Descartes begins his journey toward the truth is in a natural way by questioning and doubting his thoughts, that which he knows, and what he accept as truth. In trying to answer the question, “What is human nature?” he seeks to understand what we are and who we are as human beings.
Descartes’ method is doubt; he states in the first meditation what “truths” we should doubt. He “attack[s] those principles upon which all [his] former opinions rested.” For this, the first thing that he realizes as important in establishing some sense of truth is to reach some stage of maturity. One must be able to entertain these thoughts before being able to arrive at truth. Here Descartes also states that the main source of learning and knowledge is from or …show more content…
He confronts his first understanding with a new one that emerges supposing the presences of the evil genius God. He writes, “Undoubtedly I believed myself to be a [hu]man,” with a body and a soul; both body and soul have attributes. Descartes understands his body by something that can be perceived with the senses and with the power of self-movement. With regards to the soul, he asserts that the actions of nourishing, waking, feeling and thinking refer to soul, which he considers as something “extremely rare and subtle like a wind, a flame, or an ether, which was spread throughout [his] grosser parts.” However, in this thought experiment of the evil genius God, Descartes thinks that he does not posses any of these attributes of soul or body. With regards to the soul, he finds that the only attribute belonging to him is thinking. Humans exist, as long as humans think. We are things that think. For Descartes a human is not a body and a soul, but rather a thing that thinks. But I think that thinks is a thing that “It is a thing which doubts, understands, conceives, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, which also imagines and …show more content…
Descartes understands God, as “a substance that is infinite (eternal, immutable), independent, all knowing, all powerful, and by which everything else, if anything else exist has been created.” Descartes also asserts that this idea of God cannot come from himself, but from God. He could have the idea of substance because he is a substance, but the idea of infinite, for example, cannot come from him since he is a finite being. Another thing that he considers to probe the existence of God, is that as a thinking being we have this sense of lacking and imperfection because we have this idea of some being that is perfect. Therefore, we could state that this idea of God’s existence is innate, because we could not understand the idea of God is already on us. Descartes also develop the idea of God is not only our creator but also who conserve us. When he is talking about his parents, he states “ although all that I have ever been able to believe of them were truth, that does not follow that it is they who conserve, me, nor are they even the author of my being in any sense, in so far as I am a thinking being…”
Descartes’ method is doubt; he states in the first meditation what “truths” we should doubt. He “attack[s] those principles upon which all [his] former opinions rested.” For this, the first thing that he realizes as important in establishing some sense of truth is to reach some stage of maturity. One must be able to entertain these thoughts before being able to arrive at truth. Here Descartes also states that the main source of learning and knowledge is from or …show more content…
He confronts his first understanding with a new one that emerges supposing the presences of the evil genius God. He writes, “Undoubtedly I believed myself to be a [hu]man,” with a body and a soul; both body and soul have attributes. Descartes understands his body by something that can be perceived with the senses and with the power of self-movement. With regards to the soul, he asserts that the actions of nourishing, waking, feeling and thinking refer to soul, which he considers as something “extremely rare and subtle like a wind, a flame, or an ether, which was spread throughout [his] grosser parts.” However, in this thought experiment of the evil genius God, Descartes thinks that he does not posses any of these attributes of soul or body. With regards to the soul, he finds that the only attribute belonging to him is thinking. Humans exist, as long as humans think. We are things that think. For Descartes a human is not a body and a soul, but rather a thing that thinks. But I think that thinks is a thing that “It is a thing which doubts, understands, conceives, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, which also imagines and …show more content…
Descartes understands God, as “a substance that is infinite (eternal, immutable), independent, all knowing, all powerful, and by which everything else, if anything else exist has been created.” Descartes also asserts that this idea of God cannot come from himself, but from God. He could have the idea of substance because he is a substance, but the idea of infinite, for example, cannot come from him since he is a finite being. Another thing that he considers to probe the existence of God, is that as a thinking being we have this sense of lacking and imperfection because we have this idea of some being that is perfect. Therefore, we could state that this idea of God’s existence is innate, because we could not understand the idea of God is already on us. Descartes also develop the idea of God is not only our creator but also who conserve us. When he is talking about his parents, he states “ although all that I have ever been able to believe of them were truth, that does not follow that it is they who conserve, me, nor are they even the author of my being in any sense, in so far as I am a thinking being…”