DESCARTES

The most influential and pioneer works

presented at the beginning of the modern
period of philosophy were those of Rene
Descartes (1596-1650.)

Descartes withdrew his work on Physics in
1633 upon learning the fate of Galileo Galilei
who had been arrested by the Inquisition.
He then cleverly transmitted and converted all
his ideas on Physics in a book of Philosophy
called Meditations wherein he couched his
ideas in words that would no threaten the
Brothers.
Descartes' Method of Radical Doubt
The motto of this method was Everything is to
be doubted so as to quench his thirst for
certainty.

He felt he had to detach himself from both the
credible authority of knowledge as well as the
accepted sources of knowledge.
He wanted to give philosophy a fresh start by
arriving at truths from the sole faculty of his own
powers rather than a reliance on other sources.


Descartes' skepticism about empirical foundations and
his eventual shift towards mental understanding as in
the case of the melting of the wax.

This led him to doubt each and everything including his
own material body.
He even questioned as to how can we be certain that
the entire world has been created by God and not be
an evil genius demon such that all things that we
experience are nothing but illusions.
Reversal of Doubt
He then moved slowly at finding that one
immovable foundation of knowledge which
could not be doubted by anyone at any point
whether in a dream or in real life.

That was the point when he acknowledged
and gave the famous dictum Cogito Ergo Sum
i.e. I think therefore I am.
Hence , through his method of doubt he
discovered the Self .

He argued that discovery of the Self had to
come prior to the discovery of God or to the
discovery of the physical world.