Questions
for September 25
WHY DOES DESCARTES NEED THE SIXTH
MEDITATION?
If Descartes proves God's existence
and God being a non-deceiver in the
Third Meditation, then what is the purpose of having a Sixth
Meditation? Why do we need this meditation if all that it proves
at the end is that material things must exist because God would not
deceive us to make us have ideas of all these things?
If he concludes that our ideas must
exist as we perceive them, because
otherwise we are being deceived, why all the individual proofs in the
Sixth Meditation?
GOD'S OMNIPOTENCE
Is there anything God can't do?
At the beginning of the sixth
meditation (71),
Descartes suggests that God is
incapable of things that I can't perceive
distinctly. Is he questioning
God's omnipotence or is he just
saying that he
isn't able to clearly perceive things
or understand God's power?
UNDERSTANDING, IMAGINATION, AND
MATERIAL THINGS
Please explain exactly what is going
on in Descartes' distinction
between imagination and intellection - and why isn't imagination as
essential to him as other forms of thinking (73)?
(73) How does Descartes move from
understanding vs. imagining to the
conclusion
that the body "probably" exists?
How does Descartes' distinction
between pure intellection and
imagination prove that a body (probably) exists (m72-73)? More
specifically, why is it that "the power of imagining depends upon
something distinct from me" (m73)?
What does Descartes mean when he
writes that "[when the mind imagines]
it turns toward the body, and intuits in the body something that
conforms to an idea either understood by the mind or perceived by
sense" (m73)? Does the mind literally turn toward the body when
using the imagination ? When I form a mental image of a
chiliagon, is it literally in my brain? Also, what does Descartes
mean exactly by "body" in this passage?
How is it possible that "nothing else
belongs to my nature or essence
except that I am a thinking thing" if some kinds of thinking (e.g.,.
imagining) depend upon the body (m78)?
Why are some kinds of thinking (e.g.,
pure intellecting) essential to
our minds while others (e.g., imagining) are not (m73)? Which
kinds of thinking are essential to our minds, which are inessential,
and how can we know which is which?
In Meditation Two (marginal page 28),
Descartes says "But what then am
I? A thing that thinks. What is that? A thing that
doubts...and that also imagines and senses." Descartes' essence
is as a thinking thing, but in Meditation Six (73), he excludes
imagining from his essence. Why does he contradict his conception
of what a thinking thing is?
ARGUMENT FOR THE SEPARATION OF MIND
AND BODY
How does the proof of the separability
of the mind and the body work
(78)?
In 78, is Descartes arguing that the
body is separate from the mind
simply
because his idea of a body is separate
from his idea of a mind?
Why does his
"ability clearly and distinctly to
understand one thing without another
suffice
to make [him] certain that the one
thing is different from the other"?
In 78, Descartes argues that the body
and mind are distinct. Does
he think that
the mind exists after the body dies?
Could you explain the concept on page
78 about the ability to clearly
and distinctly distinguish things from each other, especially in
relation to mental and physical separation?
At the end of 78, Descartes writes,
“Thus I perceive them to be
distinguished
from me as modes from a thing.”
What does that mean, and what are
modes?
In 78, Descartes argues that the body
and mind are distinct. Does
he think that
the mind exists after the body dies?