Classics and the Western Canon discussion
Interim Readings
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Descartes - Meditations 1 and 2
Patrice wrote: "When we read this book in class everyone was so eager to hear a "proof" of God's existence but we were all very disappointed..."Descartes starts with a "clear and distinct" -to him at least- idea of God, and proceeds to prove that the idea must correspond with reality. His chain of arguments seem eminently logical, but the premise is not always true -many, if not most, people don't have a "clear and distinct" idea of God, and those who do probably have no need of logical proof. I've yet to come across someone who became religious by reading Descartes.
Roger wrote: "Is Descartes' method of radical doubt really reasonable? .."I'm reminded of the parable of a man building a house on the sand vs. the rock. His beliefs are the house, and his doubts are the floods and the winds that beat on that house. By doubting all things that are not certain and indubitable, he is trying to eliminate all false beliefs, and rest his beliefs on a surer foundation, IMO.
In Meditations VI, he reasoned why the senses are beneficial to us.
Patrice wrote: "Roger wrote: "A dog thinks, but does not realize that it thinks, and does not conclude from that that it exists."How do we know that?"
LOL. My thoughts exactly. :)
If I meet Descartes in person, I would ask him this question: if a man becomes unconscious (and does not think) -- as happens in sleep or certain illnesses, does he still exist?
Paul wrote: "His doubt is methodological, and not intended for practical life. For the purpose of his meditations, he's trying to disable a long-held mental habit. "This is a good point, and I agree. What troubles me a bit is that he says that this experiment is meant as a foundation for science (or knowledge, translating the latin scientia a little more broadly.) Isn't it a little strange to place the basis of human knowledge on such an impractical foundation?
Descartes seems to me to make a huge mistake when he discounts all sensory experience based on the imperfection or uncertainty of some sensory experiences. In the pursuit of intellectual perfection he divorces himself from the sensory world entirely.
Patrice mentioned the allegory of the cave. Borrowing that analogy, it's as if Descartes is the philosopher who refuses to return to the cave after experiencing the pure light of intelligence. He walks to the end of the Divided Line and jumps off.
Thomas wrote: "Descartes seems to me to make a huge mistake when he discounts all sensory experience based on the imperfection or uncertainty of some sensory experiences."Because all sensory experiences come to us via the same mechanism -- Decartes explored neurology in some length in Meditations VI, if we know that some sensory experiences are imperfect, it is reasonable to cast doubt on the rest, even though there is no evidence of their falsehood yet.
The question is not whether the sensory world can be of practical use to us, but whether it can be trusted as the ultimate proof of certainty.
Nemo wrote: "The question is not whether the sensory world can be of practical use to us, but whether it can be trusted as the ultimate proof of certainty. ..."And thinking is more bulletproof because.....?
Lily wrote: "Nemo wrote: "The question is not whether the sensory world can be of practical use to us, but whether it can be trusted as the ultimate proof of certainty. ..."And thinking is more bulletproof be..."
I never said that. :)
Nemo wrote: "If I meet Descartes in person, I would ask him this question: if a man becomes unconscious (and does not think) -- as happens in sleep or certain illnesses, does he still exist?"Interesting thought. But when we sleep we dream, which is an unconscious representation of thought.
I attended a lecture recently about sleep and dreaming. Which was pretty cool.
The presupposition is that we dream because we sleep right? Our brainstem activates our sleep cycle and we go from non REM to REM sleep and dream?
But this has been disproven. Although our brainstem(which is our primitive brain) drives sleep; our anterior cingulate cortex (which is involved in emotion and cognition) drives dreaming. In disease states where the ACC is interrupted, dreaming and by extension REM sleep is interrupted. Non REM sleep is maintained but the sufferer wakes regularly, sometimes barely sleeps. And this has dire consequences.
The conclusion to this is that we have some representation of thought even when we sleep and without this representation of thought- without thinking (almost constantly) in fact- we cannot survive.
Interesting?
Thomas wrote: "Descartes seems to me to make a huge mistake when he discounts all sensory experience based on the imperfection or uncertainty of some sensory experiences. In the pursuit of intellectual perfection he divorces himself from the sensory world entirely."Ha ha about jumping off the end of the Divided Line!
But I think Descartes did justify his approach when he noted at the beginning that many opinions he had held as true in life had turned out to be false. It was specifically this that led him to use radical doubt as etching fluid, knowing full well that he would discard much that was true along with the false. His aim was to find certainty.
As far as using an artificial method for ultimately practical purposes, perhaps it's not so different from disciplines like geometry or mathematics, which are purely theoretical and abstract until they are adapted for practical use. There is no perfect circle in the real world, but nonetheless the laws of geometry are applied usefully to imperfect real-world circles.
Lisa wrote: "But when we sleep we dream, which is an unconscious representation of thought...."Interesting. Do dreams always occur during REM, even though we don't remember the dreams when we awake?
I'm reminded of a case where a guy killed his parents when sleepwalking, and the judges had to decide whether he was guilty. The verdict was that he was unconscious during sleep and therefore cannot be held responsible.
Nemo wrote: "Lisa wrote: "But when we sleep we dream, which is an unconscious representation of thought...."Interesting. Do dreams always occur during REM, even though we don't remember the dreams when we aw..."
Yup, we only dream in REm. And we always dream. But we don't always remember and that may be because our brain filters out what was irrelevant.
There's an interesting anomaly called lucid dreaming where people are sometimes aware that they are dreaming and have a degree of control.
Sleepwalking occurs in REM sleep. There've been a few forensic cases over the years. (I think the one that stuck was something to do with a gas stove- it's in my textbook...somewhere) But sleepwalking is not a complex behavior. And people don't do what they would not usually do. So someone may get up and go to the fridge. They will not open the fridge, make a sarmie and then use the knife to stab someone. Disorientation resolves within minutes of waking.
Nemo wrote: "If I meet Descartes in person, I would ask him this question: if a man becomes unconscious (and does not think) -- as happens in sleep or certain illnesses, does he still exist?"Yes, but he does not know that he exists.
Alright, it's not as simple as that.
Patrice wrote: "I've only started re-reading but IMO it's straight Plato. Just replace "God" with "the good". The senses deceive. They can't be trusted. Reason is the way to the truth. Just think of the electromagnetic spectrum. How much of light is visible? So little! Should we make our conclusions about the world by observable light?"I think what Descartes does here is quite a departure from the classical Greek style of thinking. Plato and Aristotle have no problem with uncertainty. Virtually every Platonic dialogue ends in uncertainty. (The Republic even ends with a fantasy!) And Aristotle simply says that some things can be understood precisely, others not so much. The senses are not perfectly reliable, but reason is not a substitute for observation of the world. I think this is why Socrates is so fond of mundane examples -- shoe making and cookery and so forth. Not exactly theoretical science.
Descartes's insistence on starting with absolute certainty is very different, and by comparison pretty extreme.
I heard this on the radio yesterday -- it's more neuroscience than philosophy, but it might interest those thinking about the consciousness and existence issue.http://www.radiolab.org/story/91681-w...
Descartes doubts the senses but believes his reason. Why? Because his senses sometimes deceive him, while reason can always be trusted. But by what does he make this judgment? By nothing other than reason! What if reason itself is corrupted in such a way that it cannot detect its own corruption?
Patrice wrote: "Roger wrote: "A dog thinks, but does not realize that it thinks, and does not conclude from that that it exists."How do we know that?"
I asked my dog if he was thinking, and whether or not he existed, he told me that he had no idea what I was talking about.
LOL. I always wonder why people talk to their pets, as though they understood hunan speech, and am often told, "Oh they understand. Absolutely."
Roger wrote: "I asked my dog if he was thinking, and whet..."I know my cat thinks, mostly about how to get more food out of me, but you can see the villain plotting. Maybe your dog's not in a chatty mood:-)
Lisa wrote: "Roger wrote: "Maybe your dog's not in a cha..."Of maybe he thinks it is beneath his dignity to address petty human concerns.
Lisa wrote: "But sleepwalking is not a complex behavior. And people don't do what they would not usually do. "That's why the parricide case struck me as bizarre. It is possible that part of our mental faculties, such as judgment, are inhibited, so we behave in impaired condition in dreams.
Descartes has no memory in his dream, and that's how he knows when he is awake, but what if he loses his memory?
Patrice wrote: "Lisa, you might like this. When I was a kid, very occasionally (maybe once ever 6 months) my mother ..."You really should think about writing memoirs. I like the way you make personal experiences come alive to us.
Roger wrote: "Descartes doubts the senses but believes his reason. Why? ... What if reason itself is corrupted in such a way that it cannot detect its own corruption? "I think he believes his reason the same way you (and I) do. When you ask "why", you're resorting to reason, to rational arguments.
Descartes believes he is a being that thinks/reasons, if reason is corrupted, it means there is a defect in his being which he cannot detect, nor can anybody else. So it doesn't exist.
Roger wrote: "What sense does it make to doubt the reality of things that we can all plainly see are real? "But can you plainly see that they are real? Even without considering Computer Generated Images or other tricks from the movies, which didn't exist in Descartes's time, there are many things he could see that are not real. Mirages are a classic example. So are rainbows. So are unicorns, if you accept the theory that unicorns were known about based on explorers seeing certain African creatures from the side so they clearly only had a single horn. If you've ever seen Brain Games you have seen many things that appear totally real but aren't.
Then, of course, there are dreams. Are the things you see in dreams real? And magicians who do sleight of hand tricks, and were doing them in Descartes's day -- he could easily see things that weren't really there. (And equally not see things that were there.)
I don't even need to get into created memories, which are proving to be a totally real phenomenon, so that a created but false memory can be every bit as real to the brain as a memory of something that actually happened.
I think Descartes is perfectly justified in saying we should doubt everything we see until it is proved by rational and logical proof to exist. Seeing is NOT a safe basis for believing!
Paul wrote: "But I think Descartes did justify his approach when he noted at the beginning that many opinions he had held as true in life had turned out to be false. "Good point. That being the case, that sometimes the senses deceive us or what we thought was true turns out to be false, it makes sense to try to devise a foolproof method for figuring out what really is true beyond any doubt.
Everyman wrote: "Roger wrote: "What sense does it make to doubt the reality of things that we can all plainly see are real? "But can you plainly see that they are real? Even without considering Computer Generate..."
What if I say, "Baloney. The fact that sight can be fooled for a while some of the time does not cast meaningful doubt on the reliabity of sight confirmed by other senses and by multiple observations by different people at different times"? Isn't that more reasonable, less fanciful, and less paranoid than worrying about a demon systematically deceiving me?
Nemo wrote: "LOL. I always wonder why people talk to their pets, as though they understood hunan speech, and am often told, "Oh they understand. Absolutely.""There's plenty of evidence that they understand tone of voice and body language. But if you say "good dog" with a very negative voice and expression, just as though you were saying "bad dog," the research I've seen shows that the dog will take that as "bad dog," not as "good dog." So they do understand, but not the words.
Can the dog tell whether you're mad at it or something else?
Nemo wrote: "Can the dog tell whether you're mad at it or something else?"Don't know whether the research looked into that.
Everyman wrote: "I think Descartes is perfectly justified in saying we should doubt everything we see until it is proved by rational and logical proof to exist. Seeing is NOT a safe basis for believing! ..."Outside of mathematics, given what I have seen represented as "thinking" or "rational," I don't necessarily give thought alone credence for revealing "truth" -- even without all the strange things we are slowly learning about how the brain functions.
One of the reasons most sciences tend to want to label themselves as using "empirical" evidence -- sensory data corroborated by independent observations over time.
Roger wrote: "The fact that sight can be fooled for a while some of the time does not cast meaningful doubt on the reliabity of sight confirmed by other senses and by multiple observations by different people at different times""A stopped clock, no matter what senses you use, how many different times, different people observe it, from different locations, it is not going to tell you the correct time.
Descartes is arguing that the corporeal world is constantly in flux and uncertain by nature. Regardless of the types of observations we make, it doesn't change the underlying uncertainty. Doesn't even modern physics tell us that? The best we can get from it is probability, not certainty.
Descartes' is aiming for certainty. It's no more paranoid than the pursuit for liberty and happiness, imo.
Nemo wrote: "Descartes' is aiming for certainty. It's no more paranoid than the pursuit for liberty and happiness, imo. ..."(Smile) Maybe the paranoia is the aim for certainty. Or, perhaps "aim" is fine, so long as "certainty" is not viewed as an achievable destination.
Does your clock parable possess a "correct time"?
Lily wrote: "Outside of mathematics, given what I have seen represented as "thinking" or "rational," I don't necessarily give thought alone credence for revealing "truth" ..."One of the things that bothers me about the "cogito" is that it seems to have no content. There is no "truth" to it. It reveals nothing. It means nothing. It could all be a trick of the demon. All it indicates is that something exists -- Descartes calls this thing himself, but he also admits that he doesn't know what this self is. In the final analysis, he can say only that something exists. What this thing is, and what it means, is somewhat ironically, uncertain.
But of course he does go on...
Lily wrote: "perhaps "aim" is fine, so long as "certainty" is not viewed as an achievable destination."Why not?
Descartes is certain that he exists, and not a thing in the world can deny him that. Something we can all relate to, isn't it?
Does your clock parable possess a "correct time"?
Not sure it's a parable, just something that popped into my mind while I was thinking about this. Not sure it's "my" parable either, since I can't prove ownership. :)
Nemo wrote: "Descartes is certain that he exists, and not a thing in the world can deny him that. Something we can all relate to, isn't it?..."Well, at least the evidence seems to be that he did (exist).
My overall take is that Descartes was seeking philosophical axioms, like the ones that form the bases of mathematical proofs. In this he was doing exactly what Thomas Hobbes, along a different line, did in Leviathan, which was published 10 years later in 1651. And in these first 2 Meditations Descartes finds a single axiom: his own (mental) existence, known directly through intuition, and subjected to--and passing--the most stringent test of radical doubt.
Lily wrote: "Outside of mathematics, given what I have seen represented as "thinking" or "rational," I don't necessarily give thought alone credence for revealing "truth" -- even without all the strange things we are slowly learning about how the brain functions."I agree that there are ways of discovering truth beyond pure reason. But that doesn't mean that pure reason isn't a way to discover truth. It just isn't the only way.
But the problem is that at least under our current standard of understanding, I find that the other ways are less verifiable, and that while a trail of reason should be able to be followed by any other person, a trail of meditative thinking, for example, usually can't.
Does your clock parable possess a "correct time"? "A stopped clock is precisely accurate twice a day. A clock consistently running ten seconds slow will never be precisely accurate.
Yet the running clock is more useful to most people than the stopped clock.
Everyman wrote: "while a trail of reason should be able to be followed by any other person, a trail of meditative thinking, for example, usually can't...."Could you provide an example of "a trail of meditative thinking"?
Nemo wrote: "Could you provide an example of "a trail of meditative thinking"?For me, it happens most often during Quaker meeting. The mind is emptied as much as possible, and close meditation on the divine can take one some very interesting places where rationality dare not tread, and which is not really explainable, but only experiential.
Do those who meditate in this way ever try to make sense of their thoughts, doctrinize or act upon them?
Nemo wrote: "Do those who meditate in this way ever try to make sense of their thoughts, doctrinize or act upon them?"Hard question, and sometimes quite personal. I can only answer for myself. It's not an intellectual process, but act on the results of meditation, certainly.
Does anyone know where to get the book including the complete "Objections and Replies" in print?Thanks to Everyman, BTW, for choosing it as a interim read. I enjoyed it much more than I had expected. There is so much more to read and discuss, it deserves to be treated as a major read. :)
Nemo wrote: "Does anyone know where to get the book including the complete "Objections and Replies" in print?"It's all in the Great Books of the Western World, volume 31....
Paul wrote: "Nemo wrote: "Does anyone know where to get the book including the complete "Objections and Replies" in print?"It's all in the Great Books of the Western World, volume 31...."
Thanks. I don't think the volumes are sold individually. How much did the whole set cost you?
Patrice wrote: "The objections and replies reminds me of a dialogue form, ala Plato."The exchange between Descartes and Hobbes reminds me of Socrates vs. Thrasymachus, except that Descartes was curt in his replies to Hobbes, as if to say "I have no tolerance for fools".
Nemo wrote: "Thanks. I don't think the volumes are sold individually. How much did the whole set cost you? ..."Try ebay, besides whatever other recommendations you get here. Your library system may have them, too.
Looks like you can pick up a copy of the Descartes volume for a song and a prayer: http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/Searc...
Nemo wrote: "Thanks. I don't think the volumes are sold individually. How much did the whole set cost you?"I got my set on eBay in 2010. As I recall, the price I paid was US$127--but the shipping was more than that. Three big, heavy, cardboard boxes, all securely packed by the seller, a lovely lady farmer in Minnesota.
Classics and the Western Canon
Books mentioned in this topic
A Beautiful Mind (other topics)Mountolive (other topics)
Alexandria Still: Forster, Durrell, and Cavafy (other topics)
The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, Volume II (other topics)
Meditations on First Philosophy, with Selections from the Objections and Replies (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Jane Lagoudis Pinchin (other topics)Ruth Ozeki (other topics)
I'm reminded of William James, who held that doubt needs to be justified as much as belief does.
But I think Descartes covered this off in the 1st Meditation:
His doubt is methodological, and not intended for practical life. For the purpose of his meditations, he's trying to disable a long-held mental habit.