Essential Concepts in Descartes’ Philosophy
Descartes’ Philosophy: Key Concepts and Definitions
This document defines essential concepts in Descartes’ philosophy.
Algebra (Modern)
A branch of mathematics that considers numbers and their relations using letters and signs to represent numbers. Each letter or sign represents a number or other mathematical entity. Thus, the algebraic expression ‘y = 2x + 3’ represents the relationship between 1 and 5, 2 and 7, 3 and 9, and so on. The discipline was developed mainly during the Renaissance and the Modern Age. Descartes uses the phrase “of the moderns.” Algebra allows for operations on numbers that were previously performed on figures.
Soul
Thinking substance.
Analysis
The decomposition of something into its constituent elements. Analysis is one of the two deductive processes of reason. Its proper functioning is regulated by rules of the second method.
Analysis of the Ancients or of Geometry, or Geometric
Greek geometry, hence the expression “of the old,” which Descartes encountered through Clavius’ manual that was used in Jesuit colleges. The term “analysis” refers to the method used by surveyors: assume that the problem is now resolved and then analyze the conditions that make such a solution possible (Example: Can we build a twenty-story building here? We first assume that it is constructed and then analyze, dividing the problem into parts, the conditions necessary for the building to stand). Descartes made the vital contribution that led to the traditional geometry of bodies or figures to create a coordinate system that allowed each figure or body to be expressed using variables and constants. This enabled the use of algebra to describe and analyze geometric figures.
Appetite
One of the passions of the soul. It consists of a stirring of the soul caused by the desire for future things that it finds convenient. Wanting to get home to have the satisfaction of sitting the whole afternoon to study philosophy is an appetite.
Art of Lully
The Ars Magna (Greater Art) of Ramon Llull (1235-1315). His idea was that to convert infidels, one cannot rely on beliefs, but on the common element between the believer and the non-believer: reason. It is therefore necessary to demonstrate rationally the articles of faith. His Ars Magna is an attempt to do so through logical developments. Descartes does not criticize the intent of the project but rather that the principles from which the complicated logical arguments departed were not evident.
Attribute
The main property of a substance that constitutes its nature or essence. This property depends on the rest of its features (modes). Its essential character is the reason that it is inseparable from the defining substance. Therefore, substances are classified according to three types of attributes: infinite or perfect substance, thinking substance, and extended substance. Substances are known through their attributes. Attributes are mutually exclusive and are what make possible the knowledge of the substance.
Good Sense
Reason.
Certainly True
It can be defined from two perspectives. Subjectively, reason considers something to be knowledge or certainty when it is presented with something to which it agrees without fear of error, that is, what it perceives clearly and distinctly. From this perspective, certainty is the criterion of truth. Objectively, any object that produces in reason a clear and distinct knowledge of certainty is qualified as a certain object.
Metaphysical Certitude
Certainty we have when it is concluded that it is impossible that the thing is different from how it is judged. I think, therefore I exist is a metaphysical certainty because there can be no possibility that this claim is false.
Science
In the text, it has two meanings:
- The Cartesian definition of certain knowledge and obvious reason. All sciences form a unit caused by the unity of reason and method. The conduct of science, therefore, does not differ in terms of objects known. Science is like a tree whose roots are metaphysics, the trunk is physics, and the branches are other sciences, especially medicine, mechanics, and morals. Therefore, the truth of the latter sciences depends on the truth of the former.
- Its meaning as “probable knowledge”: the kind of knowledge that the author criticized for trying to obtain knowledge consisting of probable reasons (scholastic knowledge).
Circumspection
Prudence that reason must maintain when faced with questions submitted to it in order to avoid precipitation. This caution leads reason to refrain from judging the truth or falsity of knowledge until it is known with certainty, and to follow the proper order in deductions.
Clarity, of course
A distinctive feature of understanding the perceptions and ideas through which these perceptions are known. Clarity occurs when that perception, and therefore the idea perceived, is “present and manifest to the mind (understanding) attentively.” The opposite of a clear perception is a dark perception.
Conceive
It is an act of the intellect by which ideas are immediately known clearly and distinctly. In some cases, it is synonymous with intuition; in others, it has a broader sense and does not seem to include the concept of immediacy inherent in intuition.
Knowledge
Knowledge itself is only apparent or true knowledge. Reviews, beliefs, and doubts are not acts of cognition because they do not lead to truth.
Sensible Things, Physical, Material, or Extensive
Different ways of referring to extensive substances. Extensive substances, precisely because they are extensive, are physical and material and, consequently, are also sensible, that is, knowable through the senses.
Beliefs, Belief
Believing in something is different from knowing. A belief is an act of reason that qualifies something as probable or likely. Through belief, truth is never attained. Beliefs are accepted as valid, as true, when the method is not followed. Descartes decides to treat them methodologically as false. In many cases, Descartes uses “belief” as synonymous with “opinion”; in others, he defines “opinion” as a kind of belief.
Body
Any extended substance. Living bodies, including humans, carry out their biological functions autonomously. They move through their animal spirits (also a material element). However, to explain voluntary movements, feelings, and desires in humans, Descartes affirms that the human body and thinking substance are intimately linked through the pineal gland. But this union does not add or detract from either of the two substances.
Deduction
One of the two acts by which reason reaches certainty. It consists of the simple inference of one thing from another. Each stage of the inference appears clear and distinct if it follows from the previous one. Given the evidence of the first propositions or principles, the rest of the certainty results from rational deduction. Compared to the intuition of reason, deduction is not immediate but discursive. Thus, with deduction, evidence is not reached, but only certainties. Both analysis and synthesis, as methods, are different forms of deduction.
Proof
An argument that leads to a conclusion that must necessarily be accepted as true because it is a consequence of other propositions taken as true. Demonstrations are opposed to probable reasons and mere opinions. The only possible demonstration of the first principles is the intuition of their evidence. For all other truths, their proof is the deduction of their accuracy.
God
The infinite substance.
Different
A feature that characterizes the ideas and perceptions of the mind (understanding) that, “in addition to being clear, are so precise and separated from all others, that they contain nothing more than what is clear.” It is through understanding that the distinction of an idea is determined.
Doubt
Uncertainty or lack of decision about the truth or falsity of a statement, which at that time is therefore only a belief or opinion. The lack of action leads to stagnation, the “bracketing” of any act or statement. Doubt may be skeptical or methodical (e.g., Cartesian).
Understanding
One of the five elements that influence knowledge, along with the will, memory, imagination, and senses. It is the ability to conceive ideas. In many cases, this design requires the collaboration of imagination and memory, which can cause errors. The will should only judge as true what the understanding conceives clearly and distinctly.
Error
A bad deduction never arises, but only from certain experiences that are little understood, or from judgments that are formed hastily and without foundation. Error does not occur when ideas are conceived, but when the will judges their truth. The cause of error is that the will extends beyond the understanding: in many cases, the understanding conceives ideas that are not clear and distinct, and without that requirement, the will pushes reason to judge that they are true, that is, that these ideas correspond to realities. That is when error occurs. Therefore, the method should prevent such judgments.
Skeptical
Whoever denies the existence of an objective reality and/or the possibility of knowing it. They deny, therefore, that man has enough elements to describe whether his knowledge is real or not. In Descartes’ time, there was a strong current of skepticism that he tried to combat with his method and the establishment of certain knowledge.
Essence
The attribute of a substance.
Spirit
Translates the phrase ‘esprit.’ In this text, it is almost always used as a synonym for understanding and less frequently as a synonym for reason. The context helps determine its meaning.
Evidence
What is clear is attributable to knowledge (subjectively) or the object known (objectively). Objectively, the evident is the object of an intuition of reason: simple natures. Subjectively, the evident is the result of such intuitive knowledge. Therefore, what is evident is immediately true. Not all knowledge is evident, since some are also known by deduction of reason.
Existence
Being. Existence is a necessary feature of the Perfect Being only because its perfection necessarily implies its existence. In all other beings, since they are not perfect, their existence is not necessary; therefore, if they exist even though they are imperfect, it is because they have been created.
Extension
The defining attribute essentially of material or extended substance. “Extension is everything that has length, width, and depth, and can be a body or a space.”
False
A characteristic of knowledge that is not certain. Following the implementation of the first rule of the method, Descartes considered doubtful knowledge false. Within these are included the likely, the plausible, that is, those for which we do not have evidence or certainty of their truth.
Fundamentals
Refers to first principles.
Man
The composite result of the accidental and temporary union of two substances, one extended (body) and the other thinking (soul), is what defines a man who, therefore, is essentially a substance that thinks. Between extension and thought, there is no interaction, so the two are independent. The soul is pure thought that does not need any part of the body (not even the brain) to think. The body also performs its biological functions autonomously. To explain voluntary movements of the body, feelings, and desires, Descartes claims that soul and body are linked through the pineal gland. But this union does not add or detract from these substances.
Idea
Thinking that is “like a picture of a thing.” They are representations. Ideas are neither true nor false, since falsity or truth only occurs in judgments. Ideas have two aspects: a) their formal reality, that is, essentially what defines them as being modes of thinking. From this perspective, all ideas are equal. b) Their objective reality, “consideration as images that represent things, and then they are very different from each other,” some seem to me to be born with me (innate), others are foreign and come from outside (adventitious), and others are made and invented by myself (fictitious).
Imagination, Imagine, Imagining
One of the five elements that influence knowledge, along with understanding, will, memory, and senses. Only reason (intellect and will) is capable of perceiving the truth, but it must be helped by the other three, although in many cases, the dependence of reason on imagination makes it fall into errors. Imagination invents and pretends images (hence the origin of factitious ideas) or provides a pattern of corporeal things received through the senses. Imagining is one of the modes of thinking. Therefore, what is imaginable is what can be represented in the imagination, whether it is received through the senses or created by it.
Infinity
Attribute of the infinite substance.
Ingenuity
Translates the phrase “esprit” that Descartes used in various senses. In some cases, it refers to the combination of imagination and memory. Every man’s ingenuity is different, unlike what happens with the capacity of reason as such, which is the same. But since in many cases understanding knows in collaboration with imagination and memory, cognitive differences between men are produced by the different capacities of imagination and memory. It is therefore also used in the sense of “skill.” Thirdly, it is also used as a synonym for understanding. Finally, in other cases, it has a broader meaning and refers to the cognitive capacity of man in general, that is, his reason.
Intelligible
Can be known through reason, which is the only way to reach true understanding.
Intuition
One of the two acts by which reason, proper to understanding, reaches certain knowledge. Intuition, which reaches immediate certainty, that is, evidence, satisfies the following features: it is not a result of the senses or the imagination, but of understanding. It is more certain than deduction because it is not discursive but immediate, and its object of knowledge is the first principles.
Judgment, Judge
A proposition that affirms or denies something of something, which is essentially characterized because it is true or false. Saying, “Go” is not a judgment, but “This glossary is useful” is. Judgment is what produces truth or falsity and is the result of the will judging the truth of an idea when the understanding presents it clearly and distinctly, or false if it does not. If the will does not follow the understanding and rushes, it has made a misjudgment.
Freedom
The ability to choose. It is a feature of the will. This ability is the broadest of the powers, the least constrained, and therefore the one that most closely resembles man to God. It is “to act in such a way that we do not feel constrained by any outside force,” and in this sense, although the will of God can refer to more objects, considered as an act of man, it is no less.
Logic
The science or art that deals with the study of the formal correctness of reasoning, demonstrations, and syllogisms. Logic, applying its rules, analyzes the correctness of arguments regardless of the content of its proposals. The necessity of logical rules that oblige the move from premises to conclusion provides logic with its accuracy. Descartes applied his method to this need for logic.
Meditations
Descartes defined meditations as thoughts through which he thinks he has reached certain and evident knowledge of truth. The procedure of meditation has its roots in the “disputationes” (discussions on certain issues) of Scholasticism. Metaphysical meditations are discussions to reach the first principles of knowledge: the existence of the self, God, and the world, the roots of the tree of knowledge.
Memory
One of the five elements involved in knowledge, along with understanding, senses, imagination, and will. Memory helps understanding when making deductions. But that intervention can make it fall into errors because of forgetting the reasons and previous arguments. Deduction is always correct; error comes only from the intervention of memory.
Method
The set of “certain and easy rules, whereby anyone who observes them exactly will never take anything false for true and, without uselessly expending any effort of mind [reason], but always gradually increasing his science, will arrive at true knowledge of everything he is capable of knowing.” The method is necessary for reason to get the truth. It consists of four rules.
Mode
The changes that the attribute of each created substance may undergo. Thus, modes of thinking substance are affirming, denying, believing, certainties, imagining, feeling, etc., that is, all possible thoughts of which the thinking substance is capable. The attributes of extended substance, that is, a body, are size and shape. But God, the infinite substance, being immutable, has no modes.
World
The set of extensive substances considered as a whole. It is an innate idea.
Nature
An expression used in the text in two ways:
- What defines a substance and explains the various accidental changes that occur in it. In this sense, nature is synonymous with attribute.
- As a synonym for substance. When the expression is used in the plural, its meaning is always this. If it is singular, we need help from the context.
Corporeal or Physical Nature
The extended attribute of substances. Corporeal is synonymous with extensive.
Intelligent Nature
The attribute of thinking substance. It has intelligent nature because its attribute is thought.
Naturally
What is according to the nature of something.
Notion
An expression with a very broad sense; in most cases, it amounts to ideas or concerns the first principles of knowledge.
Simpler Objects
Or more easily knowable or simple natures. They are the elements that can be known only through an intuition of reason. Their knowledge is evident. They are the last elements into which to analyze the problems that one intends to address and know with certainty. They are the last elements that reason can analyze in reality, what cannot be further analyzed into simpler elements.
Opinion, Probable Opinions
Any knowledge whose accuracy is unknown. On many occasions, this expression is synonymous with belief. Opinions are not certain because they are received from various sources (books, teachers, society, etc.) without the subject submitting them to the judgment of reason.
Order
One of the basic elements of the method. Once the evidence of the first principles is established, the certainty of the rest depends on knowledge being deducted in order. Therefore, order is basic in analysis and synthesis: “The method consists in order […] and seeing if we reduce complicated and obscure propositions to simpler ones, and if after we try to ascend by the same degrees from the intuition of the simplest to the knowledge of others.”
Paralogism
A faulty reasoning task without the subject being aware that it is produced. It differs from sophistry in that in the latter, the subject does know that such reasoning is erroneous, but overlays it rhetorically with the appearance of propriety to confuse the opposite.
Passions
Emotions that the soul experiences involuntarily through the action that the body exercises on it. Through the pineal gland, the soul receives impressions of the world that cause emotions. Although our body is the cause of our passions, it is the soul that suffers them. They are purely psychological acts (admiration or surprise, love and hate, desire, joy, and sadness). Passions are not bad in themselves, only if they are not addressed well, since they may prevent reason from reaching the truth.
Thought
In the singular, it refers to the attribute of thinking substance. It should be understood in a broad sense as all conscious activity. Understanding, loving, denying, imagining, hating, feeling, etc., are here the same as thinking. In the plural, “thoughts” is synonymous with ideas.
Perfect, Perfection
An expression with two meanings:
- The orderly, balanced, harmonious, devoid of contradiction; in this sense, one speaks of the perfection of construction, buildings, cities, and human knowledge. It is the rationalist view of perfection.
- Being that contains within itself all the maximum degree of positive attributes, including its existence, and has no deficiency (the infinite substance or God). In the perfection of other beings, there are degrees.
Precipitation
Those who fail fall into error by forgetting that their understanding is finite, they are impatient and judge as true what is not yet clearly such. They also fall into error by not giving the time necessary to derive new knowledge orderly from the first. The error is twofold: to judge from a supposedly clear and distinct idea when it is really confusing and obscure, and not to follow the order necessary for correct analysis and synthesis. The remedy for precipitation is circumspection.
Prejudice
Knowledge that is not certain conditions our reason, preventing it from judging for itself. These conditions are the beliefs and opinions received from the socio-cultural environment in a more or less unconscious way without having analyzed and verified their accuracy. These beliefs and opinions confuse reason and lead to erroneous judgments. Therefore, to make true judgments, a prior process of doubt is required that makes us aware that such views and beliefs are not certainties but simply “pre-judgments.”
Prevention
A defect of reason as opposed to precipitation. Those who are prevented do not consider themselves to have sufficient capacity to judge for themselves and follow the judgments of others whom they consider more trained and, therefore, consider as teachers. Due to a lack of confidence in their own reason, those who are prevented refuse to accept the truth of an idea even though it is presented clearly and distinctly.
First Principles
Subjectively (from the subject who is looking for certainties), they are the certainties of knowledge. These principles are the I (first principle), God, and the world. From these principles, which are part of metaphysics, the rest of knowledge is constructed. Objectively, they are the first principles of the realm of being: the simple natures that are known to the intuition of reason. The order from first principles in the subjective sense does not correspond to their order in the objective sense.
Proposition
Or judgment. A predicative statement that is either true or false.
Prudence
Valid practical knowledge to guide actions and decisions in ethical and moral life.
Reason
An expression with two meanings. In a broad sense, it is the ability to judge correctly and distinguish the true from the false. It is the only property that makes us men and, therefore, is equal in everyone. Erroneous views and beliefs do not come from reason as such but from the misuse of it due to the use of inappropriate methods or their absence. It learns through two acts: intuition and deduction. It is divided into perceptions of understanding and volitions of the will. Strictly speaking, “reason” is synonymous with understanding.
Sufficient Reason
The principle that nothing happens without a reason for it. This explanatory reason is sufficient reason.
Reasoning
Arguing that from some basis of knowledge or evident truths (acting as assumptions) leads to others (concluded). From the first principles of reason, following the method, arguments are developed that lead to certain knowledge. Arguments are opposed to likely reasons. It is an expression synonymous with argument, deduction, or demonstration.
Likely Reasons
Arguments that are not true. Descartes believes, following the first rule of the method, that all “probable” knowledge is not true. Probability and certainty are exclusive, as what is likely is doubtful, and in certainty, there is no room for doubt. The expression “probable opinions” has the same meaning. Probable reasons are opposed to certain and evident reasons. Descartes separates himself from Scholasticism by differentiating between the true, the likely, and the false.
Rules
An expression with three meanings:
- The rules of the various parts of mathematics that guarantee the success of calculations.
- The logical rules that guarantee the correctness of syllogisms.
- The four precepts of the method of reason towards obtaining certain and evident knowledge. These are characterized by being “easy to follow” and their accuracy. The condition that guarantees the method works is “not even once breaching the enforcement of such rules.”
Moral Security
Or moral certainty. Certainty that we deem sufficient to guide us in our lives. “This certainty is sufficient to regulate our habits, or as large as that of those things that we do not usually hesitate when it comes to the direction of life, although we know that it can happen, absolutely speaking, that they are false. Thus, those who have never been to Rome have no doubt that it is a city in Italy, although it could be that they had been deceived by all those who have told them so.” Contrary to moral certainty is the possible.
Senses
One of the five elements involved in knowledge, along with understanding, will, memory, and imagination. The information they provide is neither certain nor evident. They continually make us fall into illusions and deceive us. It is an option that is part of the body and not the soul. Therefore, it is not a spiritual one.
Perfect
The infinite substance (God). The Perfect Being is the one that encompasses all perfections, including existence, a feature that will prove its existence.
Syllogism
Reasoning consisting of three propositions such that the first two act as premises (major and minor) from which the third, which is the conclusion, necessarily follows. It is characterized in that the conclusion can never exceed the knowledge established in the major premise. Therefore, it never expands knowledge.
Synthesis
The process by which, from simple elements taken as premises, the certainty of the complex elements formed by them is reached. It is one of the two processes of deduction of reason. Its proper functioning is regulated by the third and fourth rules of the method.
Substance
A thing that exists so that it needs no other to exist. Therefore, strictly speaking, there is only one substance, God. Therefore, when Descartes qualifies the I think or bodies as substances, he applies the concept in an analogous way, since the I and bodies have independence from other beings, but both have been created and, therefore, depend on God. Substances are essentially characterized by their attributes. There are three (infinity, thought, and extension), and thus there are three types of substances: infinite substance, thinking substance, and extended substance. Secondly, in substances, except for the infinite one, there are different modes by which the attributes may undergo changes.
Extended Substance or Body
. A substance that is the extension attribute, namely, that occupies a
space and can never move by itself but by something else. This extension excludes
possibility of thought. The methods of this substance are the length, width, depth, figure …
Due to its length, sensitive substances can be known by the senses. The human body
also an extended substance.
Infinite substance. God. Substance whose attribute is infinity or perfection. The only person who
itself is a substance, since the rest are just in a similar manner, since God is the only
might not need any other to exist. This substance does not admit to be immutable anyway. The
All that is true of God are features already included in the attribute ‘perfection’ or ‘infinity’ eternal
immutable, simple, independent, omniscient, omnipotent creator of the imperfect beings (the
thinking and extended substances). Its essence requires its existence.
Thinking substance. Substance whose attribute is thought. He identifies with the self or soul. There are two
modes of thought: the perception of understanding and volition of the will, for feeling,
imagine and pure feel are various ways of perception and desire, refuse to affirm, deny and
doubt, are different modes of willing. It is characterized because it is what defines man is independent
and separated from the body (dualism anthropology), is immortal (their existence depends not on the body) and is
more easily known than the body.
True, true. The evidence or certainty of reason. The ideas of reason through the will
deemed obvious and / or certain are true. The truth therefore is absent in the idea as such but in the
trial that is about it. That is, truth itself is not the result of the understanding but the
will.
Will. Faculty of judging thinking substance, nodding or shaking from what the
perceived understanding. Man’s will is infinite and free, and so is the source of the error. A
never obscure or confused idea is false. Falsehood is when the will, not subjected to
understanding, affirms the truth of the idea that understanding has not clearly perceived and
distinction. The volition of the will are one way of thinking.
Yo. Thinking substance.