Ports of Call   Ports of Call Introduction Las Casas Montaigne Descartes1 Descartes2 Descartes3 Spinoza Locke1 Locke2 Locke3 Berkeley Hume

Unit 6: Descartes 3

Activity

Preparing for the Midterm

The activity for this unit is going to be preparing for the midterm. Your midterm study questions will be passed out on Feb. 1 and the midterm will take place on Feb. 8. To prepare yourself in the best way for the exam, you should write out answers to all of the study questions. You should make sure that the answers you produce address all of the points posed in the questions, and you should think about how to effectively organize your essays, so that they parts are effectively integrated.

There is also going to be a brief (4pt) quiz on the process of rebuilding the house of knowledge. Descartes: Rebuilding the House of Knowledge. Here are the quiz questions. When you have figured out the answers, click on the link above and take the quiz.

Descartes: Rebuilding the House of Knowledge
Regaining truths of reason, the imagination and the senses
1. Once Descartes has eleminated the evil demon hypothesis by proving that a benevolent God who is not a deceiver exists, it follows that: he no longer has any doubts about the senses. he no longer has doubts about the truths of mathematics. he no longer doubts that his essence is to be a thinking thing. he has a criterion to distinguish between dreaming and waking. 2. Descartes claims that he has proofs from all three faculties (reason, imagination and the senses) that material objects exist in the external world. The proof from the imagination: relies on the distinction between powers of active and passive perception. Active perception is the working of the imagination, passive perception is sensation. relies on the distinction between essence and existence. Since Descartes knows the essence of material bodies, they must exist. relies explicitly on the fact that God might be a deceiver. relies on the relation of the imagination to the senses. relies on finding a criterion between waking and sleeping. 3. Descartes gives a proof for the real distinction between the mind and the body. This proof requires that: both the soul the body are indivisible. that the body has color, taste, smell and other sensible qualities. that Descartes knows that the essence of the body is to be extended, flexible and moveable, and that the essence of the mind is its potential for interaction with God. that the mind is in essence something extended flexible and moveable. that God can create whatever Descartes (or anyone else capable of such a feat) can clearly and distinctly perceive to be distinct. 4. Descartes dualism between mind and body involves a doctrine of two way causal interaction. This doctrine holds that: Bodies effect minds in the imagination, while minds effect bodies in the understanding. Bodies causally interact with minds by causing perceptions, and the mind interacts with God, thereby coming to have knowledge. Bodies causally effect minds in action, minds causally effect bodies by making the body perceive. Mind causally effect bodies in two ways, first by causing them to perceive and second to act, bodies (being lower on the scale of being) cannot effect minds. Bodies causally effect minds in perception; while minds causally effect bodies by making them act.