René Descartes

 

Descartes was in influential man within the Renaissance. He was born in March 1596 and had influences within science, philosophy and politics. He spent a lot of his life travelling through and living in many different countries throughout his life. He spent his early life in scholastic education which gave him grounding in science and maths and allowed him to make the advancements he did in later life. One of his most important mathematical works was the theory of the conservation of momentum.  Although this was an important discovery in his life and had an important influence upon the advancement of science I will not be writing around it now, I will instead be focusing on his psychological work which has had a profound effect on almost all modern day rationalists. (1596-03-31)

Cartesian doubt, as it has become known, grew from Descartes’ need for an even base to build his philosophical ideas. He began with scepticism towards his senses; he challenged what he was seeing and asked the question is he actually seeing what his mind is telling him, or is there someone manipulating these scenes in his head. He began to realise that when he dreamed he would believe what he was seeing because everything he saw had been experienced when he was awake. For example if he saw a winged horse he knew it wasn’t possible but he had seen wings and a horse before so he then questioned why it wasn’t possible. This thought allows Descartes to begin to challenge everything he sees and he comes to the conclusion that his senses cannot be trusted because they could be manipulated by God or some sort of demon who wishes to deceive him. His most well-known example is that of wax. He knows the properties of wax, how it feels, looks and smells, but when a flame is introduced the properties change. Even though your senses are telling you the wax has changed you know it is still wax and therefore you cannot trust your senses. With his Cartesian doubt Descartes also decided that physics and astrology cannot be trusted because they rely upon the study of physical objects, which Descartes thought could be manipulated. He came to the conclusion that he could not trust his body and the only thing he could truly know as existing were his thoughts, because he was thinking them. This inspired him to write “Cogito ergo sum” or I think therefore I am. This was Descartes most important work within the realms of philosophy and is believed to be the birth of modern philosophy because, once this work was published, it allowed a base for future philosophers to work from because once the material world cannot be trusted then everything is influenced by the mind.

Descartes was a devout Catholic and after “Cogito ergo sum” he had stripped all his thought back to one idea. Descartes began to then think about our bodies in relation to our minds. He begins to think about the objects around him, and rather than refusing that they exist, he thinks that they are there. However, he has knowledge of what the object is, and if the object is changed then he still knows what it is. This is how Descartes rationalises the existence of God, because God has given him senses then because God can be trusted so can his senses and if God is benevolent then he can same faith in what his senses tell him. This allows Descartes to then qualify the existence of everything around him.

Cartesian doubt is an important thing for journalists to obtain and although I probably won’t take it to the extremes of Descartes I will try to begin to challenge anything which cannot be proven beyond reasonable doubt and I believe for a successful future within this career path this is something we must all learn to do.

Henry