The Cartesian method, construed as a way of organizing domains of knowledge according to the "order of reasons," was a powerful reductive tool. Descartes made significant strides in mathematics, physics, and metaphysics by relating certain complex items and problems back to more simple elements that served as starting points for his inquiries. But his reductive method also impoverished these domains in important ways, for it tended to restrict geometry to the study of straight line segments, physics to (...) the study of ambiguously constituted bits of matter in motion, and metaphysics to the study of the isolated, incorporeal knower. This book examines in detail the negative and positive impact of Descartes's method on his scientific and philosophical enterprises, exemplified by the Geometry, the Principles, the Treatise of Man, and the Meditations. (shrink)

The conception of René Descartes as the arch-rationalist has been sufficiently exploded in recent literature; however, there is still a large lacuna in our understanding of how empirical research and experimentation fits within his philosophy. My dissertation is directed at addressing just this problem. I contend that Descartes’ famed method is not a singular monolith but instead two interdependent methods: one directed at metaphysical and epistemological truth, while the other directed at empirical questions and contingent facts of the world. (...) I claim there is evidence for this position not only in his actual scientific practice, but also in the rhetorical structure of the Discourse on Method and the Principles of Philosophy. In exploring the empirical side of Descartes’ method, I show how his unusual system produces a system of experiment designed to serve both as a discovery and verification tool at the same time. As a further application of my interpretation, I argue that the Passions of the Soul and Descartes’ ethical theory expressed in his correspondence must also be seen as part of his two-fold methodology. Instead of attempting to cast Descartes as a virtue ethicist or deontologist, as is normally done, I emphasize that Descartes’ ethics is centered on the mind-body union, and therefore, includes an empirical element as well. The end result is an ethics that requires a detailed study of mechanics, anatomy, physics, as well as medicine. Lastly, I show how this methodology can help us understand the works of some of his early followers: Claude Gadroys and Jacques Rohault. Both of these philosophers not only serve to ground my interpretation, but also to highlight aspects of Cartesian that have often been passed over. I show how the experimentalism of Jacques Rohault goes beyond the epistemological boundaries set up by Descartes, as signifies a new direction that will ultimately eclipse the Cartesian school of thought. In the case of Claude Gadroys, I present a concrete example of the exploitation of the over generality of Cartesian principles. In so doing, I show that while Descartes’ experimentalism was intended to rule out the possibility of occult causes, he in fact created a system that allowed for them, only under a different guise. (shrink)

Locke tells us that his purpose in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding is “to inquire into the original, certainty, and extent of human knowledge, together with the grounds and degrees of belief, opinion, and assent”. He provides a characterization of general human knowledge as universal truths in propositional form. In doing this he presupposes a striking doctrine about the “extent” of man's general knowledge, and he draws freely upon a theory meant to explain both the materials out of which this (...) knowledge is constructed and the way in which it is constructed. He holds that the “certainty” which characterizes general knowledge is obtained only if we proceed from the right materials or foundations in the right way, and that the right foundations themselves can only be obtained in one specific way. In this study I try to show how much more Cartesian Locke is than many commentators would allow. I argue that on Locke's own view the way to obtain the foundations for general knowledge is that of Cartesian analysis, and the way to construct general knowledge once these foundations have been obtained is that of Cartesian synthesis. (shrink)

The idea that the ‘I’ of Meditation One stands for a solipsistic self is familiar enough; but is it correct? The reading proposed here does not saddle Descartes with so questionable a doctrine, and yet it does not shield him from Wittgensteinian criticism either. Descartes is still vulnerable, but on a different flank. I first consider critically the claim that Descartes is committed to solipsism. Then I take issue with the attribution to him of the idea that privacy is the (...) mark of the mental. Finally, I consider his tendency to “first‐personalize” knowledge and to trace to “the prejudices of childhood” certain prephilosophical errors. Here is where Wittgensteinian criticism comes genuinely into its own. (shrink)

1) Gaukroger estimates that there exist two irreconcilable theses in the Cartesian method in the Rules. The first thesis concerns the problem of the cognitive grasp of inference, the other the problem of the method of discovery. Descartes, by integrating deduction as a simple object of intuition, rejects the psychologicalinterpretation of inference, and elevates deduction to the status of a necessary condition of knowledge. On the other hand, the problem of the method of discovery requires that (...) inference produces a new truth as its conclusion. Descartes takes the algebraic solution of equations as the model of this method. But this orientation leads Descartes to deny all cognitive function operating in the inference of synthetic form. Thus, according to Gaukroger, these two theses tendto be opposed, calling into question the unity of the method. 2) We admit the cognitive analysis of Gaukroger on the Cartesian inference. However, Gaukroger does not see the importance of “the natural power of the mind” in the Rules. Indeed, the cognitive role of inference is always understood by Descartes, in light of this natural power. Thus, the main role of the method is to teach ways of increasing this power. Descartes tries to pose, by the algebraic treatment of questions, an analogy between the mathematical order and the order of the operations of the mind, enabling him to discover pure schemes of these operations. And, It is by theses schemes that the mind exercise itself in order to increase its natural power. For this reason, we must reconsider Gaukroger’s thesis that Descartesassimilates literally the method of discovery and algebraic solution, as well as his thesis of the inconsistency of the Cartesian method. (shrink)

J’étudie la méthode structurale définie par Vuillemin dans La Philosophie de l’algèbre ainsi que les origines de cette méthode en partant de la quatrième règle du Discours de la méthode et de l’interprétation qu’en donne Vuillemin dans Mathématiques et métaphysique chez Descartes. J’analyse pour ce faire la conception de Vuillemin de l’histoire des mathématiques ainsi que les relations entre méthode et objets. J’examine d’autre part les différentes formes d’analyse et d’abstraction mentionnées par Vuillemin et leur rapport à la thématisation au (...) sens de Cavaillès. (shrink)

Este artigo analisa alguns aspectos da moral cartesiana. Num primeiro momento, investiga-se como a expressão moral provisória é equivocada e como a moral do Discurso é retomada na Correspondência. Num segundo momento, é interessante a compreensão da nova significação que Descartes fornece ao termo paixões. Enfim, mostra-se como a moral se insere, paulatinamente, na filosofia de Descartes.

"Ronald Bruzina’s superb translation... makes available in English a text of singular historical and systematic importance for phenomenology." —Husserl Studies "... a pivotal document in the development of phenomenology... essential reading for students of phenomenology twentieth-century thought." —Word Trade "... an invaluable addition to the corpus of Husserl scholarship. More than simply a scholarly treatise, however, it is the result of Fink’s collaboration with Husserl during the last ten years of Husserl’s life.... This truly essential work in phenomenology should find (...) a prominent place alongside Husserl’s own works. For readers interested in phenomenology—and in Husserl in particular—it cannot be recommended highly enough." —Choice "... a thorough critique of Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology... raises many new questions.... a classic." —J. N. Mohanty A foundational text in Husserlian phenomenology, written in 1932 and now available in English for the first time. (shrink)

The apparently circular arguments in Descartes’s Meditations should be read as analytic arguments, as Descartes himself suggested. This both explains and excuses the appearance of circularity. Analysis “digs out” what is already present in the meditator’s mind but not yet “expressly known”. Once this is achieved, the meditator may take the result of analysis as an epistemic starting point independent of the original argument. That is, analytic arguments may be reversed to yield demonstrative proofs that follow an already worked-out order (...) of ideas. The “Cartesian Circle,” for example, is circular only when Descartes’s original analytic argument is mistaken for the demonstration that it enables. This approach to Cartesian Circles is unlike the standard approach, which attempts to show that Descartes’s original arguments do work as demonstrations after all. (shrink)

"Besides the impact of their content, the clarity and reach of these essays force one to consider foundational questions concerning philosophy and its history."—Richard Watson, Journal of the History of Philosophy.

Review of Dika, T. (2023). Descartes’s Method. The Formation of the Subject of Science. Oxford: Oxford UP.

This chapter contains sections titled: The Status of the Rationalist Image The Deeper Background Descartes: The Directed Imagination of Mathematics, and Passions as Nascent Images Malebranche Conclusion.

This book argues that Descartes’ physics was a milestone on the road to modern mathematical physics. After Newton introduced a completely different approach to mathematical description of motion, Descartes’ physics became obsolete and even difficult to comprehend. This text follows the language of Descartes and the means of which motion can be described. It argues that Descartes achieved almost everything that later Newton was able to do—to describe the motion of interacting bodies- by different (i.e. algebraic) means. This volume completely (...) refutes the received view according to which Descartes’ physics was merely a kind of discursive natural philosophy. To make this interpretation more plausible the book follows Descartes’ ideas from his early work in mathematics, through his invention of the analytic method towards his mature physics. It shows that Descartes followed a similar heuristic pattern. The volume appeals to students and researchers; it invites the reader equippedwith minimal understanding of college mathematics to follow Descartes on his intellectual journey through the Scientific Revolution. The reader will gain a deeper understanding of the role of mathematical language in the creation of modern physics and a glimpse into the fascinating world of Descartes’ scientific thought. Several of Descartes’ philosophical ideas can be traced back to his scientific interests and thus the book elucidates the motivation behind some of Descartes’ key positions in the area of epistemology and method. In the penultimate chapter the book presents four arguments in favor of seeing Descartes as a physicist on par with Galileo and Newton. (shrink)

In the last twenty-five years, Jean-Luc Marion has established himself as the preeminent interpreter of the philosophy of Descartes as well as one of the most interesting philosophers working in the phenomenological tradition. His earlier books, Sur l’ontologie grise de Descartes, Sur la théologie blanche de Descartes, and Sur le prisme métaphysique de Descartes, are all subtle and provocative examinations of Descartes’s philosophy, informed by an unparalleled knowledge of the history of ancient, medieval, and modern philosophy.

The problem of the Cartesian circle, as it is called, has sparked ongoing debate, which intersects several important themes of the Meditations. Discussions of the circle must address questions about the force and scope of the famous method of doubt introduced in Meditation I, and they must examine the intricate arguments for the existence of God and the avoidance of error in Meditations III to V. These discussions raise questions about the possibility of overturning skepticism, once a skeptical (...) doubt has been introduced. More generally, the problem of the circle resonates with recent questions about the foundations of knowledge: Must we be able to validate our methods of reasoning or of knowing before using them? If we must, wouldn't we be forever stuck at the beginning, unable to use our methods of reasoning or of knowing in their own validation? The problem of the Cartesian circle raises general questions about the validation of reason and the possibility of knowledge. This chapter examines the Cartesian circle in the context of Descartes' central project in the Meditations, to secure the foundations of metaphysics. In carrying out this project, Descartes felt the need, or adopted the strategy, of examining the possibility of human knowledge more generally. Such an examination can be interpreted in various ways. Depending on the interpretation given, the roles assigned to the method of doubt and the proofs about God may differ, thereby altering how we see the problem of the circle. We therefore need first to consider Descartes' metaphysical project along with the methods and strategies he adopted in carrying it out. Subsequently, I explain and evaluate several main approaches to the problem of the circle. The chapter concludes with some reflections on the relation of Descartes' metaphysics of knowledge to other prominent positions in the history of philosophy. (shrink)

This paper aims to provide an explication of the meaning of ‘analysis’ and ‘synthesis’ in Descartes’ writings. In the first part I claim that Descartes’ method is entirely captured by the term ‘analysis’, and that it is a method of theory elaboration that fuses the modern methods of discovery and confirmation in one enterprise. I discuss Descartes’ methodological writings, assess their continuity and coherence, and I address the major shortcoming of previous interpretations of Cartesian methodology. I also (...) discuss the Cartesian method in the context of other conceptions of scientific method of that era and argue that Descartes’ method significantly transforms these conceptions. In the second part I argue that mathematical and natural-philosophical writings exhibit this kind of analysis. To that effect I examine in Descartes’ writings on the method as used in mathematics, and Descartes’ account of the discovery of the nature of the rainbow in the Meteors. Finally, I briefly assess Descartes’ claim regarding the universality of his method.Author Keywords: Cartesian method; Theory elaboration; Analysis; Synthesis; Simple natures; Rainbow. (shrink)

In this extraordinarily original and profound work, Noam Chomsky discusses themes in the study of language and mind since the end of the sixteenth century in order to explain the motivations and methods that underlie his work in linguistics, the science of mind, and even politics. This edition includes a new and specially written introduction by James McGilvray, contextualising the work for the twenty-first century. It has been made more accessible to a larger audience; all the French and German in (...) the original edition has been translated, and the notes and bibliography have been brought up to date. The relationship between the original edition and contemporary biolinguistic work is also explained. This challenging volume is an important contribution to the study of language and mind, and to the history of these studies since the end of the sixteenth century. (shrink)

In a recent article G. Hatfield claims that Descartes for a certain time thought a purely a priori science to be possible. Hatfield's evidence consists of his reading of the Cartesian method in the Regulae and of a letter to Mersenne, written in May 1632. I argue that Hatfield misinterprets the Cartesian method and Descartes' claim in the letter to Mersenne. I first show that the latter does not argue for an a priori science. Then, I (...) show that the method of the Regulae is not a priori. Finally, I propose a reading of Descartes' letter. (shrink)

It has been a traditional claim that Newtonian inductivism sharply contradicts Cartesian deductivism, and that Newton's rejection of the method of hypothesis is intended as a criticism of the Cartesian scientific methodology. There have been some sharp attacks against the received view that Descartes aimed at the construction of a purely a priori science, but despite this two beliefs still dominate even recent interpretations of Descartes' work. The first is the belief that a significant part of Descartes' (...) natural philosophy was meant to be a priori, and the second is the belief that the Cartesian empirical scientific method was a version of the method of hypothesis. Also, new light has been shed on Newton's famed inductivism and his rejection of the method of hypothesis, a light which shows first, that the traditional inductive interpretation of Newton's method falls significantly short of capturing the richness of this method, and second, that hypotheses play an important role in shaping the conceptual framework in which Newton's work was developed. Despite these recent interpretations, however, an accurate account of Newton's experimental method and an examination of the exact scope and significance of Newton's critique and rejection of the method of hypothesis are still needed. ;The central thesis of this dissertation is that a study of the methodological work and actual scientific practice of Descartes and Newton reveals profound similarities that can be traced back to their employment of the same scientific method of discovery, namely the method of analysis. To that end, I have undertaken a comparative study of the methodological and scientific work of both thinkers. I argue that the official Cartesian method is not the method of hypothesis, and that Descartes did not think any of the parts of his science to be purely a priori. I also argue that the content of Newtonian methodology exceeds that of simple induction, and I try to reconstruct this method as accurately as possible. The conclusion is reached that both Newton and Descartes employed the same scientific method, and that the differences in the fruits delivered by this method are due to the differences between the conceptual frameworks within which Descartes' and Newton's thoughts were developed. (shrink)

Since Descartes, the nature of doubt has played a central role in the development of metaphysics both positively and negatively. Despite this fact, there has been very little discussion centering round the specific nature of doubt which led, for example, to the Cartesian discovery of the cogito. Certainly, the role of doubt has been well recognized: through doubt Descartes arrives at his indubitable first principle. But what can it mean to doubt the existence of the sensible world? This would (...) seem to rest upon the assumption that we have clear and distinct knowledge of the precise nature of what it means to exist and indeed of what it means to be. As it stands, Descartes’ initiates his Meditations upon certain definite assumptions that demand more thorough interrogation. In this paper and presentation, I examine the possible assumptions inherent in the Cartesian method of doubt within the first and second meditation and the manner in which this leads to the discovery of the cogito. I consider a number of essential questions in light of this: What presuppositions lie at bottom to Cartesian doubt? What is the precise nature of metaphysical doubt? What can it mean to doubt the existence of the sensible world? (shrink)

I examine the role that Descartes’ theory of optics shapes the entire Cartesian methodology. After explaining the importance of methodology in Descartes’ project, I his method in terms of the three dimensions of time. I put this method to work by describing Descartes’ search for the elusive hyperbolic lens, a lens that would offer the type of perfect vision that is necessary for the Cartesian scientific process. It will soon become clear that this lens is the (...) mind itself. The task of this project is thus to sculpt the mind so as to achieve the highest clarity and distinctness of scientific vision. Thus, by focusing on how the eye works and how seeing can be improved, the subject and the objects it sees both radically transform in structure, content, and kind. The Cartesian corpus thus initiates a sort of specular regime that produces a new subjectivity and a new world. (shrink)

There are several paradigms of 'first philosophy' (e.g. Aristotle, Descartes). A third paradigm of first philosophy is transcendental pragmatics or transcendental semiotics (exemplified by Peirce and Wittgenstein). Husserl correctly grasped that Descartes inaugurated first philosophy in the sense of a transcendental inquiry into the foundations of absolute knowledge. But Husserl's retrieval of Descartes remains within the second paradigm in that it ignores the role of language as a condition of the possibility of objectively constituted knowledge. I propose to re-examine Descartes's (...) conception of first philosophy to see if it can be read in the light of the third paradigm of transcendental philosophy, namely transcendental semiotics. I argue that Cartesian methodic doubt can be rehabilitated (against Wittgenstein's critique) as a kind of 'fallibilistic' approach to knowledge of a Peircean kind, and that the Cartesian cogito can be read (following Hintikka) as recognition of performative contradiction and of the necessity of speech acts, and hence of the transcendental communication community. (shrink)

Traditionally, ‘René Descartes’ is synonymous with ‘method.’ The so-called father of modern science, he is perhaps the systematic and methodological philosopher par excellence, a fundamental motivation for his attempt to secede from contemporary thought being the possibility of establishing a universally valid method in the search for truth. In a passage in the Rules for the Direction of the Mind, Descartes contrasts his method with what he calls scholastic “[r]iddles,” verbal equivocations that hinder the acquisition of knowledge. (...) In this paper I analyze this notion of riddling and the Cartesian method to posit that, finally, Descartes cannot avoid replicating the very riddles he criticizes, that his ‘revolutionary’ method only generates more riddles to be methodically solved. In short, Descartes’ method is dependent upon words but also calls for the effacement of the very words that constitute it. Words are both a methodological necessity and limitation; a double bind, there is no method without words, but, at the same time, there can be no method with words, that is, no methodo-logos. In its broadest formulation, Descartes must always at once say too much and too little. (shrink)

In Part V of his Discourse on the Method, Descartes introduces a test for distinguishing people from machines that is similar to the one proposed much later by Alan Turing. The Cartesian test combines two distinct elements that Keith Gunderson has labeled the language test and the action test. Though traditional interpretation holds that the action test attempts to determine whether an agent is acting upon principles, I argue that the action test is best understood as a test (...) of common sense. I also maintain that this interpretation yields a stronger test than Turing's, and that contemporary artificial intelligence should consider using it as a guide for future research. (shrink)

This essay seeks to contribute to the critical reception of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives by tracing the Taxonomy’s underlying philosophical assumptions. Identifying Bloom’s work as consistent with the legacy of Cartesian thought, I argue that its hierarchy of behavioral objectives provides a framework for certainty and communicability in ascertaining student learning. However, its implicit rejection of intuitive knowledge as well as its antagonism between the human subject and the known object promote the Enlightenment ideal of education as “intellectual (...) work.” When embodied in the Taxonomy, Cartesian assumptions foster a fundamental disposition in front of reality that is ultimately alienating. The paper begins with an explication of the Taxonomy’s affordances and philosophical assumptions. I then identify the Cartesian elements of these assumptions, particularly the Taxonomy’s inherent mind–body dualism and primacy of method. Finally, the paper employs these elements as an explanatory factor for the predominant critiques of the Taxonomy in educational theory literature. An addendum questions the possibility or plausibility of distance from objectives frameworks in the contemporary classroom. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Focused upon Descartes’ writings and letters, this paper considers the exponentially-charged relationship between sadness, melancholy, doubt and philosophical inquiry. The first sections examine the relation between sadness in the Cartesian corpus and melancholy as a traditional pathological classification, with both set against a larger seventeenth century intellectual discourse. The letters exchanged between the Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and the Palatine and Descartes between 1643 and 1649, that is, just prior to the death of the philosopher in 1650, reveal (...) the central paradigm of this particular relationship between sadness and melancholy. The call to use philosophy as a cure against sadness also enters consideration, with the theatrical, artificial nature of the philosophical cure presented as essential not only to Descartes’ relation to sadness, but also to philosophical method in general. The moral aspect of the establishment of mental habits and their emendation by philosophy hence yields central insights into the larger Cartesian project, here viewed as essentially premised upon a medical vocation. (shrink)

HOME . ABOUT US . CONTACT US HELP . PUBLISH WITH US . LIBRARIANS Search in or Explore Browse Publications A-Z Browse Subjects A-Z Advanced Search University of Cambridge SIGN IN Register | Why Register? | Sign Out | Got a Voucher? prev abstract next Two Approaches to Reading the Historical Descartes A Devout Catholic? Knowledge of The Mental Thought and Language Descartes as A Natural Philosopher Substance Dualism Notes Two Approaches to Reading the Historical Descartes Author: Desmond M. Clarke (...) DOI: 10.1080/09608780902986680 Publication Frequency: 5 issues per year Published in: British Journal for the History of Philosophy, Volume 17, Issue 3 June 2009 , pages 601 - 616 John Cottingham: Cartesian Reflections: Essays on Descartes's Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008) 40.00 (hb.). ISBN 978-0-19-922697-9 John Cottingham, in a new collection of essays, asks the question: 'what exactly did Descartes himself chiefly take himself to be doing?' (254). 1 While the question is relatively clear, and while it acknowledges implicitly that Descartes was probably doing a range of different things, the answer that is apparently proposed here emerges only on reading the whole collection. Cottingham distinguishes in Chapter 1 - which is a new, synoptic overview of what is discussed in the other chapters, all of which were previously published - between two approaches to reading Descartes. One is to see him as 'a dummy on which to drape various suspect doctrines (such as “Cartesian dualism”)' (3), which contemporary analytic philosophers have shown to be radically mistaken. Another approach is adopted by historians of ideas 'who make it their life's work to pay meticulous scholarly attention to the philosophical works of past ages' (3). Cottingham does not explicitly criticize either of these approaches, but he hints at situating his own as some kind of Aristotelian middle course between the two. Since the two reference points are dangerously close to straw men or what Cottingham calls 'extreme positions', the proposed middle way may simply combine elements of two approaches, each of which is entirely legitimate. I return to this question at the conclusion. In fact, many of these essays were intended to show (rightly!) that Descartes never held the philosophical positions that are often attributed to him. The interpretation of Karol Wojtyla, later Pope John Paul II, provides a good example of how mistaken one can be: The Cogito ergo sum radically changed the way of doing philosophy … After Descartes, philosophy became a science of pure thought: all that is being- the created world, and even the Creator, is situated within the ambit of the Cogito, as contents of human consciousness. Philosophy is concerned with beings as contained in consciousness, and not as existing independently of it. (257) The only way to address such a caricature is to refer back to what Descartes actually wrote. Cottingham does precisely that, often quoting the original Latin or French texts. However, having shown successfully, by a close reading of the texts, that Descartes did not hold many of the views that are attributed to him, it still remains to say what Descartes did hold or teach about various philosophical problems that retain their perennial interest for us. This is how the question arises, intermittently, about what Descartes thought he was 'chiefly' doing, or what was his primary objective, in the course of an intellectual career that spanned three decades. However, the apparently legitimate desire to bring Descartes' intellectual endeavours into sharp focus may be frustrated by the evidence. His life and work manifestly lack the coherence or unity of purpose that one finds, for example, among many of his French or Dutch contemporaries. It is comparatively easy to 'read' the life of Gisbertus Voetius as that of an unwavering Calvinist theologian, to see Antoine Arnauld as a staunch and consistent theological defender of Port Royal, and even to interpret the obviously fragmentary contents of Pascal's unpublished notebooks (subsequently, the Penses) as an extended search for authentic religious faith, in opposition to what he perceived as the corruption of ecclesial structures. In contrast, Descartes' life reveals features that are difficult to integrate into a coherent pattern. He lived and published during a critical juncture in the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. Although baptized into the Catholic Church soon after his birth in the Loire district of France, he chose to live most of his life in the aggressively Calvinist United Provinces, in which other religious practices were officially (though often ineffectively) banned. Descartes may have adopted the motto from Ovid, at least early in his career: 'bene vixit qui bene latuit' (he lives well who conceals himself well), and he seems genuinely to have wished to avoid theological controversies. However, he engaged in very public controversies with so many of his contemporaries - including Hobbes, Gassendi, the French Jesuits (collectively) and Father Dinet (in particular), Voetius and the University of Utrecht, Regius, Fermat, Roberval, Revius and other theologians at Leiden - that one might conclude that his claimed preference for a quiet life was a disingenuous mask. 2 Descartes published four books during his lifetime, and wrote at least one other that he had intended to publish. The latter was his first major composition, Le Monde, which he suppressed when he heard about Galileo's condemnation by Rome in 1633. This was followed, in 1637, by Descartes' first book (also written in French), which he tried to publish anonymously by withholding his name from the title page: the Discours de la methode pour bien conduire sa raison, & chercher la verit dans les sciences. Plus la dioptrique, les meteors, et la geometrie, qui sont des essais de cete methode. Four years later Descartes published the first edition (in Latin) of Meditationes de prima philosophia, in quibus Dei existentia et animae immortalitas demonstrator, which also included six sets of objections and replies. The Principia philosophiae appeared (in Latin) in Amsterdam in 1644, and was followed five years later by Les Passions de l'Ame (in French). 3 In parallel with these publications, Descartes carried on a very extensive correspondence over a thirty-year period (in both Latin and French), and preserved copies or drafts of his letters with a view to future publication. Given the range and variety of his interests, and the sheer volume of writings, published or otherwise, that have survived from his pen, one may be tempted to engage in a comparative evaluation, as Cottingham does, by selecting one of Descartes' books as his primary contribution to philosophy. Cottingham claims that the Meditations was Descartes''masterpiece' (44), 'the definitive statement of Descartes's philosophy' (45) and the 'definitive statement of his metaphysics' (68). He also describes the Meditations more narrowly as 'his metaphysical masterpiece' (259, 303) and, more broadly, as 'his philosophical masterpiece' (289), and he lists it with the Discours as one of Descartes' two 'masterworks' (280). The Principia offers some competition in this comparative judgement when it is described as 'the canonical presentation of his metaphysical views' (114), while 'the construction of a moral system … was the crowning aim of his philosophy' (231). Having pitched repeatedly for the Meditations as Descartes' primary text, Cottingham claims that its author was 'a devout Catholic' (215), that he was 'a devoutly religious philosopher' (256), and that he could not free himself 'from the influence of the long years of theological study he had dutifully completed at La Flche' (62). Accordingly, the Meditations should be read as 'in essence a work of theodicy' (220); 'what has pride of place in the construction of his philosophical system is … an appeal to God … the nature and existence of the Deity is something that lies at the very heart of his entire philosophical system' (255). Without quite saying so, there are hints here that Descartes was a devout Christian whose primary intellectual contribution was to write a work of metaphysics, in which God is central and in the course of which the author alternates between proving God's existence and contemplating God - the latter a seventeenth-century version of Bonaventure's Journey of the Soul to God. 'Descartes's attraction to a contemplative mode of philosophizing' (305) is reflected, in the Meditations, in 'the language of the soul's coming to rest in adoring contemplation of the light' (306). Cottingham also accepts the overwhelming evidence from Descartes' correspondence that he 'devoted most of his career not to metaphysics but to science' (108), although he quibbles elsewhere with those who adopt the shorthand term 'science' to describe part of what was called 'natural philosophy' in the seventeenth century (282). He also refers to the '(notoriously lame) argument for the essential incorporeality of the thinking self' in one of Descartes' masterworks (60), and he describes the 'strange, seemingly isolated world of his metaphysical meditations' (139), with its 'creaking ontology' (147), when read in isolation from the rest of his work as a natural philosopher. How should we read him, then, in the twenty-first century? A Devout Catholic? That Descartes was a devout Catholic is possible, unlikely and undecidable. He seems not to have studied theology at all while at school at La Flche, although he completed the pre-theology college cycle in the company of Jesuit students who then continued their studies in theology. Descartes consistently attempted to avoid public entanglement with religious and theological controversies, and said so frequently. 4 Given the alignments that prevailed at the time, both in France. (shrink)