Rene Descartes Good Sense Is The Best Shared-Out Thing In The World

Unequivocally one of the most historically and culturally-significant pieces of literature, Thomas Paine’s Common Sense has been meticulously analyzed for its effectiveness in eliciting the reaction that Paine himself intended in 1776. At the forefront of Paine’s pamphlet is “Thoughts on the Present State of American Affairs,” notable for its first sentence: “In the following pages I offer nothing more than simple, facts, plain arguments, and commonsense” (7). Within, Paine “elaborates” on three main points that strengthen the option of independence: the effects of British rule on the colonies; the plausible relationship with Britain upon reconciliation; and the actual role of England as a parent country as opposed to England’s optimal role. However, upon analysis of the text, I discerned that Paine does not develop his main points to the extent that he does his almost-propaganda-like statements regarding England. Despite this, adding historical knowledge to Common Sense can help one corroborate Paine’s views to an extent. Overall, when expressing his views on the colonies’ relationship with England, possible results of reconciliation, and England as a parent country, Paine does not elaborate, but information regarding the Navigation Acts and mercantilism can assist one in understanding the significance of Common Sense.

During the seventeenth century, the scientific revolution in Europe was at its peak, changing people’s lives through the new techniques of the scientific method. Citizens of western civilizations had previously used religion as the lens through which they perceived their beliefs and customs in their communities. Before the scientific revolution, science and religion were intertwined, and people were taught to accept religious laws and doctrines without questioning; the Church was the ultimate authority on how the world worked. However, during this revolution, scientists were inspired to learn and understand the laws of the universe had created, a noble and controversial move toward truth seeking. The famous scientists of the time, such as Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo and Newton, were known to be natural philosophers, intending to reveal God’s mystery and understand (through proof) the majesty of God. Throughout previous centuries, people had hypothesized how the world and natural phenomenon may work, and new Protestant ideals demanded constant interrogation and examination. Nevertheless, some of these revelations went against the Church’s teachings and authority. If people believed the Church could be wrong, then they could question everything around them, as well. As a result, the introduction of the scientific method, a process by which scientists discovered and proved new theories, was revolutionary because it distinguished what could be proved as real from what was simply

Lisa Jardine’s Ingenious Pursuits: Building the Scientific Revolution provides a comprehensive breakdown of the discoveries that defined the Scientific Revolution and the history behind them. The story of the scientific revolution truly begins with a separation between the Catholic Church and the denizens of Europe brought on by the Protestant Reformation. This separation led directly to the questioning of the church and what they deemed to be true. The growing suspicion of the church applied not only to the politics and religious views but the scientific “facts” the church was built upon. The suspicion of these scientific facts quickly grew to an open challenging of these facts, The Scientific Revolution. The Scientific Revolution is something we have all studied in our grade school years and the discoveries of people such as Isaac Newton and Galileo Galilei are well documented and arguably common knowledge but Jardine’s book Ingenious Pursuits encapsulates the scientific revolution in a new light. Jardine accomplishes this by telling the stories of some of the greatest achievements of the Scientific Revolution. These stories reveal the collaborations of some of histories most brilliant minds as well as the secrecy amongst them and uncover the motives that fueled many of these accomplishments.

This essay will explore parallels between the ideas of the scientific revolution and the enlightenment. The scientific revolution describes a time when great changes occurred in the way the universe was viewed, d through the advances of sciences during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The enlightenment refers to a movement that grew out of the new scientific ideas of the revolution that occurred in the late seventeenth to eighteenth century. Although both the scientific revolution and enlightenment encapsulate different ideas, the scientific revolution laid the underlying ideological foundations for the enlightenment movement. A number of parallels

This essay attempts to explain Descartes’ epistemology of his knowledge, his “Cogito, Ergo Sum” concept (found in the Meditations), and why he used it [the cogito concept] as a foundation when building his structure of knowledge. After explaining the concept I give a brief evaluation of his success in introducing and using this cogito as a foundation. Finally, I provide reasons why I think Descartes succeeded in his epistemology.

The Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment, which spanned from the late 1500’s to 1700’s, shaped today’s modern world through disregarding past information and seeking answers on their own through the scientific method and other techniques created during the Enlightenment. Newton’s ‘Philsophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica’ and Diderot’s Encyclopedia were both composed of characteristics that developed this time period through the desire to understand all life, humans are capable of understanding the Earth, and a sense of independence from not having to rely on the nobles or church for knowledge.

In Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes takes the reader through a methodological exercise in philosophical enquiry. After stripping the intellect of all doubtful and false beliefs, he re-examines the nature and structure of being in an attempt to secure a universally valid epistemology free from skepticism. Hoping for the successful reconciliation of science and theology, Descartes works to reconstruct a new foundation of absolute and certain truth to act as a catalyst for future scientific research by “showing that a mathematical [rational-objective] physics of the world is attainable by creatures with our intellectual capacities and faculties” (Shand 1994, p.

In Rene Descartes’ Discourse on Method he expresses his disappointment with traditional philosophy and with the limitations of theology; only logic, geometry and algebra hold his respect, because of the utter certainty which they can offer us. Unfortunately, because they depend on hypotheses, they cannot tell us what is real, i.e. what the world is really like. Therefore Descartes suggests a method of thought combining the consistency of mathematics but based on natural truths about what is real, basic knowledge which could not be wrong (like the axioms of geometry). He calls into question everything that he thinks he has learned through his senses but rests his entire system on the one truth that he cannot doubt, namely, the reality of his own mind and the radical difference between the mental and the physical aspects of the world.

There are many aspects of Rene Descartes’ and Francis Bacon’s practices of approaching the scientific method. When comparing the two scientists, it is clear that there are many similarities. In an effort to compare Rene’ Descartes and Francis Bacon it is important to discover the pioneer’s investigations and philosophies. Both credited with the evolution from Aristotelian discovery to modern science, Descartes and Bacon re imagined science. Through various explorations, Francis Bacon and Rene Descartes created the scientific method we still use today. Descartes believed that only two things in life proved true, that man in fact exists and that mathematics are the base of all truth. Similarly, Bacon believed in a simple truth as well, the fact that everything in nature can be broken down and understood by simple parts. Descartes’ and Bacon’s similarities can be seen in their respective published works, Discourse on Method and the New Organon, both published in the 1600’s. From their skepticism towards previous philosophy to how they changed science, there are many similarities between Descartes and Bacon.

At its climax the scientific revolution would bring enormous change with the revolutionary contributions made by Isaac Newton. Newton, building on previous works produced the concepts of gravity, and he developed the three laws of motion which could be accurately proved through mathematical calculations. These discoveries about the natural world would serve to mend past uncertainties which in turn gave people real hope. It was the beginning of an end of Europe’s dark times and the birth of many new innovations and developments that were to come in the eighteenth century. It was truly a new age where through reason one could become fully become enlightened.

The mythical phoenix is born in the ashes of its mother once she has been consumed in flame, becoming stronger than she ever was. In Discourse on Method, Descartes hopes to destroy the conventional understanding of philosophy that has been followed throughout the ages, and in doing so establish his own philosophy as the new convention in the ashes of the old philosophy. In this paper, I will present Descartes’ findings of instability in philosophy and distaste for the way people learn as his motivation for undertaking this reconstruction of his thoughts, finding a firm and lasting basis for the sciences as his end goal for the reconstruction, and his rules for conducting thought and code of doubt as the way by which he hopes to achieve

In his work Meditations on First Philosophy, published in 1641, René Descartes sets out to establish a set of indubitable truths for the sciences. He begins by discarding all of his beliefs, then works to rebuild his beliefs based on careful thought. Descartes clearly states this goal, saying in the First Meditation, “I will work my way up… I will accomplish this by putting aside everything that admits of the least doubt” (I, 17). He is able to establish his own existence, but struggles to move beyond his internal thoughts to discuss external objects. Descartes decides that the Christian God is the bridge he needs to escape the confines of his own mind, and argues for the existence of God in the Third Meditation in order to move on to discussing the physical world. In this paper I will argue that Descartes’ rationalistic project would have been improved without an appeal to the Christian God, although I will also argue that Descartes thinks this appeal is necessary.

The leading minds of science and literature were playing right into the hands of the common man at the most opportune time in history. The blind trust in religion was beginning to fade and the papal order was beginning to be shrouded in skepticism. Unquestioningly taking someone else’s word for what was true and acceptable was a thing of the past. The average individual was beginning to doubt the existence of an all-powerful God and turn his or her attention inward. The landscape of Europe and the world would forever be changed by these new revolutionary ideas and go on to influence the crusaders of the American and French Revolution.

With the emergence of the scientific revolution in the 17th century, views of society and nature were transformed throughout Europe. There were great developments in mathematics, physics, astronomy, biology, and chemistry. The world and its views were changing, and with that change, came a new change in thought, a new change in philosophy. Apart from ancient Greek philosophy, which was centered on finding order in a vast variety of things by searching for a fundamental amalgamating principle, Descartes sought to establish order via some fundamental division. Descartes understands and expresses that what we know about our mind is more definite than what we know about the world outside our mind. Descartes’

The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries witnessed a colossal transition in the scientific view of the universe. During this period a profound rethinking of scientific theory as well as moral and religious matters took place. Traditional ideas were reconsidered by religious thinkers. Philosophers began applying rational scientific thought to problems that they considered. The main concept of the Scientific Revolution was to "question everything". The Scientific Revolution was an elaborate movement. Many brilliant people with a wealth of new ideas contributed to this movement. The French philosopher, mathematician, and scientist Rene Descartes was one of these people.