Descartes: Summary of Some Major Points
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Descartes: Summary of Some Major Points
Metaphysics:
1. Mind and body are separate substances. "Substance," strictly speaking, for Descartes means "a thing existing in such a manner that it has need of no other thing in order to exist" (Principle LI, The Principles of Philosophy, trans. Anscombe and Geach). In this strict sense, according to Descartes, only God is really a substance. But in a derivative sense "created substances, whether corporeal or thinking, may be conceived under this common concept; for they are things which need only the concurrence of God in order to exist" (Principle LII, trans. Haldane and Ross). Descartes goes on to say that "there is always one principal property of substance which constitutes its nature and essence, and on which all the others depend. Thus extension in length, breadth and depth, constitutes the nature of corporeal substance; and thought constitutes the nature of thinking substance. For all else that may be attributed to body presupposes extension, and is but a mode of this extended thing; as everything that we find in mind is but so many diverse forms of thinking." So the essence of mind is thinking; other mental properties are "modes" of thinking (e.g. sensation, imagination, understanding, . . .). The essence of matter is extension; other physical properties are modes of extension (e.g. mass, volume, shape, movement . . .). Each person is a mind, a mental substance; each person is also attached to a body with which he or she interacts.
This interaction, however, poses a problem for Descartes. How do two substances as radically different as mind and body, two substances which indeed have no properties in common (mind doesn’t have extension and body doesn’t think, according to Descartes), have any effect on each other? Here is a fragment from a letter from Princess Elizabeth to Descartes (written May 6-16, 1643): "I beg of you to tell me how the human should can determine the movement of the animal spirits in the body...
Metaphysics:
1. Mind and body are separate substances. "Substance," strictly speaking, for Descartes means "a thing existing in such a manner that it has need of no other thing in order to exist" (Principle LI, The Principles of Philosophy, trans. Anscombe and Geach). In this strict sense, according to Descartes, only God is really a substance. But in a derivative sense "created substances, whether corporeal or thinking, may be conceived under this common concept; for they are things which need only the concurrence of God in order to exist" (Principle LII, trans. Haldane and Ross). Descartes goes on to say that "there is always one principal property of substance which constitutes its nature and essence, and on which all the others depend. Thus extension in length, breadth and depth, constitutes the nature of corporeal substance; and thought constitutes the nature of thinking substance. For all else that may be attributed to body presupposes extension, and is but a mode of this extended thing; as everything that we find in mind is but so many diverse forms of thinking." So the essence of mind is thinking; other mental properties are "modes" of thinking (e.g. sensation, imagination, understanding, . . .). The essence of matter is extension; other physical properties are modes of extension (e.g. mass, volume, shape, movement . . .). Each person is a mind, a mental substance; each person is also attached to a body with which he or she interacts.
This interaction, however, poses a problem for Descartes. How do two substances as radically different as mind and body, two substances which indeed have no properties in common (mind doesn’t have extension and body doesn’t think, according to Descartes), have any effect on each other? Here is a fragment from a letter from Princess Elizabeth to Descartes (written May 6-16, 1643): "I beg of you to tell me how the human should can determine the movement of the animal spirits in the body...