An Analysis of Rene Descartes's Meditations on First Philosophy

ISBN-13: 9781912127320 / Angielski / Miękka / 2017 / 102 str.

Andreas Vrahimis

Opis

René Descartes’s 1641 Meditations on First Philosophy is a cornerstone of the history of western thought. One of the most important philosophical texts ever written, it is also a masterclass in the art of critical thinking – specifically when it comes to reasoning and interpretation.

Descartes sought to do nothing less than create a new foundation for the pursuit of knowledge – whether philosophical, scientific, or theological. To that end, he laid out a systematic programme that reinterpreted prior definitions of knowledge, and reasoned out a systematic means of obtaining, verifying, and building on existing human knowledge. To this end, Descartes created a definition of true knowledge as that which is based on things which cannot be called into doubt by radical scepticism. If, he suggests, we can find a belief that cannot be called into doubt, this will provide a solid foundation upon which we can build systematic reasoning. This ‘cartesian’ method, as it has come to be known, is a blueprint for reasoning that continues to shape the study of philosophy today: a careful weighing of possibilities, searching out solid ground and building on it step by step.

René Descartes posed questions about the nature of knowledge and the nature of being that philosophers still debate today.

Spis treści

Ways in to the Text  Who was René Descartes?  What does Meditations Say?  Why does Meditations Matter?  Section 1: Influences  Module 1: The Author and the Historical Context  Module 2: Academic Context  Module 3: The Problem  Module 4: The Author's Contribution  Section 2: Ideas  Module 5: Main Ideas  Module 6: Secondary Ideas  Module 7: Achievement  Module 8: Place in the Author's Work  Section 3: Impact  Module 9: The First Responses  Module 10: The Evolving Debate  Module 11: Impact and Influence Today  Module 12: Where Next?  Glossary of Terms  People Mentioned in the Text  Works Cited

O autorze

Andreas Vrahimis is Honorary Research Fellow at Birkbeck, University of London, UK and teaches at the University of Cyprus. He is the author of Encounters between Analytic and Continental Philosophy (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013).