Discards
I'm the only man on earth and maybe not
there is land and no man.
Maybe a god is cheating on me.
Has a god condemned me to time,
that long illusion.
I dream the moon and I dream my eyes that perceive
the moon.
I dreamed the afternoon and morning of the first
day.
I have dreamed of Carthage and the legions that
desolate carthage.
I dreamed Lucano.
I dreamed the hill of Golgotha and the crosses
of Rome.
I dreamt geometry.
I dreamed the point, the line, the plane and the
volume.
I dreamed the yellow, the blue and the red.
I've dreamt of my sick childhood.
I dreamt the maps and the kingdoms and that duel of dawn.
I've dreamed of the inconceivable pain.
I dreamed my sword.
I dreamed Elizabeth of Bohemia.
I've dreamed of doubt and certainty.
I dreamt yesterday.
Maybe I didn't have yesterday, maybe I wasn't born.
I dream of dreaming.
I feel a little cold, a little scared.
On the Danube is the night.
I will continue to dream Descartes and the faith of his
parents.
Jorge Luis Borges (1989) The Figure
“ The power to judge well and to distinguish the true from the false, which is proper to what we call “good sense” or “reason”, is by nature the same in all men; therefore, the diversity of our opinions does not come from some being more rational than others, but only from directing our thoughts in ways different, and we do not consider the same things. It is certainly not enough, to have a good understanding: the principle is to apply it well” The discourse of the method, Descartes
Descartes was remarkable not only as a philosopher but also as a scientist, baseta recall some of his contributions such as analytical geometry, the king of refraction of light, etc.
From his philosophical interest, it is necessary to characterize his radicalism, a singular feature of his thinking. Indeed, Descartes moves towards the “roots” or the root causes, in the search for the ultimate foundations. Cartesian philosophy can be valued as a tenacious effort to achieve the basic principles of things.
Descartes' historical context is of a sufficient plurality and diversity of philosophical systems, while noting that despite the commitment of so many philosophers throughout history, none of the problems silvery by philosophy seemed to have a genuine solution. And specifically, this is what Descartes found annoying: the dubious predominates, the plausible ones. In his view, knowledge must be absolutely secure or abandoned as insufficient. Descartes perceives with a remarkable lucidity the failure of almost twenty centuries of philosophical effort and proposes to end such a state of affairs by basing knowledge on the basis of which there is no room for doubt.
The starting point is, therefore, an attitude of doubt and mistrust in the face of all previous philosophical systems, which implies the effort to start completely anew. Ortega will say that Descartes is, in this sense, the first modernman, and as a new man who is willing to philosophize, he will begin to do so as if no one had done it before.
Indeed, the problem of knowledge becomes the fundamental problem of the philosophy of modernity:
“ The philosophy of the new times (...) has as its principle, in a general way, the spirit present before itself very much; it confronts the point of view of the Middle Ages, which was that of the diversity of the thought and of the existing Universe and work for the dissolution of that point of view. His fundamental interest is not, therefore, to think objects in their truth, but to think the thinking and understanding of objects (...) Thought thus acquieses its independence” Lessons on the history of philosophy, Hegel
The rationalist thesis of the identity between reason and reality will allow Descartes to develop a metaphysics of high flights, based on the concept of substance. “Substance” is the first “innate” idea from which odo will derive after a strict deductive process. Rationalists are metaphysical comparable to the level of Aristotle which will only be achieved later by Hegel's philosophy in the 19th century.
“ I have long realized that, since my childhood, I have admitted as true a protion of false opinions, and that everything that I have built on such flimsy principles can only be very doubtful and uncertain; since then I have judged that it was necessary to seriously undertake, once in my life, to desire me to all the opinions to which I had given credit, and start again, from the foundations, if I wanted to establish something fimemente constant in the sciences” Metaphysical Meditations, Descartes
This critical attitude to the past does not mean that Descartes completely forgot about it and simply devotes himself to the use of his own faculties. On the contrary, the history of philosophy contains at least one teaching implicit in its failures, which says that we must avoid error by being critical of ourselves and not just of the above. In this sense, Cartesian radicalism manifests itself primarily as a genuine concern to eitate error. However, this does not lead to the construction of a mere theory of error such as Bacon's work, but rather to something deeper: to methodical doubt.
Methodical doubt is not a simple doubt as an exercise, nor should it be related to the sterile doubt of the systematic skeptic. What Descartes intends is to turn doubt into a method.
Reviewing the past, Descartes is not contested with knowledge that is more or less likely or seem certain to some extent. In order to avoid mistakes or uncertainties, radicalism aims to achieve an absolutely true knowledge whose truth is so firm that it is beyond doubt.
In apparent paradox, Descartes starts from doubt and embarks on the path of doubt because he considers it the safest way to find something absolutely sure if there is.
The Cartesian method initially consists of using doubt to see if there is anything capable of resisting it, so that something is absolutely true. Doubt is therefore methodical, because it is used as an instinct to reach the truth and not the way of the skeptics, that is, to remain in it.
Secondly, doubt is universal because it will apply to everything without exception and nothing should be excluded from it. And finally it's hyperbolic because it will be carried to its last, exaggerated extreme.
The illusions of the senses
The senses often lead us to error, and it is prudent not to trust those who have ever deceived us. Indeed, if anyone ever fails his word, it would be foolish to trust his promise in the future: the only prudent attitude is to distrust his word. Similarly, if our senses have shown us so many times that they are unreliable, why should we believe in the information they provide us with?
Consequently, “sensitive things” are doubtful, so we cannot know whether the senses deceive us or not. At least, it is possible to say that it is not certain that we are not deceived therefore, according to the plan of the “methodical doubt” of false all the dubious, the knowledge of the meaning must be rejected.
While the senses can often deceive us there are many things that would be unreasonable to doubt, Descartes says: “For example, I am here, sitting by the fire, dressed in a robe, holding a cake in my hands, and other things like that.” Metaphysical Meditations, Descartes.
Doubt such things, would be something close to madness, therefore discarded. But then he adds that in dreams he has once imagined situations that seem as real as reality itself without any indication to discern between sleep and wakefulness. For Descartes, this point is decisive in concluding that any sensitive knowledge should be considered doubtful.
1. The Mistakes of Men in Reasoning
Descartes will say that there are men who are wrong to reason, even about the simplest questions of geometry (paralogisms).
This means that even in mathematics (the most rational of science) there would be a possibility of making mistakes even in simple operations. Therefore, there is a possibility, albeit small, that all rational arguments are fallacious and that all rational knowledge is false.
What has been said above is unbearable since even considering it valid, that is to say the relatively complex “processes” of our thinking (discursive processes).
However, the discursive processes rely on certain “principles” such as: “every object is identical to itself” or “the whole is greater than the part”. These “principles” are known intuitively, without a rational process intervening in our thinking. Descartes believes that it makes sense to doubt these principles...
This argument is difficult to apply, so Descartes introduces the famous hypothesis of the evil genius:
“ I will assume (...) that a certain genius of the evil spirit, no less cunning and mocking than powerful, has put his industry all into deceiving me” Descartes
Although unlikely, perhaps Descartes would really think that some kind of genius or powerful and perverse god created us in such a way that we were always predisposed to error, making us believe that 1 + 1 = 2, when this was not actually true.
This argument is clearly hyperbolic, it would be incorrect to maintain, in fact, that Descartes affirmed the existence of the “evil genius”, what he tries to point out, is that we have no compelling argument to affirm its non-existence, its existence is a possibility no matter how remote or far-fetched it seems and represents the point maximum of doubt, the last extreme to which a doubt can reach.
---
“ But I warned then that, wanting to think, of that fate, that everything is false, it was necessary that I, who thought it, should be something; and observing that this truth “I think, then I am” was so firm and sure that the most errant assumptions of the excéptics are not capable of moving it, I judged that I could receive it unscrupulously. as the principle of philosophy I was looking for” Discourse of the Method, Descartes
Indeed, even if it might still be assumed that the “evil genius” exists and jercies his evil power over the ability to think, one himself should exist because otherwise one could not even be deceived by another. Descartes will say that:
“ There is no doubt, therefore, that I am, for he deceives me and, as much as he deceives me, he will never be able to make me anything, as long as I think I am something. So, having thought it well and carefully examined everything, it must finally be concluded and kept as constant that the following proposition: “I am, then I exist”is necessarily true while I am pronouncing it or conceiving it in my spirit. Metaphysical Meditations, Descartes
= = == =
The way Descartes enunciates its principle, I think, then I am might suggest that it is a discursive knowledge or an abbreviated syllogism (entinema), whose complete formula would be:
All the entities that think, are,
I think,
Then I am.
However, this would be a misinterpretation since Descartes himself makes a warning about it: for it to be a syllogism, it would be necessary that the larger premise: “all the entities that think, are”, assumes that there are other entities other than me, things that, strictly following the criterion of “methodical doubt” does not we know so far.
The cogito is an intuitive knowledge, which means that it is known immediately, directly and not as a deduction from a larger premise.
It is remarkable that Descartes does not say,: I doubt, then... but“I think, then...” , in fact, for this philosopher, thought is everything that happens within us: denying, affirming, doubting, understanding, wanting, imagining, etc. Thought is therefore every conscious act of the spirit . This implies a clear subjectivist position since the evidence is given only within the subject. It should be noted that what is evident is, above all, the very act of thinking, the existence of thought... then what is thought of the idea (the object of thought) is no longer immediately evident.
It is likely that the meaning of the “cogito” is that by starting Descartes from his own interiority and from the thoughts he discovers in himself he comes into existence. His conception of the self is that of a thought that exists. This raises a bridge between pure thought, enclosed in itself and the reality of the world of existences.
When we conceive the substance, we conceive only one thing that exists in such a way that it has no need but of itself to exist Principles, Descartes
Substance and thing (res) are taken as synonyms in such a way that substance is what exists specifically. In this regard, Descartes adopts an axiomatic definition, that is, the principles are not demonstrated.
The definition of substance will follow that only God is substance while creatures need it to exist. In this regard, it discriminates between two classes of substances:
God or the infinite substance: by definition.
Souls and finite bodies or substances except God need nothing else to exist. A finite substance does not need another substance to exist: for example, the soul does not enact the body.
Descartes will add that each substance has an attribute that constitutes its essence (and identifies with it). Ex: soul, thought; body, extension.
The various forms in which the substance is available are modes. Ex: the body, substance; has an extension, attribute; having a certain figure, mode.
Although Descartes' thinking is fluctuating at this point (sometimes it will say that there is a union between body and soul) what is inferred from his conceptual scheme is that if the soul and the body are substances, they do not need each other to exist:
This self, that is, the soul by which I am what I am, is entirely different from the body and even easier to know than it Discourse, Descartes