplify them; capturing the complexities of Descartes' thought can cause one to leave inexperienced readers behind. When the conflict arises, Cottingham routinely picks (...) accessibility over philosophical complexity. As a result, his book is not as philosophically sophisticated as other commentaries, such as E. M. Curley's, Margaret Wilson's and Bernard Williams's, but it is a superb introduction to Descartes' philosophy for the uninitiated. Cottingham places Descartes' philosophical ideas within the context of the intellectual climate of his time and shows the interrelations between major elements of Descartes' system, from his epistemology to his view of the physical universe to his physiological and psychological theories. The book's only drawback as an introduction is its limited bibliography. Many who read this book will be inspired to learn more; a more extensive, perhaps topically organized, bibliography would have helped them get started. (shrink)

This little book which is a sequel to "Cartesianism" is not written for professional philosophers. Its less ambitious purpose is to initiate undergraduate students of Catholic Universities and Colleges, who are engaged in the study of scholastic philosophy, into a knowledge of the fundamental principles of those numerous systems that have contributed to the chaos of modern thought from the time of Descartes to the present day.

ANGLO-AMERICAN PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE has tended to define itself squarely against the kinds of so-called metaphysical approaches that have characterized so-called continental philosophy in the line of descent from Husserl. Indeed, Husserl’s project of phenomenological enquiry was the target of criticism by Frege—and later by Gilbert Ryle—which pretty much set the agenda for subsequent debate. That project seemed to them some form of argument that reveals his basically psychologistic approach, one that purported to address issues of truth, validity, rational warrant, (...) and so forth, but which fell far short of the logical rigor attained by thinkers in the analytic tradition. Thus Husserl might claim—like Descartes and Kant before him—to be raising questions about the a priori forms of human knowledge and experience, forms that were given or necessarily presupposed in every possible act of cognition. Moreover, he might claim to have advanced beyond Kant in distinguishing more clearly between formal and transcendental logic, or judgments whose necessity follows from the ground rules of this or that logically binding system of thought, and judgments that result from a rigorous reflection on the genesis and structure of human understanding in general. However these claims counted for little with Husserl’s critics in the other, that is, post-Fregean analytical camp. What they chiefly objected to in Husserl’s project was the approach via thoughts and ideas in the mind of some perceiving or reasoning subject, even though Husserl was very often at pains to reject any merely empirical or psychologistic construal of his claims. To their way of thinking, all this talk about transcendental truth- and validity-conditions was just another variant of the bad old Cartesian-Kantian retreat to consciousness as the last court of appeal in epistemological matters. Only by rejecting that entire line of thought—that is to say, by adopting a strictly analytical or logico-semantic approach—could philosophy at last break free of its attachment to naive, subject-centered, or metaphysical notions of meaning and truth. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:468 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY explanation of this in terms of "Aristotelian" categories is not Plotinus at his most convincing. Certainly Aristotle could not possibly have accepted the use of the categories of potentiality and actuality that O'Daly finds at VI. 2.20.20ff., and it is difficult to see how anyone could regard as seriously illuminatinga solution in which there is a "reciprocal" relationship between part (or particular) and whole such (...) that the whole is potentially the part, which is, actually, while simultaneously the part is potentially the whole, which is, actually. Throughout, O'Daly strives to avoid obscurantistic appeals in explicating Plotinus's thought. As typical of his approach I would cite his philological solution of the puzzling passage at V. 1.7.4-6 where Plotinus seems either to claim that the One produces intelligence by intelligence's acting in a certain way, or uncharacteristicallyto attribute thought to the One. Plotinus is not asking, O'Daly claims, how the One produces nous, but rather how it is that what is produced is nous. The solution is both neat and clear. I was disappointed, for this reason, with the concluding lines of the book. O'Daly is determined, as we have seen, to find the self preserved in the mystical union with the One. Unable to find this in Plotinus's characterization of the self in terms of nous orpsych~ he turns to the One itself to find a clue, for the One is an egregious instance of self. The move renders "selfhood, for Plotinus... in strict contrast to individuality" (p. 91), which is perplexing enough in view of O'Daly's previous stress on the identity of the self at its various levels. But it also provides him with the concept of epibol~, the "simple intuitive approach to Itself" (p. 93) that characterizes the One at VI. 7. 38. 10-39ff. and is used to characterize the approach to the One at III. 8.9. 20ff. O'Daly seizes on this concept to provide a perfectly obscure solution to his problem in these mysterious concluding words: "The term epibol~ links the two passages [III. 8.9 and VI. 7. 38]: both seem to corroborate the assertions that, on the one hand, the One is a Self, and, on the other, that, of the faculty experiencing unio, we can say no more than that it is--'the self'"(p. 94). O'Daly is forced to this pass, 1 believe, by his taking the mystical experience as too central in Plotinus's thought, as the cornerstone of his system, while, in reality, the heart of this system lies in the intelligible realm and its ties to the phenomenal. The union with the super-real, I suggest, serves only to indicate to the individual that he has overreached himself and needs, in good Platonic fashion, to return to the realm of intelligibility,that realm of nous and soul that O'Daly has spent the bulk of his time usefully examining. JEROME P. SCHILLER Washington University Descartes. By Jonathon R6e. (New YOrk: Pica Press, 1975. Pp. 204) Like the Discours de la m~thode, this is an "elegant essay," clear, condensed, and orderly. It analyzes in brief the Cartesian system of philosophy, pointing out that Descartes's approach to science was philosophical, although his philosophy was an attempt to discover the most scientific forms of description. And science for this "nouveau philosophe" was not qualitative but quantitative. The book furnishes an antidote to the myth popularized by Voltaire that misrepresents Descartes as an unscientific rationalizer whose fantastic physics was entirely superseded by Newton's. "The habit of classifying thinkers into warring schools," warns the author, "has resulted in a completely mistaken image of Descartes" (p. 13). Newtonian physics R6e sees as in the Cartesian tradition. After an analytical table of contents, ~t la Descartes, the book starts with a one-page chronological table, from which one regrettably misses the Cogitationes privatae, the Recherche de la v~rit~ par la lumi~re naturelle, the Primae cogitationes circa generationem animalium, and the Trait6 des passions de l'ame. A brief introduction is followed by sixteen short chapters and two appendices. The first appendix... (shrink)

Faith has many aspects. One of them is whether absolute logical proof for God’s existence is a prerequisite for the proper establishment and individual acceptance of a religious system. The treatment of this question, examined here in the Jewish context of Rabbi Prof. Eliezer Berkovits, has been strongly influenced in the modern era by the radical foundationalism and radical skepticism of Descartes, who rooted in the Western mind the notion that religion and religious issues are “all or nothing” (...) questions. Cartesianism, which surprisingly became the basis of modern secularism, was criticized by the classical American pragmatists. Peirce, James and Dewey all rejected the attempt to achieve infallible absolute knowledge, as well as the presumptuousness of establishing such a knowledge by means of casting Cartesian hyperbolic doubt. They advocated an alternative approach which was more holistic and humane. This paper lays out Descartes’s approach and the pragmatists’ critique. Despite the place that pragmatic considerations hold in Jewish tradition, some thinkers reject the relevance of these ideas. Yet Berkovits’s thought suggest a different path. He rejected Descartes’ radical skepticism and his radical foundationalism, in favor of a moderate foundationalism, which allows for a belief in God alongside constructive doubts. Similar to Peirce’s conception of the fixation of belief, Berkovits views local doubts (distinct from the hyperbolic doubt) as necessary for thought. Berkovits’s understanding of the biblical human-divine encounter, following Rosenzweig, Buber, and Heschel, is conceptualized here as “encounter theology”. Berkovits criticizes the propositionalist attempts to prove God’s existence logically, as well as the presumptuousness of basing religious belief on the teleological world-order. However, Berkovits’s conception of the ‘caring God’ is not provable, and thus defined as a pragmatic ‘postulate’. The article concludes by considering Berkovits’s “encounter theology”. In contrast to the approach described by Haym Soloveitchik, of halakhic stringency and lack of subjective experience of God’s face, Berkovits’s approach is dialogic through and through. (shrink)

In this chapter, I examine similarities and divergences between Du Châtelet and Descartes on their endorsement of the use of hypotheses in science, using the work of Condillac to locate them in his scheme of systematizers. I conclude that, while Du Châtelet is still clearly a natural philosopher, as opposed to modern scientist, her conception of hypotheses is considerably more modern than is Descartes’, a difference that finds its roots in their divergence on the nature of first principles.