Descartes- Things that Think
Rene' Descartes was a modern European thinker. Throughout his meditations he constantly implies that we are "things that think". Our bodies, these things, are just a jumbled mess of flesh, blood and bone. It is thinking that creates the person. Thinking is what separates humans from the rest of the animal kingdom. Skepticism is described as doubting everything and is a frequently used method by Descartes. He doubts the fact that he is really living; maybe what he is doing at this moment is dreaming. "As if I did not remember other occasions when I have been tricked exactly similar thoughts while asleep! As I think about this more carefully, I see plainly that there are never any sure signs by means of which being awake can be distinguished from being asleep" (178). This quote is found in Descartes first meditation where he doubts many physical things. He is not saying that nothing exists. He is simply saying that there is no way to know; no proof they do exist. I agree very much with this declaration that Descartes made. He knows that there is no proof that the world doesn't exist and he states that. I cer
Descartes uses the wax example to describe how our senses can deceive us, but we know by reason that wax is wax whether you melt it or not. tainty agree that it is not for sure that the world we are living in is real. If our bodies, like the wax, changed in every aspect, then our mind and reasoning would stay the same. Descartes gives the example of wax fresh from the honeycomb. It is hard, cold, smell like the flower it came from and tastes like honey. I absolutely love the way Descartes doesn't try to prove that nothing is real, he just doubts it and questions it. Descartes describes himself as his mind, not the physical brain, but the spiritual mind. He has a great imagination about the mind and the body without being too creative. Of all the philosophers and great thinkers I have studied, I would have to say that Descartes is my favorite. I am, then, in the strict sense only a thing that thinks; that is, I am a mind, or intelligence, or intellect, or reason- a thing which is real an which truly exists" (181). "I am not merely present in my body as a sailor is present in a ship, but that I am very closely joined and, as it were, intermingled with it, so that I and the body form a unit" (190). For it could be that were I totally to cease from thinking, I should totally cease to exist. Humans rely on their senses to gather information. But for how long? For as long as I am thinking. Just as the wax was still wax, Descartes is saying that the mind and thinking will stay the same if the body or ethnicity is magically changed.
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