Michael Geathers
Philosophy
S. Yeng
10/2/15
The topic of paper will involve an in-depth discussion of two differing views on the senses, but at the same time. These two epistemological and ontological views have been discussed by French philosopher Rene Descartes and Greek philosopher, Socrates. The first view, where Socrates proposes that in understanding knowledge, the senses should not be of great importance to humanity. He instead believes that understanding the world of ideas is the theory that in terms of understanding the world around us is favorable, especially when it comes to learning. He sees it as considerably unfavorable to only rely on received knowledge and empiricism alone.
Due to the fact received knowledge in
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Elaborating further, he saw the only way that comes close to understanding reality is the realm of his reason, in that the use of knowledge and cognition helped Descartes understand the world around him. He then explains further that with his mind, he is able to perceive the world as it is. On Descartes view regarding the mind, he admits that “for since I have now learned that bodies themselves are not perceived not, strictly speaking, by the senses or by the imaginative faculty, but by intellect alone.”
With this revelation, Descartes realizes that many of the objects in reality, including the senses are only resulting out of the act of his cognition and knowledge. But from where that knowledge comes from, he explains that it is not only from himself, but proposes a more theological explanation. Despite Descartes’s rationalism as an explanation for human perception of the world, he sees God existence as an explanation for his knowledge and cognition. To elaborate Descartes explains further about his existence of God revealing to himself philosophically that “I received this idea from God. For I did not derive it from the senses, nor did it ever spontaneously thrust itself on my attention, as do the ideas of sensible things, when the things themselves make an expression on the external sense organs (or appear to do so). Nor is it a fiction, a creation of my own, for I cannot subtract anything from it, or add anything from it.”
Descartes is now clear on his perception of God so he looks at material things. He points out that a body must exist in reality, because for him to dream about his body, it must exist before he would know what to dream about. So although he can perceive qualities of material things, he is still confused about some things because of is imperfect perception. He concludes that the senses are meant to help him get around in the world, not to lead him to the truth. ( SparkNotes Editors, 2012 )
This is where the wax argument comes into play. All the properties of the piece of wax that we perceive with the senses change as the wax melts. This is true as well of its primary properties, such as shape, extension and size. Yet the wax remains the same piece of wax as it melts. We know the wax through our mind and judgement, not through our senses or imagination. Therefore, every act of clear and distinct knowledge of corporeal matter also provides even more certain evidence for the existence of Descartes as a thinking thing. Therefore his mind is much clearer and more distinctly know to him than his body. At this
Like many people today, Descartes believed that the mind and soul were separate. He believed that the mind’s purpose was only for “thinking” and “non-extended” things. While, the body is an extension; non-thinking. Descartes thought that the mind and body were different substances, thus they
Some have suggested that René Descartes argues that sense perception relies on the mind rather than on the body. Descartes asserts that we can know our mind more readily than we can know our body. In support of this idea he gives the example of a piece of wax which is observed in its solid form and its liquid form. After pointing out the difficulties of relying on the senses of the physical body to understand the nature of the wax he makes this claim: [P]erception ... is neither a seeing, nor a touching, nor an imagining. ... [R]ather it is an inspection on the part of the mind alone (Section 31). 1 This quote is perhaps the most direct statement of the author's thesis on this subject.
Descartes defines senses as a part of the process of thinking. He also explains that we can use our senses to help us understand the true nature of things. Descartes struggled with doubt and his senses when he used his ontological proof that God existed. For example, he explains that he is aware that he is not perfect and he makes mistakes. He understands that he must know what perfect is in order to give someone the title. He knew that something perfect lead him to have these ideas and that it must exist. His definition of perfect is unique without the knowledge of anyone else and he defined it as God. For example, Descartes believes that God is perfect and deception is a sign of imperfection. Therefore, Descartes came to the conclusion that God cannot deceive. This example shows that Descartes did struggle to accept his own belief without doubting himself. His ontological argument proved, to Descartes, that through God everything
Descartes’ argue that mind is better known than body by first claiming humans as fundamentally rational, meaning “a thing that doubts, understands, affirms, denies, is willing, is unwilling,” ( Descartes, 19) he therefore argues that humans have the ability to know their proper minds clearly and distinctly. He proposes the conception of the mind where the imagination and the senses are also inherent capabilities of the body (faculties), specifically powers of the mind.
Descartes starts his distinction of mind and by writing of his senses, that he has
He finds it plausible that we are all living in a dream and we have never experienced reality. He can no longer give any credence to his senses and finds himself in a place of complete uncertainty. Descartes comes to the conclusion that nothing can be perceived more easily and more evidently than his own mind. He has discovered that even bodies are not accurately perceived by the senses or the faculty of imagination, and are only accurately being perceived by the intellect. He also realizes that they are not distinguished through being touched, smelled, or tasted, but by being understood alone. (An apple is an apple because our mind tells us that it is an apple.) It is the faculty of reason that gives the knowledge and lets the mind know the truths and essences of objects. Descartes assumes that all of us can be decided by our senses, someone can see something far away, and then discover that is not what we thought it was. Or even a oar when is immerse half in water attempt to be bent, but instead is straight. Descartes think that we cannot always be sure of what we sense, and gives the example of himself seated by the fire.
On the journey to find truth to base all thought upon, Descartes explains his first step in doing so. “Never accept anything for true which I did not clearly know to be such; that is to say, carefully to avoid precipitancy and prejudice, and to comprise nothing more in my judgment than what was presented to my mind so clearly and distinctly as to exclude all ground of doubt.”(Kolak, Pg.228). Assuming that everything you see is fictitious, Descartes believed he had no senses at all; “body, shape, extension, motion, and place are unreal.”(Weissman, Pg.23). Our senses have failed us all at one point or another in our lives, so why use the senses as a base for thought? The most famous quote and philosophy by Descartes in history ever, “Je pense, donc je suis, cogito ergo sum” (Durant, Pg.639). “I think, therefore I am” was the first step towards a basis to understand truth, and leaning away from truth through the senses.
In his Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes strives first and foremost to provide an infallibly justified foundation for the empirical sciences, and second to prove the existence of God. I will focus on the first and second meditations in my attempt to show that, in his skepticism of the sources of knowledge, he fails to follow the rules he has set out in the Discourse on Method. First I claim that Descartes fails to draw the distinction between pure sensation and inference, which make up what he calls sensation, and then consider the consequences of this failure to follow his method. Second, I will show that in his treatment of thinking Descartes fails to distinguish between active and passive thinking.
He reasons that, through these principals, his idea of God cannot have come from himself, as he is an imperfect being. He does not have the capability of thinking of an infinite substance or a perfect substance, such as God, because he has lesser reality than these ideas and cannot be the cause of them. The only way these ideas could exist is if they were created by something of equal (greater being impossible, as infinite perfection cannot have a superior) reality. Because God is the only infinite Descartes can recognize at this state, it must be God that planted the idea in his mind.
He then begins to address the problem of imagination. If he realizes that things are around him, that rules out the possibility that he is imagining such entities. He says that imagination is not essential to his existing, so he removes himself from these thoughts.
He specifically says he didn't draw it from his senses. He didn't make the idea of God he says the idea was imprinted on him. He makes the conclusion by stating, "Thus the only option remaining is that this idea is innate in me just as the idea of myself is innate in me." God imprints the innate idea of Him on us at birth and that is why we know of God. An example of this is how a craftsman imprints his signature on his work. Descartes says he gets innate ideas from God because God instills the idea of himself onto us, which is an innate idea.
Descartes declares that he will only accept ideas that he can absolutely affirm, but accepts the existence of God without adequately proving it. This inadequacy undermines his declared project of defining the world in terms of established ideas. He does not sufficiently prove the idea of God, yet bases so much on it. When he later discusses physical bodies, intellect, and mathematical concepts, the reader cannot forget that everything he writes is based on the shaky foundation of the Christian God, and finds his
Before these changes were apparent, Descartes pointed out the difficulties of relying on the senses, of the physical body. In section 31 of Meditation two, he says that the perception he has, "is a case not of vision or touch or imagination - nor has it ever been, despite previous appearances - but of purely mental scrutiny". Descartes shows that our senses cannot be used to have knowledge of things in the external world, and that knowledge of these things must come through the mind alone.