Category: Rene Descartes

Although two of the most important of the early modern philosophers were writing a century apart from each other, Rene Descartes and David Hume were both examining epistemological arguments, ultimately coming to very different conclusion. Rene Descartes was a 17th century French philosopher whose main fields of interest were metaphysics and epistemology, and he is often considered to be the father of modern philosophy. One of his more important works, The Meditations on First Philosophy, details his philosophical viewpoints on God, his own existence, the human soul and Christianity. David Hume was an 18th century Scottish philosopher, whose view of epistemology focused on the theories of empiricism and skepticism. David Hume’s most important philosophical book, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, lays out his philosophical arguments on topics such as human habits and from where humans obtain their knowledge. Each philosopher presents theories and arguments on various topics of philosophy, such as considering the idea of God, whether or not God exists, and how people attain their knowledge, but Descartes viewed these as a rationalist whereas Hume’s viewpoint was that of an empiricist.

In the philosophy of this time period, there are two schools of thought on the subject of attaining knowledge, which are the rational and empirical philosophers. Rational philosophers believe that people’s knowledge comes from within themselves. That is by using thought and reasoning we can “put the pieces together” perhaps by recalling something from our memory in order to attain knowledge. On the other hand, empirical philosophers believe that knowledge is attained through experiences, meaning that they believe that humans attain knowledge a posterior, or after having a direct experience with something. For example, the empirical philosopher believes that a person would know that a hot stove will burn their hand only after experiencing this, and until then that person would not know that the stove is hot and that they should not touch it. The rational philosopher on the other hand, believes that a person who has learned that a hot stove can heat a pan or burn food would be able to recall that and infer that their hand would get burned by the stove as well.

Rene Descartes was a rationalist philosopher whose main focus was epistemology, which is the study of knowledge. The philosophical structure to Descartes’ arguments in The Meditation on First Philosophy is based on both his cogito argument and his argument for the existence of God. Building on that structure are his two philosophical arguments on mathematics, which he explains must exist, and how we obtain knowledge of the physical world. Further, he argued that human knowledge was equivalent to justified true belief, so that to know that a proposition is true, a person must first believe in the given proposition as well as having a good reason for believing it to be true. Descartes’ most famous argument is the cogito argument in which Descartes says that he must exist and be a living being because he is aware of himself and the world around him. The famous saying associated with Descartes is the basis of this cogito argument, “I think, therefore I am”, which means that because he can think for himself he must exist in some context. He wrestles with the thought of whether or not he exists and he concludes that he is a thing that thinks (as well as a thing that doubts, understands, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, imagines and senses). Descartes then continues with his argument about the existence of God and whether or not Gods is a deceiver. He argues that the idea of an absolute perfect God could not have originally come from within his thoughts. Descartes continues by writing that God is an infinite, powerful, and benevolent being that created him and everything else that is living and therefore would not deceive him. The more he focuses on this idea the less likely it is that these ideas could have come from himself alone that they must have come from a being more perfect than himself or any other person who taught him. Therefore he concludes that God must exist and that the idea of God came from God who is the only perfect being. Descartes continues the argument by saying that he admits that he does not understand or can even touch with his thoughts the infinite and many other ideas in God. The nature of the infinite is not for humans to fully understand because Descartes writes that we are restricted in our thoughts and senses. Descartes’ conclusion is that the idea he has of God is a true, clear and distinct thought which came from God himself.

Associated with his ideas about existence, Descartes contemplates the attributes of intellect, which is the power of knowledge, and will, which is the power of choice. Descartes says that the will of humans is imperfect while the will of God is always going to be perfect. Descartes writes that even though humans were made in the image of God, we can still make mistakes. Descartes writes that if he only acted trough his intellect and because everything he has in his thoughts comes from God, that since God gave him all of these thoughts, he would be incapable of making any errors in his lifetime. When he focuses on the idea of God, he cannot find any mistakes or error in his idea of God. Meanwhile, when he turns his argument back on himself, he finds that he makes a lot of mistakes in his lifetime. Descartes says that it is not a huge surprise that he makes mistakes and that he comprehends that error does not depend on God but is more of a defect in himself. He concludes the argument by saying that the reason he makes mistakes because of his own free will, and he, unlike God, is restricted in his ability to judge the truth.

David Hume’s thoughts on epistemology are based on his belief in empiricism, which is knowledge gained through experience. Hume examines the arguments for the existence of God in section two of An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. In this section, Of the Origin of Ideas, Hume’s writes, “The idea of God, as meaning an infinitely intelligent, wise, and good Being, arises from reflecting on the operations of our own mind, and augmenting, without limit, those qualities of goodness and wisdom.” (Hume, 11) In discussing the existence of God, Hume is disagreeing with Descartes’ arguments that God exists, that we come from God and that we are not perfect but we are made in the image of God. Instead Hume argues that the idea of God as a perfect Being actually comes from people thinking about themselves and magnifying their own power, intelligence, and good behavior to create in their mind a more perfect Being than themselves. This comes from Hume’s empirical beliefs that knowledge comes from what we have experienced.

One of Hume’s important arguments as an empiricist philosopher is known as “Hume’s fork,” which is how Hume divides thoughts into the “relations of ideas” and “matters of fact.” Hume believes that an idea in philosophy, like the existence of God, can either be “relations of ideas” or “matters of fact” but the idea cannot fall into both categories at the same time. “Relations of ideas”, Hume argues, are the ideas that humans naturally know or can discover by thinking about them, also known as a priori knowledge An example of “relations of ideas” is the sciences of Geometry, Algebra, and Arithmetic. “Relations of ideas” Hume argues are ideas that humans already know or can be known by asking yourself what if that idea is not true, which is also called a contradictory test or a priori. “Matters of Fact” are thoughts and knowledge that we can gain through our own experience so that we should ourselves if an idea is true something known a posteriori knowledge. All reasoning about “matters of fact” is based on cause and effect, which is based on experience. Knowing our experience and believing that the future will resemble the past means that “matters of fact” are finally based on the principle of custom.

As two of the most important early modern philosophers, Hume and Descartes laid out important epistemological arguments which some times were in agreement and other times completely opposed one another. Descartes’ rationalist approach to philosophy is based his most important arguments about his existence and the existence of God. He writes in Meditations on First Philosophy that he is a living thinking thing (his cogito argument) created by a perfect benevolent Being. As a rationalist, another important argument that Descartes makes is that the senses and experiences are unreliable and that knowledge only comes when a person uses pure reason and understanding. Hume and other empirical philosophers agreed that some knowledge which they referred to “relations of ideas”, such as mathematics, could be obtained by thought and reason alone. However they disagreed with the rationalists in how we gain knowledge of the physical world which they say must be learned through the senses and experience. Hume even presented his thoughts on the nature of God in his book, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, as something people understood based on their own experience. Both Descartes and Hume’s philosophical arguments have survived the test of time, laying the groundwork for the arguments of future modern philosophers as well.

Whether God exists has been pondered and argued by many philosophers throughout time, and there are many different proofs of his existence given to us by those philosophers. Descartes and Spinoza are two very famous philosophers who had some similarities and differences in their conclusions regarding God’s existence. This paper will focus on Descartes first proof of God’s existence given in the Third Meditation and Spinoza’s response to Descartes proof.

In order to understand the Third Meditation, I will briefly summarize the first two Mediations. Mediation I is essentially about skepticism and how to defeat it. Descartes becomes skeptical of the knowledge he attained through his professors and books, stating that there is no truth in that knowledge. He then seeks to attain true knowledge- knowledge that is certain- by rejecting everything that is uncertain and discarding the false knowledge he has obtained which can be doubted. He begins by doubting the senses, one of the main foundations of his knowledge, because our senses can sometimes be deceitful. Descartes states that if he is dreaming, his senses are not to be trusted so how does he know whether he is asleep or awake? He could have a dream in where he is awake and everything in that dream seems just as real as when he is awake, what perceptions can he be certain of? He then states that even though he is being deceived, the elements of his dreams must have some reality to them; he concludes that he cannot doubt what is considered as simple or universal, like geometry. However, he then states that even simple things can be doubted; God could even possibly deceive us about mathematics. Since God is all good, it is unlikely that he would be deceitful so there must be an ‘Evil Demon’ who is responsible for the deceiving. He concludes the first meditation by questioning what he can be certain of.

Meditation II is about Descartes establishing what he can truly be certain of: he exists. He can doubt his body and the worlds existence, but he cannot doubt himself. He claims that because he can think, he exists and so long as he thinks, he exists but what is he? He does not define himself as a ‘rational animal’ because that brings upon more questions or a bodied soul because the Evil Demon could be deceiving him about that. He states that he is a ‘thinking thing’ capable of doubting, affirming, imagining, etc. However, there still remains doubt how the external world is understood; the perception of the external world depends on interactions with the senses and imagination. Descartes then introduces the wax argument, which essentially states that wax is mutable so we understand it through intellectual inspection and not through our senses or imagination. He concludes that he knows his mind better than he knows his body.

Meditation III aims to prove God exists and that he does not deceive us- so that he can discover truth via clear and distinct ideas caused by God. He begins by classifying thoughts or ideas as images which are representations, volitions/affections which are desires, and judgments which are propositions (that can be false); these ideas have origins-adventitious (external), innate (independently true), and those he creates (Descartes, p. 114). These ideas represent substances which contain objective reality, some which have more than others because they have higher formal reality. Descartes then gives his first proof for the existence of God, which is as follows:

The cause of an idea must have as much formal reality as there is objective reality contained in the idea. I, an imperfect being, have an idea of God as an infinite and perfect being. This idea of God contains more objective reality than other ideas. This idea of God has more objective reality than my idea. The cause of this idea must have as much objective reality as what it is an idea of. I do not contain as much objective reality as my idea of God does, therefore its source is external to me. Only God has as much formal or eminent reality as there is objective reality in my idea of God. The source of my idea is god. Therefore, God exists (Descartes, p. 117-121).

Descartes believes that he has an idea of God because he cannot fail to have an idea of an infinite being since it is innate. Since he has an idea of an infinite being, there must be infinite objective reality. He then says something cannot come from nothing, which leads him to state the premises regarding reality in cause and effect and formal and objective reality in an idea. From there, he can conclude that since he has an idea of God with infinite objective reality, there is a being with infinite formal reality who is the cause behind his idea. Ultimately, this leads him to conclude that God exists. Descartes proves God’s existence and concludes God is not a deceiver because that would imply a defect, and God is good and perfect.

Throughout the novel, “The Meditations on First Philosophy” by Rene Descartes goes through a spitital journey of discovering what he believes to be his conception of the mind. The reader is able to see this through all of his meditations and the exploration he takes himself on to reach his final conclusion of the mind and body in meditation six. Each meditation that DescartesN writes touches somewhat on his conception of the mind and his beliefs that follow. In order to understand the conclusion, he reaches in meditation six the reader has to understand the important details he talks about in other meditations. Descartes talks about the mind and the body both as separate entities and how they work together which is dualism. Another important part of the meditations is when Descartes questions his bodies existence as well as his minds existence.

Descartes big take away at the end of his meditations are the emphasis on the mind and what Descartes means by the mind and how the body interacts with the mind. The second meditation is where it becomes clear to the reader where Descartes is heading with his conception of the mind. After Descartes has cleared his minds of all of his previous beliefs and is know to rethink he has ever come to know, he has an epiphany that he can’t even say for sure that he has a mind or a body. Descartes asks himself what kind of thing he is in relation to is existence with the world. He comes to the realization that he is than non-living things because he eats and he has all these parts of what he knows to be a body and he has sense.

He later comes to know that he cannot for sure say he has a body, he just knows what a body is due to his past experiences. Around this time in the novel, he begins to realize that he can also think, that he has a mind and he has thoughts and he can think. Descartes calls himself “a thinking thing” which becomes a huge advancement for him and his conception of mind 1 throughout the meditations. By stating and acknowledging this he believes that he has a mind and he understands what his mind does, the mind “doubts, understand, affirms, denies, wills, refuses but also imagines and senses.” All of these characters are made up of things that he 2 cannot see or touch, they are invisible but they are all ideas and traits that the mind has and does.

Even though he is not able to see these things he knows for certain that his brain has all of these things, he still remains uncertain of whether or not he knows for a fact that he has a body. Descartes believes that he can exist with just his mind, and he does not need a body to carry out all of the functions that the mind does like having senses and attempts to prove this with his wax theory. The human body cannot be proven because we cannot trust the senses which our body gives our mind. This is why Descartes believes that there can be a mind all on it’s own without having a place to live in that we know to understand today as the body.

The next argument that Descartes has for the mind and the body is that idea of separation and this is what separates the mind and the body from being alike. Apart from the body being something physical and what the human eye can see the mind is something that is invisble and doesn’t have any physical qualities to it, it simply just exists. Descartes argues that the body all has separate parts that are clearly visible, you can see the legs, the arms, the neck, and the chest and each part of the body serves a sperate part. The body needs every part in order to work properly and to run smoothly. The body needs to be able to work together in order to survive, it has to be able to work in tandem. This is what Descartes believes separates the mind from the body, the mind does not have separate parts and it is able to work altogether. Descartes did understand that there were separate parts to the mind and each part serves as a function but each part of the mind was able to work separately from the other part, this is what allowed for conflicting thoughts and desires within the mind. The mind is not able to be divided up into sperate parts like the body because the mind and all the parts of the mind all have the same driving force behind them. The mind is trying to reach the same goal and the body it will all work together to get there but it can have conflicting ideas. Desire is the perfect chararistics to be able to explain Descartes theory on the mind and why it is separate from the body. The mind is able to desire conflicting things, the mind can desire to do something bad but the mind at the same time can also desire to do something good end even though these two things are completely separate and each desire is coming from a different place in the mind the mind is still working in conjunction on the fact that it is trying to fill a desire. This is how Decartes argues and explains to himself that the mind and the body are two completely seperate entities.

As Descartes has already previously stated that the mind is internal and is something that humans can not see and the body is extended, it takes up physical space in the world. Descartes has a strong grip on what the mind does but he is still trying to figure out how he can know for sure that the body exists and what it’s relation is with the mind. This is where Descartes starts to tackle the argument of material things such as imagination and the senses. When talking about imagination that is able to picture whatever he is imagining in his mind and he is able to see it very vividly, even though it is not a real material thing he is seeing. He begins to understand that he is able to imagine things that he has seen before very easily in his mind and the example that he uses is a three-sided triangle in comparison to a 999 sided triangle he cannot see with his “mind’s eye” and this is due to the fact that he has not seen a 999 sided triangle in real life. This results in Descartes realizing that the imaginition is not an essential charismatic of the mind “this power of imagining that is in me, insofar as it differs from the power of understanding, it is not required for my own essence, that is, the essence of my mind.” What Descartes is explaining is that when the mind is trying to understand it looks to itself to be able to grasps concepts. When the mind is trying to imagine it looks to the body to help it gain an in-depth understanding of physical objects in order to compute it to the mind, so the mind is able to imagine.

Trying to understand the sensese and how they relate to the body is still a grey area for Descartes as he is unable to undertsand how the senses work with his body. He is cerain he has a body because he is able to feel things like being in pain, tastes, and sounds. Descartes has come to understand tht these are his sense “I precieve these things better by means of the senses” . This 5 is an important break through for Decartes because he is beginning to understand that he needs his body in pair with his mind to feel things like the sesnse. He is starting to trust his sense more because he sense has led him in the right direction, earlier in his thinking, they lead him to sense that he had a body and all of the parts that composed a body. His sensed him with what he understands to be human attributes like hunger and thirst and feeling like sadness and anger. His sense has also allowed him to distinguish the difference between the sky, the earth, and the seas.

All of these different ideas that is sense have led him to, he understands that the sense comes to him involuntarily, that he cannot control his sense “I knew by experience that these ideas came upon me utterly without my consent.” Descartes understands that the senses cannot be sensed if 6 they are not present, the mind is not able to imagine these since they have to be physically present at the time he is feeling them. To sum, everything up imagination and senses is modes of thought that come from the mind and are also interpreted in the mind. All of these ideas have helped to bring Descartes to his final conclusion of the mind in the sixth meditation. The idea that he comes to about the mind and the body is what he comes to call mind and body dualism. This is the understanding that the mind and the body completely separate of each other but they each have distinct qualities. Descartes also undserstands that the body is the outside force and the mind is what helps perceives senses and feelings. Descartes helps the readers to understand this theory by stating that the body is like a ship and the mind is like the sailor.

The body is the external vessel that exists in the world, and the mind is the non-material thing that controls all of the bodies senses and feelings. To Descartes, the mind is like the sailor and it holds all the control, like a sailor it can be a sailor without a boat based on the knowledge the sailor has, however, the sailor is much more credible when he has a boat. To Descartes, the mind can survive and exist all on its own but the body helps the mind to become more powerful because it helps the mind to imagine more vividly through the bodies eyes. The body helps the mind to feels and understand external sense, the body is needed for the mind to grasp the sense of touch since it is not able to do that on it’s own because Descartes has already pointed out that the mind is not physical it exists in another space. The theory that Descartes has on the mind still exists today he understands that the mind and the brain are separate, but the mind controls higher power ideas that the brain cannot do. He believes that the mind is able to sense and the mind is able to desire, these are not chemical reactions that happen in the brain because they cannot be explained by science they are controlled by the mind. The mind is the driving force behind the body, that is not saying that the mind keeps the body alive, it does not that is what the brain does. The mind is what drives the body through life, it is what gives the body meaning. The mind allows for the body to feel things and have sense which is what separates humans from non-living things.

Biblography

Descartes, Rene. ​Meditiations on First Philosophy. ​3rd ed. Translated by Donald A. Cress. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1993.

For this research paper, I will be comparing the different ways that philosophers Rene Descartes and David Hume viewed the process of human knowledge. These two philosophers have written theories to describe their ideas. Rene Descartes explains his understanding of rationalism through his “Meditations on First Philosophy”. David Hume focused more on human senses and how they help our way of thinking in “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding”. Which include a point of view through empiricism. Throughout this paper, I will compare their views on how human obtain knowledge based on their work. How their epistemologies clash together because of their two concepts of rationalism and empiricism.

For my first philosopher, I will be talking about Rene Descartes, a French philosopher who had a rationalist mindset. To get a taste into what his mindset, the term rationalism must be understood. As a rationalist, Rene Descartes thought that reason is more important than experience when it comes to knowledge. That logic was the main guide for achieving knowledge. In his work, The reliance on reason is the best and only guide for belief and action. In “Meditations on First Philosophy”, Descartes describes three lessons: how our senses do not always tell the truth if we think about our existence that is a fact that we actually do exist, and that there are three levels of truth in this world. Based on the article you can tell that Descartes follows such thoughts like Plato. In the way, that physical sensations do not matter in the thought process of rationalism. By looking at my first acknowledgment of how Descartes thinks that our sense does not always tell the truth. Implies the idea that physical senses do not matter; that senses such as touch, smell, and sight. Can deceive us because they are physical senses and do not completely determine knowledge. Another way that Descartes explains the rationalist in him, is by his thought of the “thinker” which exists outside the body. Hence his famous quote “I think therefore I am” which can be applied into one the lessons from “Meditations on First Philosophy”. Which is the idea of how humans think about their existence and questions if they are real. Which Descartes backs up with the fact that your thoughts about existence proves that you actually exist.

For my second philosopher, I will be talking about David Hume, a Scottish philosopher who had an empiricist mindset. To get an understanding of Hume’s mindset, we have to understand what empiricism is. In David Hume’s “Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding” we see that he thinks about the acquisition of knowledge. David Hume explains his viewpoints on ideas and impressions. His views on ideas are that they can be mental concepts such as beliefs, memories, or even thoughts. For Impressions, he tries to tie our knowledge with our emotions or anything that stimulates our brain. As we see the two viewpoints interact with each other throughout “Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding” by the fact that common knowledge is learned through experience. He explains that we cannot make a conclusion or a theory about anything that relates to the future without referencing the past. That is why according to Hume, we cannot make predictions from any past experiences that will resemble the future without thinking about the past.

Comparing both philosophers and their way of thinking is easy. Based on their way of thinking you can separate them. Rene Descartes was a rationalist and David Hume was an empiricist. The differences really come down to certain senses. Rene Descartes thought that thinking was the true way to achieve knowledge. That our physical senses can fool us when it comes to learning. For example, when someone is stranded in the desert and start to hallucinate. That is a perfect example of how our senses can deceive us of thoughts or images that are not there. While David Hume relied on past experiences and observations to determine to learn. Such as knowing the moon will rise since we can see it physically rising every night.

For my contemporary academic discussion I will be using the academic journal “Environmental Ethics”. The issue presented in this journal is the moral considerability of ecosystems. The author of this academic journal is Harley Cahen, who is associated with the Department of Natural Resources at Cornell University. In the beginning of the article Against the Moral Considerability of Ecosystems Cahen relies on her framework of being a environmentalist. The debate in this article is listed as “If natural areas had no value at all for human beings, would we still have a duty to preserve them?” (Cahen 1988, 195). If we frame the debate on both the frameworks that are demonstrated in Rene Descartes and David Hume’s work. By examining what morality has to do with the environment, we can argue with Descartes rationalism and Hume’s empiricism can be applied. With Descartes rationalism we see how human beings can ask the question if how or why is it important to preserve the environment. Rationalism gives people the opportunity to think about it from a moral point of view. We can think on multiple aspects for preservation, such as recycling, planting trees, or even solar energy. With Hume’s empiricism we see how our human senses allow us to actually look at the physical changes of the environment. For example, global warming we can see from the past years how the ice caps are melting. And we can further make a conclusion about the future based on past observations on how the ice caps are melting.

Throughout this paper I compared and contrasted both Rene Descartes and David Hume. Their respected work in “Meditations on First Philosophy” and “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding”. Show the mindset and ideology of a rationalist and a empiricist.

The backbone of philosophical thoughts relied heavily on Greek Mythology in the 16th Century. The common understanding of what was human was halfway between the Beast and God. As philosophy grew more popular, the question of where humanity lies within humans became a topic of discussion. What does it mean to be human and what doesn’t make us beasts? In Jean-Pierre Vernant’s “Myth and Society in Ancient Greece” he explores defining characteristics that separate beast from man through the Gardens of Adonis and Mythology of Spices. According to ancient Greek Mythology, what separated humans from beasts and gods was sacrifice and marriage. As the philosophical ideals on humanity, matter, science, and reason advanced these defining ideas of separation between beast and man were questioned. In debating the topic of human distinction, the works of Montaigne, Descartes, and Diderot exposed new solutions and opposing opinions that served as the base of modernity. By way of Descartes’s popularity as a philosopher and as his only response to a predecessor, his acknowledgment of Montaigne’s “Apology for Raimond Sebond” served as a landmark in philosophical modernity. Through the dissection of Descartes’s “Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy” and its relationship to Montaigne’s work, human reason and the limits of human knowledge are brought to the philosophical forefront.

In the 16th century, uncertainty, and accepting skeptical ideas were viable intellectual properties. There seemed to be more room for the possibility of human knowledge being secondary to another form of knowledge. By the mid-17th century, the landscape of philosophy was focused on definitive intellectual ideas based on science and reason. Michel de Montaigne was one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance and his work had a direct influence on writers such as Francis Bacon, René Descartes, Rousseau, Emerson, and more. Until his death in the late 16th century, Montaigne spread the idea of looking from the outside in. He questioned the value and power of human reason and his ideas were rooted in uncertainty. Following his death, René Descartes with many opposing views changed the threshold of skepticism and ambiguity by offering a definitive answer to Montaigne. In “Apology for Raimond Sebond”, Montaigne provides examples of the perceptible behaviors of animals that one may infer that they have intelligence and that there is no defined line between beasts and humans. He asks, “When I play with my cat, who knows whether I do not make her more sport than she makes me?” By asking this question Montaigne is challenging the way people commonly look at nature. He pushes us to the point that man’s reason must acknowledge its limits in order to understand the relationship between humans and nature. He continues, “…for we understand them no more than they do us; by the same reason they may think us to be beasts as we think them.” By saying this, Montaigne is presenting the idea that human beings must acknowledge the possibility that a small portion of nature is perhaps all we are able to apprehend. It is impossible for us to draw a fine line between beasts and humans because the line isn’t apprehensive by human language and reason. Montaigne doesn’t go as far as to say that there is no line but he believes in the ambiguity and uncertainty of a definitive line especially one of reason. The question of animal intelligence among philosophers was important but most important was the vast difference between Montaigne’s and Descartes opinions. The argument which was never truly an argument between the two serves as a ground for modernity.

René Descartes wrote about the uniqueness of man in his “Discourse on the Method” which relies mainly on the human ability to reason. Descartes believed that the human ability to reason meant domination over animals whom he believed didn’t have thought or reason. In part 6 of “Discourse on Method”, he says that man may draw a clear border between himself and nature in order to make “ourselves masters and possessors of nature.” The difference between man and beast for Descartes is that beast acts only through instinct or “passion” rather than reason. But for Montaigne, it is a matter of not knowing why animals act and how they act. Human capability and apprehension are unable to reach the experience and purpose of nature and to assume that nature is compatible with the things we do, choose, and react to is unjustifiable. In part Five of “Discourse on Method ”, Descartes says that humans are the only animal that can make their thoughts understood and in doubting his own ideas, which Descartes does frequently, he paints the picture of magpies and birds who “utter words” yet cannot speak as humans do. He compares this idea to humans born “deaf and dumb” with the inability to communicate with others of the same kind due to a lack of organs, yet they invent a way of language through sign. Descartes continues to say that animals with some sort of language between each other should be able to make themselves understood by humans if they are able to make themselves understood by each other. That being said he concludes that not only do animals have less reason than man but they have none at all. He relies heavily on the idea of nature being strictly out of instinct and natural passion which takes all forms of intelligence out of the make-up of animals. His ideas are a response to Montaigne’s complex theory on the limits of human knowledge and philosophy. Descartes’s acknowledgment serves as a turning point in modernity. The difference between Montaigne’s and Descartes’ thoughts allows us to recognize the limits of human language and apprehension, and the possibility of animal languages and alternative forms of reason that lie outside of human capacity.

While expressing his uncertainty about human reason, Montaigne goes as far as to say that the barrier between language and communication extends to many human groups as well. He brings up the point that there are human beings that view each other as beasts rather than humans. By saying this he is reaffirming the idea that human reason has limits and language is just a barrier. In Diderot’s “The Supplement au Voyage de Bougainville” he covers the in-depth differences in thought and ideals of the small remote Tahitian village and a visiting European. The judgments of each overs view of civilized man and the natural world are harsh and rooted in contempt for each other. With the ability to speak the same language, yet completely separated in terms of their moral compass, knowledge of human reason, and position on marriage and religion. Diderot’s tale is just another word that followed the same idea of the questionable difference between beast and god that Montaigne touched on earlier in philosophy. Montaigne talks of dogs who communicate with each other while humans wonder what they are signifying, knowing that they understand each other is exactly what approaching a small village in Tahiti is like in the tale by Diderot. The idea that man is not defined by his reason and his reason as it relates to his surroundings was continuously being spread even after the death of Montaigne and maybe it was Descartes’s response that sparked philosophical discussion and rethinking.

In looking at the timeline of these questions and ideas of the line between man and beast we are able to get an understanding of the continuous skepticism and uncertainty people had with the human world. As civilization began to advance, the possibilities became endless and the desire for answers became stronger. Voyages allowed for experimentation and exposure to new cultures which would expand the knowledge of those writing history and philosophical triumphs. The great philosopher, Descartes was famous for his writing on Reason and the importance of human distinction from the rest of the world but what makes him important is those that came before. His ability to derive answers from predecessors and analyze the current state of humanity led him to be a highly favorable philosopher, one of the key attributes of modern-day philosophy. Through the analyses of the opposing ideas of Montaigne and Descartes, we get a better understanding of the speed at which philosophy was traveling in terms of its perspective of humanity in the world and the role of reason at the turn of the century and on.

Descartes’ arguments for substance dualism seek to show that there are two distinctly different kinds of substance – body and mind. He seeks to show that they perform different functions and are constituted of entirely different things. Two arguments he uses in an attempt to do this are the argument from indubitability and the real distinction argument. This essay will explain these arguments for substance dualism and argue that they are not widely convincing as accepting them is hinged upon his flawed trademark argument.

Descartes’ argument from indubitability focuses on showing the distinction between mind and body through the degree to which we can doubt that either exist. He states that whilst we could doubt that we really have a body, through the very fact that we are able to question this we cannot doubt that we have a mind. It is important to understand Descartes’ concept of doubt in which he holds that we could be forced to doubt our own perception through three things: our own senses deceiving us, being asleep, or being deceived by an evil demon. Descartes sees that the first two do not cause an issue for the argument from indubitability, since in order for our own senses to deceive us, we must at least have a mind for these senses to perceive and a mind to be in a state of sleep and worry about this. Having a body however could be brought into doubt upon these conditions, as simply contemplating a body does not suggest its existence, and thus our senses could be deceiving us into having the apparent experience of a body which may be untrue. Sleep would also cast doubt over the existence of a body as a body is not necessarily needed to sleep, whereas a mind is. Therefore, according to Descartes, indubitability shows that there is a clear gap in the doubt that can be cast on having a mind, and a body and this gap shows that they are indeed separate substances.

However, Descartes does recognize that his criteria for doubt of deception by an evil demon are not ruled out in this argument, and therefore we could indeed have been deceived into the idea that the mind and body are separate substances. Whilst in a modern, less superstitious context, it is unlikely that we would be concerned about deception via an evil demon, it seems credible to be concerned that our entire experience could be a deception from an outside force. This is seen in modern philosophical discussions such as the brain in a vat hypothesis, in which it is contemplated whether we are simply a matter stimulated by technology, whose thoughts and experiences are not independent thoughts but the output of a machine, and therefore we could doubt that we have a mind. As such, Descartes’ argument had the potential here to have great modern philosophical value if this line of reasoning was explored in this secular context. However, in his real distinction argument, he turns to rule out this doubt using his trademark argument and as such, loses this appeal by relying upon the leap of faith of defining God into existence, something that is largely unappealing to the modern secular audience considering the mind-body problem.

In the real distinction argument, Descartes reasons that as we clearly perceive mind and body as entirely separate substances, and God created all, including our perception, they could be separate substances. As they can exist independently, they remain separate substances. Whilst the previous argument suggested that we could doubt the body existing at all, Descartes sees that this is not the case as we have ideas of material things, such as the body that we did not willfully produce. As we did not produce them ourselves, they must come from an outside source. As God would not deceive us with the mere illusion of material things such as bodies, the idea of them must come from bodies really existing. This argument relies upon the assertion that God is the ultimate creator, not a deceiver, as this rule out the doubt of an evil demon deceiving us, since God’s omnipotence would surpass this power. To accept this, one must accept that the Abrahamic God exists, to accept this existence and perfection.

Descartes provided his trademark argument to prove God’s perfect existence. This argument hinges upon the idea that a cause must have at least as much reality as its effect, a widely accepted idea at Descartes’ time of writing. Descartes argues that as we have the idea of God as a perfect being or the innate trademark of God within us, this idea must have come from somewhere, as a trademark requires a creator to plant it. This trademark could not have come from outside of God, since God himself as the cause of the idea holds the most real of it. Coupled with the clear idea that God is perfect, he must exist and not as a deceiver, as this would undermine his perfection. For Descartes, this meant that the idea of God must have come from God, and therefore, a perfect God exists. Whilst this is not his ontological argument, it is very similar in relying upon a priori reasoning and the belief that an idea of something is a basis for arguing its existence. This has proven a flaw in Descartes’ argument for God, and once this argument is rejected, his real distinction argument collapses too.

Descartes’ trademark argument mistakenly assumes that we all have the idea of God as perfect in the same Abrahamic sense that he does. Whilst this was Descartes’ experience, it seems to be a flawed foundation upon which to base an argument today, as this point itself requires empirical proof that actually goes against the argument of the universal idea of God. Evidence shows that this idea is not the case as 30% of England and Wales report having no religion (Office for National Statistics, 2011). As such, it clearly is not true that we all have the idea of a perfect God existing, as many have no concept of a God, whilst others may have a pluralistic concept or one of a flawed God. Resultingly, Descartes’ trademark argument appears incorrect and unable to prove God’s existence, meaning that a gap is left in the real distinction argument as we are unable to show that our perception of separation is not deceived. The argument becomes entirely ineffective.

In conclusion, Descartes’ arguments for substance dualism of indubitability and real distinction have the potential in casting doubt over the certainty of our existence and substances, however, become too vulnerable when relying upon the belief in God through Descartes’ trademark argument. As such, the existence of God is rejected, and the real distinction argument collapses. This leaves only the argument from indubitability and the quandary it presents of whether our perception is deceived by an outside force such as a demon. Presenting this quandary seems the only convincing element of Descartes’ arguments for substance dualism, particularly if taken down a secular route.

Bibliography

1. Cottingham, J. (ed.) (2017) Descartes: Meditations on First Philosophy: With Selections from the Objections and Replies. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy). doi: 10.10179781107416277.
2. Gere, C. 2004. The Brain in a Vat. Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences (35), 219-225.
3. Office for National Statistics. 2020. Exploring Religion in England and Wales.

Psychology studies always has been a debate among scholars so that they can prove their theory with an already existing theories in a certain field of study. Historical perspectives of Psychology has always help them in order to open ideas and thoughts among psychologists. Few pioneers such Sigmund Freud, Erik Erikson and many more does really widen up the perception of a psychologist to explore some new ideas until now. Psychology is a combination of two parents known as Philosophy and Physiology. When talking about Philosophy, there are a lot famous philosophers that can be known and identified but this particular writing is only about Rene Descartes and his contributions to the society and to the modern world of Psychology.

Rene Descartes is a famous French philosopher, scientist and mathematician lives in seventeenth century. Descartes is a very notable person responsible to open people perception of seeing thing in a science point of view using logic during that time. He also considered as ‘father of modern philosophy’ and founder of Rationalism (theory) which is one of the main basement for psychology to form as a formal discipline of study (King, Woody & Viney, 2013). Even though just live for fifty- four years (1596-1650), his contributions is always greater than his life-span of time which is still study and acceptable by people around the world. Of course, we should first thank to Michel de Montaigne and his resurrected of skepiticism for Descartes’s growth. This is because Descartes ideas always contradict to Montaigne’s view and basically is to prove him wrong all along. So, we should not forget Montaigne role in Descartes’s life to bring him to the light of the world until his principles are recognized.

People who loves and admired Descartes’s works cannot run away from logic and reasoning when explaining how everything functions in this world. Descartes always trusted in human power of logic when others backed their theories with appeal of God (Authority). Descartes begin to observing that our human senses are deeply unreliable. He couldn’t, for example said can trusted to know whether he was actually sitting in a room in a dressing gown next to a fire, or merely dreaming such a thing (dream argument). Descartes ultimate question to answer philosophers that sometimes get unreasonably in namely, ‘how can one know that anything including oneself, actually exist rather than being some sort of dream or phantasm?’. So, he addressed the Mind and Body problem and successfully comes out the term called Dualism. Mental and physical are taken as substance for it. He is also always questioned everything that happened around him, basically to find a truth that he cannot denied. This is because Descartes believed as long as there is something that can be denied in an argument is a false statement. This what he later called as Method of Doubt so his quest was certainly around this question of whether it might all be a dream that control by the demons (evil demon theory), At the end, he come to fact that he cannot denied is that he is actually thinking. Descartes;s existence could be proved by a tautological trick. He could not be thinking and wondering if he existed if he did not exist, therefore his thinking was a very basic proof of his being. Descartes’s subjective approach to philosophy reached its climax when he arrived at the famous phrase ‘Cogito Ergo Sum’ in French which means ‘I think therefore I am’ in English. Of course, it is seem to look ordinary now but in that time, it is consider a greatest insight especially in an epistemological world (Fancher & Rutherford. 2011).

This Descartes’s thinking also influenced by Mathematics. This can be seen when Descartes demonstrated his work called Cartesian method or also known as method of inquiry. He proposes four rules in it. First rule is to never accept anything as true unless it is so clear and distinct as to be immune from doubt. Second rule is to divide all difficulties into as many parts as possible. Third rule is to start with the easiest and best known elements and proceed step by step to knowledge of the more complex ideas. Lastly, the forth and final rule is to make complete enumerations and comprehensive reviews to ensure that nothing is left out. This rules is emphasized in his Discourse on the Method which modeled on mathematicians who Descartes believed provided certain and evident reasoning. In his finding called La Geometrie (Geometry), he found analytic geometry called as Cartesian geometry. He could solved problems involve geometry by changing it into problem in algebra by introducing the term of x and y on a cartesian plane (Cartesian coordinate). This discovery act as a foundation for calculus and helped Sir Issac Newton to invent it and introduced modern notation for exponents like ‘a’ square and cube.

Descartes’s rationalism is opposed by empiricism by John Locke. Rationalism as mentioned earlier are emphasizes the activity of mind and capacity to reason where else empiricism stated knowledge depends on sensory information and observable facts (Samaha. 2009). Both can be acceptable as the criteria to claim the truth and acts as a foundation for Psychology. This idea or view of his embrace by many psychologist around the world until now as it is very relevance even today because it is still teaches in every universities which is very useful to find the accuracy of the news that we received in this globalization world which is by doubting the originality of the source and must carried our own experiment to verified it.

References

1. Fancher, R. E., & Rutherford, A. (2011). Pioneers of psychology (4th ed). NY:W.W. Norton & Company.
2. https://learnodo-newtonic.com/rene-descartes-contribution
3. https://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Rene+Descartes
4. https://www.famousscientists.org/rene-descartes/
5. https://poppedbean.wordpress.com/category/philosophy/
6. King, D. B., Woody, W. D., & Viney, W. (2013). A history of psychology: ideas and context (5th ed). Upper Saddle River, NJ:Pearson.
7. Samaha, R. (2009). Descartes’s project of inquiry. Retrieved from aub.edu.lb/fas/cvsp/Documents/Descartes.pdf.

Philosophy is composed of several branches. Epistemology is one of the branches of Philosophy. Epistemology is the branch that is concerned with knowledge and our acquisition of it. Skepticism in Philosophy deals with doubting everything one knows. We must put into doubt anything we can or may know. Descartes and Hume both employ skepticism in their writings. In this essay, I will argue that neither Descartes nor Hume are skeptics. I will begin to explain what skepticism is. Then, I will thoroughly analyze Descartes use of skepticism in Meditations on First Philosophy and Hume’s use of Skepticism in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. Lastly, I will explain why I believe neither Descartes nor Hume are skeptics.

In order to understand the works of both Hume and Descartes, we need to know what skepticism is. We have seen philosophers as early as Socrates use skepticism in their philosophical works. In the apology by Plato, Socrates claimed that he was certain about something and that was that he knew nothing. Skepticism in philosophy refers to an inquiry and it sets a certain limitation to how much knowledge one can obtain. To formulate a claim we must have had some sort of knowledge or a justification, truth or belief behind it. Skepticism calls into question any proposition we form. We do not know anything that can be true or false. There are different positions of skepticism that one can take, one of them being radical skepticism. As defined by Professor Brocatto, radical skepticism raises the bar of knowledge so high that nothing can be known. cite here Radical skepticism is what Descartes adopts in his Meditations to doubt everything surrounding him.

In Meditation 1 of Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes starts to eliminate his mind of any thoughts he had previously which he believed to be true. He states “it is now some years since I detected how many were the false beliefs that I had from my earliest youth admitted as true, and how doubtful was everything I had since constructed on the basis; and from that time I was convinced that I must once for all seriously undertake to rid myself of all the opinions which I had formerly accepted, and commence to build anew from the foundation” cite here This is how Descartes starts to employ skepticism in the first meditation. He wants to start with a blank slate to be able to build up and construct a foundation to structure his knowledge. Descartes then decides that he will doubt every belief which he thinks is false and which he is uncertain of in setting forth the following “but inasmuch as reason already persuades me that I ought no less carefully to withhold my assent from matters which are not entirely certain and indubitable than from those which appear to me manifestly to be false, if I am able to find in each one some reason to doubt this will suffice to justify my rejecting the whole”. To reject every idea would be a tedious task so he therefore decides to reject only the ideas which he thinks are false or can be doubted. Descartes proceeds to suggest that even our senses are deceptive and able to fool us “but it may be that although the senses sometimes deceive us concerning things which are hardly perceptible, or very far away, there are yet many others to be met with as to which we cannot reasonably have any doubt, although we recognize them by their means”. What is Descartes trying to say here? Well, for example, when we look at an object from a distance, we see it as a small object; however our minds already know that that object is not that size because we already recognize it by its true means. This is what he was trying to imply that even our senses such as our visions are capable of deceiving us.

Descartes also points out those even dreams are deceiving because sometimes we dream what almost seems like reality “I have in sleep been deceived by similar illusions, and in dwelling carefully on this reflection I see so manifestly that there are no certain indications by which we may clearly distinguish wakefulness from sleep”. Surely enough this has happened to many of us. We dream as if we were in a real life situation that we cannot distinguish dreams from reality, therefore we can be deceived as well. Our senses have deceived us because they cannot tell when we are awake and when we are asleep. Descartes then comes to the conclusion that what if our whole existence is merely a dream that we have not awoken from.

In an Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Hume dedicates wholly three sections to his view on skeptical doubts. In section 4, skeptical doubts about the operations of the understanding, Hume begins by stating that “All the objects of human reason or enquiry fall naturally into two kinds, namely relations of ideas and matters of fact.” Cite here. At once, Hume suggests that we don’t need to do much thinking to be able to relate ideas together such as that which involves Geometry, Algebra, and Arithmetic. Those ideas or “propositions” can be discovered purely by thinking with no need to attend to anything that actually exists anywhere in the universe. Cite here. This is what he concludes to be relations of ideas. These types of ideas can be known with certainty; discovered by thought alone, and can be formed a priori or without the need of having experienced it.