Phil: 1301
May 1, 2013 The life of Rene Descartes and Bishop Berkeley
Rene Descartes was born on March 31, 1596 in the town of La Haye in the south of France. Descartes also spent time studying philosophy, theology, and medicine. Descartes believed that the soul was a different entity from the body. He believed that the soul was distinct from the body and could exist without it. He believed that the two had opposite natures and that the body is extended and divisible, where as the soul is un-extended and indivisible. However, Descartes did realize that the body and soul have a close relationship, and this is true because if the sensations that are felt such as hunger or thirst. The body and soul are one union. . For example, if your stomach is growling which is a physical thing, will cause you to mentally decide to eat something. Mental events can cause physical change and physical events can cause mental change. Everything that we do on a daily basis proves that the body and soul are in fact united. One of the most important contribution Descartes made were his philosophical writings; Descartes, who was convinced that science and mathematics could be used to explain everything in nature, was the first to describe the physical universe in terms of matter and motion, seeing the universe a as giant mathematically designed engine. Descartes wrote three important texts: Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting the Reason and Seeking Truth in the Sciences, Meditations on First Philosophy, and Principles of Philosophy. Descartes was known for the cogito “I think, therefore I am”. Descartes finds certainty in the intuition that when he is thinking, even if deceived, he exists: “I think, therefore I am?” The cogito is a logically self-evident truth that gives certain knowledge of a particular thing's existence that is, one's self but the cogito justifies accepting as certain only the existence of the person who thinks it.