René Descartes

Descartes reasons for doubting his beliefs in meditations were because he wanted to prove a scientific method, he wanted to prove that true knowledge came from the mind and not in the sense. Descartes spent a lot of time separating the world into two substances using only the mind and body. He says science truth is made up of our body and religious truths deal with the soul and mind. His biggest question was can something be true if it can be doubted? He became a skeptic and started doubting…

Vermeer’s Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World, by Timothy Brook, sets out to explain how the world was transformed during the seventeenth century through a growing world market and expanding globalization between civilizations and cultures that either had not have contact or limited contact in the past. The book is organized into eight sections, each corresponding to a different piece of art created by Johannes Vermeer and other artists. Each of these sections covers a…

Most modern, Western citizens would not question the idea that they are a separate and autonomous being, completely independent and different in every way from their neighbor. When asked, some might answer that what makes them different is their personality, their soul, or their mind. The discrepancy lies in the fact that, between individuals, all of these can be similar. Does that imply that two individuals who are similar in personality have less of a ‘self’ than someone who is vastly…

How often do you consciously emphasize your language with metaphors? Now question how often you dare your mind to do the same? French philosopher Rene Descartes challenges the way people perceive themselves in his iconic metaphor “I think therefore I am,” which derives from his text The Discourse on Method. According to Descartes, convincing oneself of nothing in the world existing does not mean that one fails to exist. Concluding that the self must be convinced of “something” for this concept…

The Rights of women have definitely evolved over the past centuries. Women went from being treated as an object, not a person, to gaining many rights. They have evolved to be entitled to the right to vote, the right to work, the right to own land, and the basic fundamental rights that men have received. As the world becomes more modernized, women still want more rights, they want to be treated as an equal to men. In the United States, women want equal pay in the work force as men, when their…

Regarding the mind and body, we cannot say that materialism is correct because there is nothing to prove that the mind is not its own entity. Rather, the Cartesian Dualism view is a possible alternative as the mind is dependent on the body and vice versa. Paul Churchland raises several arguments against dualism and in order to evaluate his objections, it is crucial to understand the concepts of substance dualism as well as its opposite, materialism, and how they differ from one another.…

Rene Descartes was born to Joachim Descartes and Jeanna Brochard on May 31, 1596. He was the oldest of three (surviving) children. Descartes was born into a fairly wealthy family which was full of Doctors and Lawyers. He was raised by his grandmother, Jeanne Sain, in La Haye, France. He began to attend the Jesuit College at La Fleche, France during the year 1607. Descartes obtained a well-rounded liberal arts education before leaving the college in 1614. Between the years of 1615 and 1616 he…

The novel “Lord Of The Flies” by William Golding is set on a remote island in the pacific ocean. The island is a paradise, with almost constant perfect weather. It is also stuffed with tropical fruits and animals for food, and the best part, there are no adults on the island. There was four main kids on an island, in mostly good health. Although they had a perfect start on a dream island, it soon turned to chaos. As Thomas Hobbes had predicted, if humans have freedom and choice to do whatever…

In Discourse on Method and Related Writings author René Descartes explains how he developed his unique and, especially for his time, unconventional reasoning in an autobiographical style. The story of his intellectual development is an unconventional one, and he describes how his revolutionary method had transformed him into the distinguished and ever prevalent philosopher that we know him to be today. It is apparent that Descartes was the black sheep of his class, using other methods and…

3) While Cartesian dualism says that there are two different mental and physical entities that make up the mind, functionalism argues that the brain is an independent entity. Functionalism says that the brain – a singular entity – contains two kinds of properties, mental and physical. Thus, it is a form of dualism in the sense that there are two different things in play, yet only one physical entity which these properties reside in. It solves the causal relation problem that Cartesian dualism…