DISCOURSE ON METHOD by Rene Descartes, Part 4

In my Introduction to Philosophy course I introduce Descartes in this way:

Almost 2000 years after Socrates’ death in 399 B.C., the study of philosophy underwent a radical change. Epistemology became the central concern of philosophers beginning with the Frenchman, René Descartes (1596-1650), often called the “Father of modern philosophy.” Descartes, frustrated that 2000 years of speculative metaphysics yielded nothing he could confidently accept as certain, sought to discover a secure foundation upon which to base the emerging scientific outlook. His procedure, outlined in his Discourse on Method (1637) and Meditations on First Philosophy (1641), became known as methodical doubt. Descartes resolved to set aside as untrustworthy everything that admitted of the slightest doubt. As the senses often deceive us, we should not trust them. In fact, there is not even a certain procedure to differentiate waking experience from dreams. Mathematics and knowledge of general objects seems, however, to remain the same whether we dream or not, but even mathematical conclusions are susceptible to error if the supreme being of my universe is not a supremely good God, but an evil demon, seeking at all times to lead me astray. What remains of my experience that is not subject to doubt in such a scenario? Nothing, Descartes declares, except the fact of my own existence. No matter how deceptive may be the content of my thought, I cannot doubt my own existence so long as I am thinking – doubting, questioning, feeling, being deceived, experiencing. This conclusion, then, becomes the certain foundation upon which Descartes will resurrect the structures of knowledge demolished by his radical doubt. Cogito ergo sum, “I think, therefore I am” is Descartes’ foundational innate idea.

Thus, truth/knowledge is discovered, not through the senses, which remain subject to error, but rationally. Descartes and his followers (the Continental (i.e. European) tradition in philosophy) become known as rationalists.

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