Fundamental Descartes: A Practical Guide to the Method and Meditations

By M. James Ziccardi

In "Fundamental Descartes: A Practical Guide to the Method and Meditations", M. James Ziccardi presents the key passages of Rene Descartes' two most influential works, "Discourse on the Method" and "Meditations on First Philosophy".

Combined with explanations from the author, this book examines in an easy to follow format Descartes' most important contributions to Western Philosophy, which include: Cartesian Doubt, Cartesian Dualism, the essentials of rationalism, and Descartes' unique take on the ontological
argument for the existence of God.

Also included in the book is a biographical narrative on the life of Rene Descartes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: M. James Ziccardi
• Release date: Mar 2, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301587247

M. James Ziccardi

M. James Ziccardi lives in Southern California with his wife and daughter and has been a software analyst for over twenty-five years. Reading and writing about philosophy is his passion.

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Fundamental Descartes: A Practical Guide to the Method and Meditations

M. James Ziccardi

Copyright 2012 by M. James Ziccardi

Smashwords Edition

Section 1 - Notes on the Text

With regard to quotations, content found within square brackets [] is mine; content found within parentheses () is Descartes’.

Sections in bold type or that are underlined are intended by me to highlight critical points.

Section 2 - Introduction

It is customary to divide Western Philosophy into three principal eras: the Ancient, which began in pre-Socratic Greece and lasted until the fall of the Roman Empire; the Medieval, which lasted from the fall of the Roman Empire to the Renaissance, and which encompasses the whole of the Middle Ages; and the Modern, which began with the Renaissance and continues to this day. It is widely regarded that this last era, the Modern, was inaugurated through the writings of French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician, René Descartes. His tremendous achievements in all of these fields have earned him the respect of all who would follow him - so much so that Descartes is commonly referred to as both the father of modern philosophy and the father of modern mathematics; some even consider him to be the father of modern science – a title he would have been proud to accept, since Descartes often thought of himself as a scientist above all else.

Descartes was born in the town of La Haye en Touraine in central France on March 31, 1596. (In 1967, the town was renamed to Descartes.) His mother died when he was only a year old, and, upon his father’s remarriage, Descartes, along with his older brother and sister were sent to be raised by his maternal grandmother. However, not wanting to spare any expense when it came to his son’s education, Descartes’ father, a member of the French Parliament of Brittany, sent the young René to two of the more prominent schools in all of France: first, at the age of eight, to the Jesuit Collège Royal Henry-Le-Grand at La Flèche, and afterwards to the University of Poitiers where he earned his degree in law in 1616. It was the intention of his father that one day the young Descartes would become a lawyer.

Descartes never married, although he did have a daughter, Francine, with Helena Jans van der Strom, the house servant of one of his associates in Amsterdam. It is believed that Helena was the only woman Descartes was ever intimate with. Sadly, Francine died at the age of five from scarlet fever - a tragedy from which it appears Descartes never fully recovered. As a young man he traveled throughout Europe, had an eye for fashion, and preferred the company of men of affairs to that of scholars. In 1618, he joined the Dutch army, although he saw no combat. It was during his time in Holland, a country known for its freedom and independence of thought, that Descartes become fascinated with the question of what he could know for certain, and from 1629 to 1649 he spent a life of relative seclusion, mostly in Amsterdam, where he came to write most of his famous works, two of which we will be reviewing in this book: Discourse on the Method and Mediations on First Philosophy.

As the product of an educational system which was built upon medieval teachings, which for the most part were derived from the works of Aristotle, the young Descartes become greatly influenced by early European philosophical and theological thought. But as ideas and beliefs were quickly beginning to change throughout Europe, due in part by the Protestant Reformation of the prior century, Descartes increasingly began to challenge the arguments of the authorities whose ideas he often felt were wrong. Consequently, Descartes became an early advocate for both skepticism and the independence of man’s mind – positions which were strongly opposed and even condemned by these same authorities, and particularly those within the Church.

In 1649, Descartes was invited by Queen Christina of Sweden to come to Stockholm to be her tutor in philosophy. On account of the extreme Swedish winter, he was advised by friends to decline the offer, but despite their pleas (as well as his own misgivings), Descartes chose to accept. Descartes had always been a late riser, choosing to work late into the night and to remain in bed often until midday pouring over his notes from the night before. Queen Christine, however, was an early riser and insisted upon having her studies begin at dawn. It is believed that the immediate changes to his sleep pattern along with the harsh Swedish winter contributed to a rapid decline in Descartes’ health; and less than a year later, on February 11, 1650, he succumbed to pneumonia at the age of 53. As Sweden was a Protestant country, Descartes, a Catholic, was not permitted to be buried on consecrated church ground. Instead, he was buried in a cemetery reserved for unbaptized infants at the church of Adolf Fredriks kyrka (The Church of Adolf Frederick) in Stockholm. Later, his remains were transferred to the Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés in Paris where they remain to this day. In the eighteenth century, a monument was built at Adolf Fredriks kyrka in honor of his life.

Contributions to Mathematics:

It is hard to over-estimate Descartes’ contributions to the field of mathematics. By melding the principles of algebra and geometry, Descartes created what has come to be known as analytic geometry, and not since the Euclidean geometry of the Ancient Greeks had the field of mathematics experienced such a far-reaching advancement. We immediately recognize Descartes’ analytic geometry by its familiar two-dimensional Cartesian coordinate system (named after Descartes) by which points (and therefore lines and curves) are referenced by their location with respect to a fixed x (horizontal) and y (vertical) axis. Thus we see Descartes’ legacy every time we utilize two-dimensional charts and graphs. It was this achievement that laid the groundwork for Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz in their nearly simultaneous, though independent, invention of infinitesimal calculus less than fifty years later.

Contributions to Science:

In the sciences, we see Descartes’ influence in optics, meteorology, and physics, which at the time included matters relating to the inner workings of the human body. In the area of optics, he made advances in lenses, the wave theory of light, and was one of the first to document the nature of nearsightedness and farsightedness. In meteorology, he advanced the kinetic theory of heat, contributed to our understanding of rainbows by using prisms to separate white light into colors, and tracked and wrote about clouds, winds, and various other weather patterns. But despite all this, Descartes believed that the science of medicine was man’s most noble endeavor, and consequently, he studied and wrote extensively about the human circulatory system, particularly the heart. However, with respect to science per se, Descartes is perhaps best regarded as being one of the first to recognize the importance of experimentation. This represented yet another break from the prevailing Aristotelian view towards knowledge.

Like Francis Bacon, Descartes believed that, as is the case with man, the world is rationally organized, and that as such, it is capable of being fully understood. Furthermore, because of the vast scientific advances of his day, especially those of Galileo, Descartes, like many of his contemporaries, believed that within a short amount of time, possibly even within his own lifetime, all the problems of science could be solved if only a proper method of discovery could be established. This, he believed, would pave the way for a virtual utopia on earth. (It is worth noting that during the time of Descartes, science was viewed as an individual endeavor; it wasn’t until the mid-nineteenth century that science came to be practiced in the institutional and collaborative manner that it is today.)

Religious Beliefs:

With regard to theology, there has always been room for debate over whether Descartes was truly religious. Taken at his word, Descartes’ writings indicate that he fully believed in the existence of God and in the immortality of the human soul, and that in every respect he was a practitioner of the Catholicism of his day. In these matters, Descartes relies heavily upon the medieval arguments concerning the proof God’s existence, and particularly on the ontological arguments that were first put forward by St. Anselm in the eleventh century. Once he has made these stipulations, however, Descartes seems to place God outside of his overall philosophy. For him, God is simply the creator of the world and of the laws that govern it; it is up to man to decipher and to make sense of it all, and science and philosophy are his only means of doing