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The Philosophical Works of Descartes, Vol. 2
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- GenresPhilosophy
384 pages, Paperback
Published May 1, 1967
About the author
René Descartes
1,675 books2,537 followers
Meditations on First Philosophy
(1641) and
Principles of Philosophy
(1644), main works of French mathematician and scientist René Descartes, considered the father of analytic geometry and the founder of modern rationalism, include the famous dictum "I think, therefore I am."
A set of two perpendicular lines in a plane or three in space intersect at an origin in Cartesian coordinate system. Cartesian coordinate, a member of the set of numbers, distances, locates a point in this system. Cartesian coordinates describe all points of a Cartesian plane.
From given sets, {X} and {Y}, one can construct Cartesian product, a set of all pairs of elements (x, y), such that x belongs to {X} and y belongs to {Y}.
Cartesian philosophers include Antoine Arnauld.
René Descartes, a writer, highly influenced society. People continue to study closely his writings and subsequently responded in the west. He of the key figures in the revolution also apparently influenced the named coordinate system, used in planes and algebra.
Descartes frequently sets his views apart from those of his predecessors. In the opening section of the Passions of the Soul , a treatise on the early version of now commonly called emotions, he goes so far to assert that he writes on his topic "as if no one had written on these matters before." Many elements in late Aristotelianism, the revived Stoicism of the 16th century, or earlier like Saint Augustine of Hippo provide precedents. Naturally, he differs from the schools on two major points: He rejects corporeal substance into matter and form and any appeal to divine or natural ends in explaining natural phenomena. In his theology, he insists on the absolute freedom of act of creation of God.
Baruch Spinoza and Baron Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz later advocated Descartes, a major figure in 17th century Continent, and the empiricist school of thought, consisting of Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume, opposed him. Leibniz and Descartes, all well versed like Spinoza, contributed greatly. Descartes, the crucial bridge with algebra, invented the coordinate system and calculus. Reflections of Descartes on mind and mechanism began the strain of western thought; much later, the invention of the electronic computer and the possibility of machine intelligence impelled this thought, which blossomed into the Turing test and related thought. His stated most in §7 of part I and in part IV of Discourse on the Method .
A set of two perpendicular lines in a plane or three in space intersect at an origin in Cartesian coordinate system. Cartesian coordinate, a member of the set of numbers, distances, locates a point in this system. Cartesian coordinates describe all points of a Cartesian plane.
From given sets, {X} and {Y}, one can construct Cartesian product, a set of all pairs of elements (x, y), such that x belongs to {X} and y belongs to {Y}.
Cartesian philosophers include Antoine Arnauld.
René Descartes, a writer, highly influenced society. People continue to study closely his writings and subsequently responded in the west. He of the key figures in the revolution also apparently influenced the named coordinate system, used in planes and algebra.
Descartes frequently sets his views apart from those of his predecessors. In the opening section of the Passions of the Soul , a treatise on the early version of now commonly called emotions, he goes so far to assert that he writes on his topic "as if no one had written on these matters before." Many elements in late Aristotelianism, the revived Stoicism of the 16th century, or earlier like Saint Augustine of Hippo provide precedents. Naturally, he differs from the schools on two major points: He rejects corporeal substance into matter and form and any appeal to divine or natural ends in explaining natural phenomena. In his theology, he insists on the absolute freedom of act of creation of God.
Baruch Spinoza and Baron Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz later advocated Descartes, a major figure in 17th century Continent, and the empiricist school of thought, consisting of Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume, opposed him. Leibniz and Descartes, all well versed like Spinoza, contributed greatly. Descartes, the crucial bridge with algebra, invented the coordinate system and calculus. Reflections of Descartes on mind and mechanism began the strain of western thought; much later, the invention of the electronic computer and the possibility of machine intelligence impelled this thought, which blossomed into the Turing test and related thought. His stated most in §7 of part I and in part IV of Discourse on the Method .
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
October 16, 2016
This volume contains the Objections to Descartes' Meditations and his Replies, as well as a letter to a Father Dinet to complain about the author of the seventh set of objections. I find it fascinating that philosophical disputes at the dawn of modern philosophy were recorded so diligently by one of its founders. Even if the replies Descartes made to his critics aren't always convincing, this book is a testimony to the man's intellectual honesty.
The first, second, fourth, and sixth set of objections and replies are conducted with a high degree of courtesy and thoughtfulness. Even at this point, Descartes' critics were uncomfortable with both his proofs of the existence of God and his mind-body dualism. After set two, Descartes takes it on himself to put these on a more "geometrical" footing, but his axioms are far from what I'd call obviously true, or even obviously meaningful. Take for instance, "Whatever reality or perfection exists in a thing, exists formally or else eminently in its first and adequate cause." He certainly depends on something like this in his meditations, so perhaps it's best to look at this list of axioms as him really outlining what he realizes he's assuming more than a list of inarguable truths.
The third, fifth, and seventh set of objections are another thing altogether. In many ways, these three sections foreshadow the structure of discourse in internet communities. The third set were authored by Thomas Hobbes, who doesn't seem to understand what Descartes is actually saying, and receive a terse set of replies. This is not unlike arguments seen in comment sections when people bring up irrelevancies.
The fifth set, by Pierre Gassendi, is a little more substantial in its dispute over basic assumptions. I think Descartes comes off better in this set, but what's most notable is the sarcastic tone each takes against the other. Gassendi comments near the beginning that Descartes conceives of himself as a disembodied mind and addresses him "O, Mind" throughout his objections. Descartes responds by addressing Gassendi "O, Flesh." The discussion wraps up with each saying how much he actually admires the other, but Descartes can't resist the parting shot, "Among other things I rejoiced that such a long and carefully composed dissertation contained nothing in opposition to my reasoning, nothing opposed even to my conclusions, to which I was not able very easily to reply." This section reads, more than anything, like a well executed flame war. (It's also notable that there was a dispute between these two about how and when these should be published.)
I couldn't say that this was a good foreshadowing of internet-style conversation if there weren't an example of a drunk post. The seventh set covers this. (They are completely left out in another edition, by Jonathan Bennett, who notes, "The seventh set of objections is long, bad, and omitted.") The author of these objections, a Father Bourdin, essentially takes Descartes' hyperbolic doubt as the whole of his philosophy, and incessantly attacks that. The way he attacks it though, really makes him seem like he's intoxicated. He constantly throws in things like the following: "Well why do you say nothing ? do you retreat? I have not yet given up all hope. Follow me now. Hurrah! Courage!" or "Now your face beams. A new springtime of hope opens in it. My formula favours you, and so does the result which the formula creates. But note my sardonic laughter." Even Descartes at one point comments that his arguments are not unlike those of someone who'd been drinking (though he was talking about a particular point and not the overall style.)
As entertaining as I found all that, and I'm sure there are very few other readers who would share that sort of amusement, I did find some value in the work as both historical record and a more thorough examination of Descartes' philosophy. [A final word of warning: I downloaded the copy I read from https://archive.org/. The OCR on the scanned copy was not the best.]
The first, second, fourth, and sixth set of objections and replies are conducted with a high degree of courtesy and thoughtfulness. Even at this point, Descartes' critics were uncomfortable with both his proofs of the existence of God and his mind-body dualism. After set two, Descartes takes it on himself to put these on a more "geometrical" footing, but his axioms are far from what I'd call obviously true, or even obviously meaningful. Take for instance, "Whatever reality or perfection exists in a thing, exists formally or else eminently in its first and adequate cause." He certainly depends on something like this in his meditations, so perhaps it's best to look at this list of axioms as him really outlining what he realizes he's assuming more than a list of inarguable truths.
The third, fifth, and seventh set of objections are another thing altogether. In many ways, these three sections foreshadow the structure of discourse in internet communities. The third set were authored by Thomas Hobbes, who doesn't seem to understand what Descartes is actually saying, and receive a terse set of replies. This is not unlike arguments seen in comment sections when people bring up irrelevancies.
The fifth set, by Pierre Gassendi, is a little more substantial in its dispute over basic assumptions. I think Descartes comes off better in this set, but what's most notable is the sarcastic tone each takes against the other. Gassendi comments near the beginning that Descartes conceives of himself as a disembodied mind and addresses him "O, Mind" throughout his objections. Descartes responds by addressing Gassendi "O, Flesh." The discussion wraps up with each saying how much he actually admires the other, but Descartes can't resist the parting shot, "Among other things I rejoiced that such a long and carefully composed dissertation contained nothing in opposition to my reasoning, nothing opposed even to my conclusions, to which I was not able very easily to reply." This section reads, more than anything, like a well executed flame war. (It's also notable that there was a dispute between these two about how and when these should be published.)
I couldn't say that this was a good foreshadowing of internet-style conversation if there weren't an example of a drunk post. The seventh set covers this. (They are completely left out in another edition, by Jonathan Bennett, who notes, "The seventh set of objections is long, bad, and omitted.") The author of these objections, a Father Bourdin, essentially takes Descartes' hyperbolic doubt as the whole of his philosophy, and incessantly attacks that. The way he attacks it though, really makes him seem like he's intoxicated. He constantly throws in things like the following: "Well why do you say nothing ? do you retreat? I have not yet given up all hope. Follow me now. Hurrah! Courage!" or "Now your face beams. A new springtime of hope opens in it. My formula favours you, and so does the result which the formula creates. But note my sardonic laughter." Even Descartes at one point comments that his arguments are not unlike those of someone who'd been drinking (though he was talking about a particular point and not the overall style.)
As entertaining as I found all that, and I'm sure there are very few other readers who would share that sort of amusement, I did find some value in the work as both historical record and a more thorough examination of Descartes' philosophy. [A final word of warning: I downloaded the copy I read from https://archive.org/. The OCR on the scanned copy was not the best.]
February 13, 2012
This is a collection of the critiques that were advanced against Descartes philosophy, and of Descartes responses and reactions to these critiques. He gives many important precisions, and explanations.
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September 23, 2010"The Philosophical Works of Descartes, Vol. 2 (v. 2) by Rene Descartes (1967)"
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews