Descartes' Meditations: The Nature of Material Things and God's Existence, Study notes of Philosophy

Download Descartes' Meditations: The Nature of Material Things and God's Existence and more Study notes Philosophy in PDF only on Docsity! Article 19 Meditations on First Philosophy: II, V, VI René Descartes Introduction: René Descartes was born in La Haye (now called Descartes), France, in 1596. As a youth he was educated by the Jesuits at their college in La Flèche. In about 1614 he began studying at the University of Poitiers, receiving his degree in 1616. Deciding to travel rather than practice law, he went to Hol- land in 1618 to serve as a gentleman volunteer. One day in No- vember 1619, while on a military tour of Germany, Descartes sat alone in a room reflecting on a new philosophical system that would unify all branches of knowledge and give them the cer- tainty of mathematics. That night he had three dreams, which he interpreted as a divine commission to construct this new system of knowledge. He left the army shortly afterwards and traveled for several years. In 1628 he settled in Holland, where he lived for more than twenty years. There he did research in science and in mathematics (laying the foundations for analytic geometry) and developed his philosophy. In 1649, after much hesitation, Des- cartes acceded to the request of Queen Christina of Sweden to come to Stockholm to tutor her in philosophy. The harsh winter and the rigorous schedule imposed on him by the queen (philos- ophy lessons at five o’clock in the morning, for example) took their toll on his health: He died of pneumonia in 1650. Descartes’s major works are Rules for the Direction of the Mind (written in 1628, published posthumously), Discourse on Method (1637), Meditations on First Philosophy (1641), Prin- ciples of Philosophy (1644), and The Passions of the Soul (1649). Our selection is from Meditations on First Philosophy. (By “first philosophy” Descartes means truths about the basic topics of philosophy, which for him are God, the soul [mind], and the external world.) Our reading begins with Meditation II, in which Descartes tries to find something of which he can be ab- solutely certain—something about which not even a powerful “evil genius” could deceive him. Descartes points out that he might be deceived even about such seemingly obvious things as the existence of the external world. But there is one thing he can be certain of—that he exists. For it would not even be possible for him to be deceived, if he did not exist. As he formulates this argument elsewhere, “I think, therefore I am.” But what is this “I” that exists? Descartes argues that since he could be deceived about having a body, he is simply “a thing which thinks.” He goes on to point out that if material things do exist, their essen- tial nature would be extension (three-dimensionality). In Meditation V, Descartes presents a proof for God’s exist- ence. Descartes has an idea of a supremely perfect being, and since existence is a necessary attribute of such a being, his idea would be self-contradictory if God did not exist. In the sixth and final meditation, Descartes uses his knowledge that God exists to prove that the external world exists: Since God is good and not a deceiver, it would be contrary to God’s nature to give someone the inclination to believe that material things (in- cluding one’s body) exist, if they didn’t actually exist. Des- cartes has a body, then, but how is he (a thinking, unextended thing) related to it (an extended, unthinking thing)? Descartes states (with little further explanation) that he is “very closely united to it and, so to speak… intermingled with it.” —Donald Abel Meditation II: Of the Nature of the Human Mind; and That It Is More Easily Known Than the Body … I shall proceed by setting aside all that in which the least doubt could be supposed to exist, just as if I had discovered that it was absolutely false; and I shall ever follow in this road until I have met with something which is certain, or at least, if I can do nothing else, until I have learned for certain that there is nothing in the world that is certain. Archimedes,1 in order that he might draw the terrestrial globe out of its place, and transport it elsewhere, demanded only that one point should be fixed and immoveable. In the same way I shall have the right to conceive high hopes if I am happy enough to discover one thing only which is certain and indubitable. I suppose, then, that all the things that I see are false; I per- suade myself that nothing has ever existed of all that my falla- cious memory represents to me. I consider that I possess no senses; I imagine that body, figure, extension, movement and place are but the fictions of my mind. What, then, can be es- teemed as true? Perhaps nothing at all, unless that there is nothing in the world that is certain. But how can I know there is not something different from those things that I have just considered, of which one cannot have the slightest doubt? Is there not some God, or some other being by whatever name we call it, who puts these reflections into my mind? That is not necessary, for is it not possible that I am capable of producing them myself? I myself, am I not at least something? But I have already denied that I had senses and body. Yet I hesitate, for what follows from that? Am I so depen-1 ANNUAL EDITIONSdent on body and senses that I cannot exist without these? But I was persuaded that there was nothing in all the world, that there was no heaven, no earth, that there were no minds, nor any bodies: was I not then likewise persuaded that I did not exist? Not at all;… [surely] I myself did exist, since I persuaded my- self of something. But there is some deceiver or other, very powerful and very cunning, who ever employs his ingenuity in deceiving me. Then without doubt I exist also if he deceives me, and let him deceive me as much as he will, he can never cause me to be nothing so long as I think that I am something. So that after having reflected well and carefully examined all things, we must come to the definite conclusion that this proposition, “I am, I exist,” is necessarily true each time that I pronounce it, or that I mentally conceive it. But I do not yet know clearly enough what I am, I who am certain that I am; and hence I must be careful to see that I do not imprudently take some other object in place of myself, and thus that I do not go astray in respect of this knowledge that I hold to be the most certain and most evident of all that I have formerly learned. That is why I shall now consider anew what I believed myself to be before I embarked upon these last reflections; and of my former opinions I shall withdraw all that might even in a small degree be invalidated by the reasons which I have just brought forward, in order that there may be nothing at all left beyond what is absolutely certain and indubitable. What then did I formerly believe myself to be? Undoubtedly I believed myself to be a man. But what is a man? Shall I say a reasonable animal? Certainly not; for then I should have to in- quire what an animal is, and what is reasonable; and thus from a single question I should insensibly fall into an infinitude of others more difficult; and I should not wish to waste the little time and leisure remaining to me in trying to unravel subtleties like these. But I shall rather stop here to consider the thoughts which of themselves spring up in my mind, and which were not inspired by anything beyond my own nature alone when I ap- plied myself to the consideration of my being. In the first place, then, I considered myself as having a face, hands, arms, and all that system of members composed of bones and flesh as seen in a corpse, which I designated by the name of body. In addition to this I considered that I was nourished, that I walked, that I felt, and that I thought, and I referred all these actions to the soul: but I did not stop to consider what the soul was, or if I did stop, I imagined that it was something extremely rare and subtle like a wind, a flame, or an ether, which was spread throughout my grosser parts. As to body I had no manner of doubt about its na- ture, but thought I had a very clear knowledge of it; and if I had desired to explain it according to the notions that I had then formed of it, I should have described it thus: By the body I un- derstand all that which can be defined by a certain figure: some- thing which can be confined in a certain place, and which can fill a given space in such a way that every other body will be ex- cluded from it; which can be perceived either by touch, or by sight, or by hearing, or by taste, or by smell: which can be moved in many ways—not, in truth, by itself, but by something which is foreign to it, by which it is touched: for to have the power of self-movement, as also of feeling or of thinking, I did not consider to appertain to the nature of body; on the contrary, I was rather astonished to find that faculties similar to them ex- isted in some bodies. But what am I, now that I suppose that there is a certain ge- nius which is extremely powerful and, if I may say so, mali- cious, who employs all his powers in deceiving me? Can I affirm that I possess the least of all those things which I have just said pertain to the nature of body? I pause to consider, I re- volve all these things in my mind, and I find none of which I can say that it pertains to me. It would be tedious to stop to enu- merate them. Let us pass to the attributes of soul and see if there is any one which is in me. What of nutrition or walking? But if it is so that I have no body, it is also true that I can neither walk nor take nourishment. Another attribute is sensation. But one cannot feel without body, and besides I have thought I per- ceived many things during sleep that I recognised in my waking moments as not having been experienced at all. What of thinking? I find here that thought is an attribute that belongs to me; it alone cannot be separated from me. I am, I exist, that is certain. But how often? Just when I think; for it might possibly be the case if I ceased entirely to think, that I should likewise cease altogether to exist. I do not now admit anything which is not necessarily true: to speak accurately, I am not more than a thing which thinks, that is to say a mind or a soul, or an under- standing, or a reason, which are terms whose significance was formerly unknown to me. I am, however, a real thing and really exist; but what thing? I have answered: a thing which thinks. And what more? I shall exercise my imagination. I am not a collection of members which we call the human body: I am not a subtle air distributed through these members, I am not a wind, a fire, a vapour, a breath, nor anything at all which I can imagine or conceive; because I have assumed that all these were nothing. Without changing that supposition I find that I only leave my- self certain of the fact that I am something. But perhaps it is true that these same things which I supposed were nonexistent be- cause they are unknown to me, are really not different from the self which I know. I am not sure about this, I shall not dispute about it now; I can only give judgment on things that are known to me. I know that I exist, and I inquire what I am, I whom I know to exist. But it is very certain that the knowledge of my existence taken in its precise significance does not depend on things whose existence is not yet known to me; consequently it does not depend on those which I can feign in imagination. And indeed the very term feign in imagination proves to me my error, for I really do this if I image myself a something, since to imagine is nothing else than to contemplate the figure or image of a corporeal thing. But I already know for certain that I am, and that it may be that all these images, and, speaking generally, all things that relate to the nature of body, are nothing but dreams.… For this reason I see clearly that I have as little reason to say, “I shall stimulate my imagination in order to know more distinctly what I am,” than if I were to say, “I am now awake, and I perceive somewhat that is real and true. But because I do not yet perceive it distinctly enough, I shall go to sleep of ex- press purpose, so that my dreams may represent the perception with greatest truth and evidence.” And thus I know for certain that nothing of all that I can understand by means of my imagi- nation belongs to this knowledge which I have of myself, and2