Husserl‘s Cartesian Meditations- Irfan Ajvazi.

Husserl’s transcendental philosophy has frequently been disparaged in many of the central philosophical debates of the 20th century. And many of his most virulent critics have been adherents of phenomenological philosophy. Critiques have stressed the bankruptcy of the concept of ultimate foundation in relation to a transcendental subject that is allegedly solipsistic and conditioned by modern prejudices. Two essential insights have led me to reconsider such critical assessments.1 On the one hand, the open-ended and infinite nature of Husserlian intentional analysis (...) seems to indicate what could be characterized as a “withdrawal of ground” or an endless deferral of a self-sufficient, “ultimate foundation” in Descartes’s sense. On the other hand, a close examination of Husserlian concepts such as ‘ground’ and ‘rational knowledge’ reveals that their original Cartesian meaning has undergone semantic changes in Husserlian thought. In the present essay, I aim to lend support to these insights by examining the Fourth and, very briefly, Fifth Cartesian Meditations. The examination comprises four stages. First, it makes a case for focusing on the Cartesian Meditations, where Husserl’s “Cartesian option” seems obvious. Second, it attempts to disclose a differentiated foundational discourse in the Fourth Meditation, one that is dedicated to the difficult and core issue of the “ego’s self-constitution.” Third, it reassesses the foundational discourse of the intersubjective transcendental theory sketched in the "Fifth Meditation," after pointing out some misunderstandings concerning the sense of Husserl’s transcendental “idealism” and “solipsism.” And, finally, it asks whether the notions of ‘ground’ and ‘reason’—whose sense is shown in the foregoing stage to have been transformed—do, in fact, belong to a project that is, as Husserl’s critics claim, no longer feasible. The guiding thesis here is that if these steps are taken and my hypotheses confirmed, then Husserl’s work will still be able to contribute significantly to contemporary debates on the status of scientific discourse and the nature and goals of practical discourse, where both are conceived of as grounded in a radically understood human praxis. (shrink)

Laboratory science is our only source of knowledge about the world as it is apart from our perceptions of the world. Empiricist philosophy, relying on evidence consisting in human perceptions, can only give us knowledge of phenomena making up the world-perceived, which recent neuroscience tells us is wholly and entirely constructed by our neuron-based human perceptual apparatus. In this light, empiricist philosophy should explicitly and fundamentally be reconceived as a method of thinking critically about phenomena, i.e. as a stripped down, (...) fallibilist, non-foundationalist version of “phenomenology”. I also describe implications of these proposals for thinking critically about and conceptualizing phenomena like the Cartesian “I”-that-thinks, consciousness, mind, personal identity, free will, and causal relationships between the brain and the conscious “I.”. (shrink)

In his Christian and Metaphysical Meditations (1683) Malebranche develops a reflection in which the self discovers in its interiority that the interlocutor able to answer some of its questions is the divine Word. Through references to the Holy Scriptures and to Augustine, Malebranche constructs a meditative itinerary that differs from the one proposed by Descartes, as it moves from the lumière naturelle in the Cartesian sense to the lumière of the Word. In the light of these historical-theoretical data, (...) we propose a reconstruction of the role played by interiority and meditation in certain texts by Malebranche, highlighting the moments in which he appropriated the Cartesian heritage and those in which he distanced himself from Descartes’ philosophical paradigm. (shrink)

We offer a novel interpretation of the argumentative role that Meditation IV plays within the whole of the Meditations. This new interpretation clarifies several otherwise head-scratching claims that Descartes makes about Meditation IV, and it fully exonerates the Fourth Meditation from either raising or exacerbating Descartes’ circularity problems.

According to the reading offered here, Descartes' use of the meditative mode of writing was not a mere rhetorical device to win an audience accustomed to the spiritual retreat. His choice of the literary form of the spiritual exercise was consonant with, if not determined by, his theory of the mind and of the basis of human knowledge. Since Descartes' conception of knowledge implied the priority of the intellect over the senses, and indeed the priority of an intellect operating independently (...) of the senses, and since, in Descartes' view, the untutored individual was likely to be nearly wholly immersed in the senses, a procedure was needed for freeing the intellect from sensory domination so that the truth might be seen. Hence, the cognitive exercises of the Meditations, modeled not on the sense- and imagination-based exercises of Ignatius of Loyola, but on the Augustinian procedure of turning away from the senses and imagination to perceive the unpicturable with the fleshless eye of the mind. In accordance with this reading, the function of Descartes' skeptical arguments is not to introduce skepticism so that it can be defeated but to aid the meditator in withdrawing the mind from the senses in order to attend to truths of the pure intellect. These truths then offer the basis for a new natural philosophy, including a new theory of the senses. (shrink)

I offer a novel reading in this dissertation of René Descartes’s (1596–1650) skepticism in his work Meditations on First Philosophy (1641–1642). I specifically aim to answer the following problem: How is Descartes’s skepticism to be read in accordance with the rest of his philosophy? This problem can be divided into two more general questions in Descartes scholarship: How is skepticism utilized in the Meditations, and what are its intentions and relation to the preceding philosophical tradition? -/- I approach (...) the topic from both a historical and a text-based analysis, combining textual and contextual research. I examine Descartes’s skepticism against two main traditions in the historical analysis: philosophical skepticism and Aristotelian Scholasticism. I argue that skepticism in the Meditations is intended to oppose and upheave both Scholasticism and skepticism. The intended results of the work are not merely epistemological but also metaphysical and even ethical. Furthermore, these ambitions cannot be neatly distinguished but merge into each other. -/- The third historical context against which the skeptical meditations are examined is the literary genre of meditative exercises, particularly from the 1500–1600’s, which, while religiously and spiritually oriented, likewise provided the practitioner with an enlightened understanding of self-knowledge and their cognitive place in the world on the way to closer spiritual proximity to God. I argue by this reading that the skepticism of the Meditations is an attentive, meditational cognitive exercise that is not merely instrumental and methodological but is to have a genuine and serious (psychologically real) effect on our thinking. The skeptical meditation is not simply a theoretical thought experiment but is to be seriously practiced as a transformative process of reorienting one’s cognitive framework to discover truth, certainty, and a way to a happy, tranquil, and virtuous life. -/- I offer a close reading in the textual analysis of the first three meditations of the Meditations. I argue that the meditative skepticism employed in the work does not reject the previous beliefs but suspends judgment on them, withdrawing assent until further evidence can be found. I introduce a new term into Descartes scholarship in this analysis, based on the terminology of ancient skepticism: Cartesian epochē (gr. epochē, suspension, withdrawal). Instead of rejecting previous beliefs or assenting to the probably false, the skeptical procedure of the Meditations is argued to emulate in important ways the suspension of judgment on equally balanced reasons in ancient Pyrrhonian skepticism. Novel interpretations are presented along the way of the will’s freedom, of the First Meditation’s skeptical scenarios, of the cogito, and of the vindication of metaphysical certainty, as well as a clarification of the Cartesian Circle problem. -/- Reinterpreting the relation of Descartes’s skepticism to the preceding historical and literary traditions leads to a new look at the skeptical method itself. Presenting a new interpretation of skepticism in the Meditations leads at the same time to a new look at its relation to the historical context. The two research questions are, then, intrinsically tied together. -/- My focus in the study is on the Meditations, but I also reference and discuss Descartes’s other philosophical works, as well as his correspondence, when necessary. (shrink)

In two recent papers, Michael Della Rocca accuses Descartes of reasoning circularly in the Fourth Meditation. This alleged new circle is distinct from, and more vicious than, the traditional Cartesian Circle arising in the Third Meditation. We explain Della Rocca’s reasons for this accusation, showing that his argument is invalid.

The syllogism and the predicate calculus cannot account for an ontological argument in Descartes' Fifth Meditation and related texts. Descartes' notion of god relies on the analytic-synthetic distinction, which Descartes had identified before Leibniz and Kant did. I describe how the syllogism and the predicate calculus cannot explain Descartes' ontological argument; then I apply the analytic-synthetic distinction to Descartes’ idea of god.

At the beginning of the First Meditation, Descartes’s meditator considers not only the famous scenarios of dreaming and deceiver but also a third scenario: that she might be insane. This madness scenario is apparently rejected in favor of dreaming. I analyze the scenario of madness, drawing from Descartes’s comments about insanity as a medical condition, and compare it with the dreaming scenario. Overall, the scenario of madness has been generally neglected, receiving only minor discussion in the literature, most of which (...) I take to be misguided, without well-driven attempts to place it in the narrative of the First Meditation or contrast it with Descartes’s more medical analysis of defects in the brain. However, the scenario deserves to be discussed more as it serves an important argumentative turning point in the narration of the First Meditation. I view the role of the madness scenario to be acting as a transitional passage between the natural common-sense attitude, used in practical everyday life, and the unnatural metaphysical doubt. These two should be considered two different states of mind, with the latter being the metaphysical attitude required for the Cartesian suspension of judgment. (shrink)

Since Descartes, the nature of doubt has played a central role in the development of metaphysics both positively and negatively. Despite this fact, there has been very little discussion centering round the specific nature of doubt which led, for example, to the Cartesian discovery of the cogito. Certainly, the role of doubt has been well recognized: through doubt Descartes arrives at his indubitable first principle. But what can it mean to doubt the existence of the sensible world? This would (...) seem to rest upon the assumption that we have clear and distinct knowledge of the precise nature of what it means to exist and indeed of what it means to be. As it stands, Descartes’ initiates his Meditations upon certain definite assumptions that demand more thorough interrogation. In this paper and presentation, I examine the possible assumptions inherent in the Cartesian method of doubt within the first and second meditation and the manner in which this leads to the discovery of the cogito. I consider a number of essential questions in light of this: What presuppositions lie at bottom to Cartesian doubt? What is the precise nature of metaphysical doubt? What can it mean to doubt the existence of the sensible world? (shrink)

One of the many areas of his philosophical project that René Descartes (1596–1650) left to be developed by future generations is political theory. While Descartes took relatively little interest in the realm of the political as long as the political stability necessary to tend to quiet philosophical meditation was maintained, later Cartesian philosophers developed their understanding of political theory in more explicit and detailed terms. Among these, two philosophers stand out: Géraud de Cordemoy (1626–1684) and Antoine Le Grand (1629–1699). (...) However, their political philosophy is little known. I first study the case of Cordemoy who emerges as a fierce defender of absolutism, especially that of Louis XIV. I will then turn to Antoine Le Grand who equally favours monarchical rule over aristocracy and democracy. Overall, this article contributes in important ways to the history of political philosophy, specifically, in seventeenth-century France. (shrink)

The apparently circular arguments in Descartes’s Meditations should be read as analytic arguments, as Descartes himself suggested. This both explains and excuses the appearance of circularity. Analysis “digs out” what is already present in the meditator’s mind but not yet “expressly known”. Once this is achieved, the meditator may take the result of analysis as an epistemic starting point independent of the original argument. That is, analytic arguments may be reversed to yield demonstrative proofs that follow an already worked-out (...) order of ideas. The “Cartesian Circle,” for example, is circular only when Descartes’s original analytic argument is mistaken for the demonstration that it enables. This approach to Cartesian Circles is unlike the standard approach, which attempts to show that Descartes’s original arguments do work as demonstrations after all. (shrink)

Kant’s Refutation targets what he calls the problematic idealist. This is understood by the mainstream of Kantian scholarship as the global skeptic that Descartes briefly adumbrated in his first Meditation. The widespread view in the literature is that the fate of the Refutation is tied to its success as an argument against this Cartesian global skepticism. This consensus is what I want to question in this paper. I argue that Kant’s opponent – the problematic idealist – is not the (...) Cartesian global skeptic, but rather what I prefer to call here the Cartesian problematic external-world idealist. According to Cartesian global skepticism we cannot know whether our commonsensical beliefs are true until we rule out the skeptical hypotheses are false. In contrast, the Cartesian external-world idealist sees as problematic the assumption that the underlying nature of outer things of which we have ideas is mind-independent rather than caused by our own thinking being. My aim here is to disentangle Cartesian global skepticism from Cartesian problematic external-word idealism and show that, if measured against global skepticism, Kant’s Refutation is doomed to fail; while against problematic idealism, it is at least a promising argument. (shrink)

According to the Monist Interpretation of Descartes, there is really only one corporeal substance—the entire extended plenum. Evidence for this interpretation seems to be provided by Descartes in the Synopsis of the Meditations, where he claims that all substances are incorruptible. Finite bodies, being corruptible, would then fail to be substances. On the other hand, ‘body, taken in the general sense,’ being incorruptible, would be a corporeal substance. In this paper, I defend a Pluralist Interpretation of Descartes, according to (...) which there are many corporeal substances. In particular, I show that none of the claims in the Synopsis about incorruptibility and substance entail either that finite bodies are not substances, or that the only corporeal substance is the entire plenum. (shrink)

Focusing on Descartes’ conclusion in the second Meditation that bodies are strictly perceived through the intellect alone, I contextualize, outline, and elucidate Descartes’ first two Meditations. I begin with a summary of key themes from the first Meditation and outline the reasons for Descartes’ radical doubt. I then provide a detailed explication of Descartes’ argumentitive journey in the second meditation, wherein Descartes arrives at the hypothesis that he is a thinking thing, and demonstrates the plausibility of this hypothesis by (...) scrutinizing a piece of wax until he is able to clearly and distinctly perceive it. I elaborate on Descartes’ conclusion that bodies are perceived through the intellect alone by discussing how abstraction can be used to understand any external body clearly and distinctly, before explaining the overall significance of the conclusion as an affirmation of Descartes’ existence, which gives him profound knowledge of the self. (shrink)

Recent research in Baroque Scholastic and early modern meditational exercises has demonstrated similarity between Descartes’s Meditations and St. Teresa of Ávila’s El Castillo Interior. While there is growing agreement on the influence of Catholic meditations on Descartes, the extent of Teresa’s role is debated. Instead of discussing the full extent of Teresa’s influence, this paper concentrates on one example of the considered influence: the skeptical scenario of demonic deception, having clear anticipation in Teresa’s work where the exercitant faces (...) off against deceiving demonic forces, which confound and temporarily halt the meditative progress. The paper analyzes Teresa’s use of deceptive demons and its influence on the Cartesian Evil Demon scenario, while contrasting both with a discussion of demonic deception in the late Medieval and Baroque Scholastic context, arguing that demonological discussions in 1500s allowed both Teresa’s and Descartes’s deceivers to not only cause diversions but to make the deception laborious to resist. (shrink)

It is well-known that in the fifth of his Cartesian Meditations, Husserl puts forth a theory of intersubjectivity. Most commentators of Husserl have read his Cartesian Meditations as presenting a theory of intersubjectivity whose basis is empathy, in the form of a process of constituting the sense of “other” in one’s own experience, as the primary origin of the intersubjective layer of experience. In this paper, I claim that the structure of intersubjectivity as Husserl presents it (...) in the Cartesian Meditations is articulated as being governed by a logic of parts and wholes rather than that of a phenomenology of empathy, and that the articulation of this logic demonstrates that the transcendental ego is intrinsically intersubjective. My main philosophical claim in this regard is that the way Husserl’s account of transcendental empathy unfolds in the Cartesian Meditations implies a prior fundamental mereological structure of which the individual transcendental ego is only a part. That is, the transcendental ego has an eidetic a-priori intersubjective structure, in the sense of being a moment of an intersubjectively structured transcendental whole. In this sense, rather than being a singulare tantum, it is more fitting to say that transcendental subjectivity is actually a plurale tantum. (shrink)

In the Fifth Meditation, Descartes makes a remarkable claim about the ontological status of geometrical figures. He asserts that an object such as a triangle has a 'true and immutable nature' that does not depend on the mind, yet has being even if there are no triangles existing in the world. This statement has led many commentators to assume that Descartes is a Platonist regarding essences and in the philosophy of mathematics. One problem with this seemingly natural reading is that (...) it contradicts the conceptualist account of universals that one finds in the Principles of Philosophy and elsewhere. In this paper, I offer a novel interpretation of the notion of a true and immutable nature which reconciles the Fifth Meditation with the conceptualism of Descartes' other work. Specifically, I argue that Descartes takes natures to be innate ideas considered in terms of their so-called 'objective being'. (shrink)

We propose a novel reading of Descartes' views on the nature of pain, thirst, and hunger: imperativism. According to imperativism, rather than (exclusively) having intentional contents individuated by a set of correctness conditions specifying the way the world is, pain thirst, and hunger have contents individuated by satisfaction conditions, which specify the way the world ought to be. Unlike representationalist treatments, the imperativist reading satisfies the unique health-preserving role Descartes sets out for pain, thirst, and hunger, without inflating his austere (...) metaphysics of res extensa. (shrink)

The essay investigates two personae: Socrates as depicted by Plato and Descartes as narrator of the Discourse on Method and Meditations. Socrates is aware of his ignorance and insists on remembering to care for the self; Descartes claims to have overcome ignorance through a method that breaks problems into simple and certain elements, establishing a self-certain yet impersonal subject that comprehends and controls objects. The Cartesian approach has led to the modern process of “liquidation” that reduces beings, property, (...) and truth to resources, wealth, and information – initiating the dangerous and unprecedented epoch known as the Anthropocene. The Socratic approach offers some promise of reintegration and resistance to liquidation by urging us to care for wholeness and recognizing that being exceeds what we comprehend. (shrink)

Descartes has been accused of reasoning in a circle since the publication of the Meditations. The Circle is easy to point out: it seems that Descartes employs clear and distinct perceptions to demonstrate God’s existence and benevolence, and the latter, in turn, validates the use of clear and distinct perceptions. But is Descartes really guilty of fallacious argument, or can we break the arc somehow?

What did Descartes regard as subject to doubt, and what was beyond doubt, in the Meditations? A review of the Objections and Descartes' reactions in the Replies provides some useful clarification, but viewing Descartes' method of doubt in conjunction with his professed theory of knowledge in the Rules for the Direction of the Mind further elucidates his own understanding of the project. In the Rules, Descartes introduces the mind's intuition of "simple natures" as the atomistic basis of all knowledge, (...) its form as well as its content. The simple natures, Descartes claims, can only be understood thoroughly, and I argue that Descartes' doubt in the  Meditations appears not to include doubt of simple natures. A related attempt to link the earlier work to the Meditations by Peter Schouls is considered and criticized; I suggest as an alternative that there are three classes of objects pertaining to the construction of knowledge in the Meditations: a) first principles and concepts that are constituents of other knowledge, intuited and not doubted, nor called 'knowledge' by Descartes; b) what Descartes calls clearly and distinctly perceived knowledge that survives doubt, known through a kind of intuition; and c) science, as remembered collections of clearly and distinctly perceived knowledge. Finally, because the two works do have important dissimilarities, I also consider how differences between the Rules and the Meditations might affect the applicability of the simple natures to the arguments of the Meditations, especially in the light of clues found in the intellectual autobiography of the Discourse on Method. (shrink)

In support of Descartes’ epistemology, Lex Newman advances the ‘Non-atheistic-knowledge- thesis’, i.e., indefeasible knowledge cannot be gained unless the existence of God is proved. Here I expound the ‘non-atheistic-thesis-of-Cartesian-metaphysics’, which, unlike Newman’s, refers to how four Cartesian metaphysical conclusions require the existence of God. To test whether such conclusions need divine existence, we may ask what would happen if God did not play any decisive role in the Meditations. As I argue, four unpalatable consequences would follow for (...) Cartesian metaphysics, which would ruin Descartes’ plan to refute the skeptic and the atheist alike. (shrink)

Recent research has defended the surprising thesis that in many cases the search for truth is better off if the information exchanged between the members of an epistemic community is limited. This is what one may call the limited information thesis. There is, however, the possibility of an even more radical position than this: the thesis that any communication between peers has zero epistemic value and that the search for truth is better off if the truth-inquirer does not take into (...) consideration the truth-claims of her peers. This can be called the solitude thesis. The paper defends the claim that Descartes is a supporter of the solitude thesis with respect to metaphysical inquiry. The defense is facilitated by means of interpreting textual evidence found in Descartes’ essays Discourse on the Method, The Search for Truth and the Meditations on First Philosophy. (shrink)

This chapter from Michel Serres’s comprehensive study on Leibniz—"Leibniz's System and its Mathematical Models [Le système de Leibniz et ses modèles mathématiques]"—examines Leibniz’s epistemological framework. This framework, which Leibniz developed for a large part in his “Meditations on Knowledge, Truth, and Ideas [Meditationes de cognitione, veritate et ideis],” is pitched against Descartes’s "Meditations on First Philosophy [Meditationes de Prima Philosophia]" and the method of systematic doubt developed therein. While Descartes rejects any knowledge with the slightest possibility of falsehood, (...) Leibniz accepts knowledge with even a minimal degree of truth. Leibniz’s approach involves a progressive genesis of truth through a series of filters, each further refining knowledge. This process is intrinsically linked to infinitism and combinatorics, allowing for a gradual differentiation of the distinct from the indistinct. The filters are applied sequentially, with each filter proceeding through its own oppositions, resulting in a spectrum of knowledge ranging from obscure to clear, confused to distinct, inadequate to adequate, and symbolic to intuitive. This framework facilitates pluralism within rationalism that proceeds through evolving or regional truths. The filters overlap, and only the final stage of knowledge is devoid of mixture. Leibniz’s epistemology is non-Cartesian, as it relativizes truth and falsehood at each stage of the filtering process. It also accounts for the limitations of sensory perception, attributing them to the imperfection of the human mind in its current state. This chapter has been translated by Martijn Boven for his seminar "Philosophy of Literature". (shrink)

Can we find a phenomenological basis for the ethical 'ought'? This essay addresses this question through a reflection on Husserl's fifth Meditation. In the fifth Meditation Husserl endeavors to show the manner in which I constitute the other through an associative pairing of the other with my own subjectivity. This essay argues that this same associative pairing forces me to acknowledge the other as a person of intrinsic worth insofar as I recognize myself as one. Having acknowledged the intrinsic worth (...) of the other in this way, I cannot but acknowledge my obligation to treat the other as I would like to be treated. Thus, the ethical imperative, in the form of the Golden Rule, proves to be implicated in the very constitution of the other in his or her otherness. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to motivate the need for and then present the outline of an alternative explanation of what Dan Zahavi has dubbed “open intersubjectivity,” which captures the basic interpersonal character of perceptual experience as such. This is a notion whose roots lay in Husserl’s phenomenology. Accordingly, the paper begins by situating the notion of open intersubjectivity – as well as the broader idea of constituting intersubjectivity to which it belongs – within Husserl’s phenomenology as an approach (...) distinct from his more well-known account of empathy in the Fifth Cartesian Meditation. I then recapitulate and criticize Zahavi’s phenomenological explanation of open intersubjectivity, arguing that his account hinges on a flawed phenomenology of perceptual experience. In the wake of that criticism, I supply an alternative phenomenological framework for explaining open intersubjectivity, appealing to the methodological principles of Husserl’s genetic phenomenology and his theory of developmentally primitive affect. Those principles are put to work using the resources of recent studies of cognitive developmental and social cognition. From that literature, I discuss how infants learn about the world from others in secondary intersubjectivity through natural pedagogy. Lastly, the paper closes by showing how the discussion of infant development explains the phenomenon of open intersubjectivity and by highlighting the relatively moderate nature of this account compared to Zahavi’s. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine a deconstitutive experience that may occur in a factical encounter between two egos. This experience has the character of nonsense, or more specifically, the sense-refusal. It is about the impossibility to access the foreign stream of consciousness while gazing at the other’s gaze. In order to show this, the paper has the following structure: First, I discuss the implicit presence of the other ego in all experiences, followed by (ii) Husserl’s analysis of the constitution of (...) the foreign ego in his Cartesian Meditations, starting from which (iii) I analyse the experience of sense refusal in gazing at the other’s gaze. Finally, (iv) I draw attention to a potential misinterpretation of the present analysis. (shrink)

This paper examines Eugen Fink’s Play as Symbol of the World as an ontological elaboration of phenomenality beyond recursion. In contrast to the reflexive or world-disclosing structures of Husserl and Heidegger, Fink conceives the world as a metamorphic continuity—a process of play in which being unfolds without centre or return. Through a close reading of Fink’s later essays and the Sixth Cartesian Meditation, the paper reconstructs play as the operative structure of openness that precedes both subject and object. Play (...) becomes the ontological principle of world-formation: a dynamic of variation, excess, and self-displacement through which the world sustains itself without ground. (shrink)

This paper proposes a novel systems theory titled Trilism, aimed at transcending the explanatory limitations of traditional Cartesian Dualism and Physicalism. Through an inquiry into the framework of ”Zero Philosophy”—defined here as ”Pre-categorical Clarification”—this study redefines the ontological structure of reality into three core categories: the Spiritual World (S), the Mediator (T, or Mesotes), and the Material World (M). Drawing upon Cartesian meditative methods and engaging with contemporary philosophy of mind, this research establishes ”intermediacy” as a logical necessity (...) for systemic coherence. Through the ”Perfectly Simulated Human” (PSH) thought experiment and the technical delineation of the ”Trilism Observer,” the paper responds to David Chalmers’ ”Hard Problem,” demonstrating the non-reducibility of subjective qualia. Furthermore, the Trilism framework is applied to economics and algorithmic ethics, proposing a normative mechanism to counteract the alienation inherent in self-referential bureaucratic systems. (shrink)

Phenomenology and logical positivism both subscribed to an empirical-verifiability criterion of mental or linguistic meaning. The acceptance of this criterion confronted them with the same problem: how to understand the Other as a subject with his own experience, if the existence and nature of the Other's experiences cannot be verified. Husserl tackled this problem in the Cartesian Meditations, but he could not reconcile the verifiability criterion with understanding the Other's feelings and sensations. Carnap's solution was to embrace behaviorism (...) and eliminate the idea of private sensations, but behaviorism has well-known difficulties. Heidegger broke this impasse by suggesting that each person's being included being-with, an innate capacity for understanding the Other. To be human is to be "hardwired" to make sense of the Other without having to verify the Other's private sensations. I suggest that being-with emerged from an evolutionary imperative for conspecific animals to recognize each other and to coordinate their activities. Wittgenstein also rejected the verifiability criterion. He theorized that the meaning of a term is its usage and that terms about private sensations were meaningful because they have functions in our language-games. For example, "I'm in pain," like a cry of pain, functions to get the attention of others and motivate others to help. Wittgenstein's theory shows how Dasein's being-with includes "primitive" adaptive behavior such as cries, smiles, and threatening or playful gesture. As Dasein is acculturated, these behaviors are partially superseded by functionally equivalent linguistic expressions. (shrink)

The editor's introduction discusses Clarence I. Lewis's conceptual pragmatism when compared with post-empiricist epistemology and argues that several Cartesian assumptions play a major role in the work, not unlike those of Logical Positivism. The suggestion is made that the Cartesian legacy still hidden in Logical Positivism turns out to be a rather heavy ballast for Lewis’s project of restructuring epistemology in a pragmatist key. More in detail, the sore point is the nature of inter-subjectivity. For Lewis, no less (...) than for the Logical Positivists at the time of the Protocols Controversy and Husserl in the Cartesian Meditations, this is a problem without a solution. The reason is that all these philosophers are apparently unable to realize that the existence of a plurality of knowing subjects cannot be treated at once both as a speculative problem and a methodological one. Lewis, thanks to his pragmatist approach both comes closer to the right answer and offers an even more naïve unsatisfactory solution to the pseudo-problem under discussion. The fact that he has clear in mind that inter-subjectivity means not only a plurality of linguistic utterances but also a co-existence of different kinds of practical behaviour. Eventually, the very idea of mind, the key-idea in the book, suffers from the above mentioned tension. In fact, if inter-subjective communication and action is considered at a methodological level, the very idea of mind would not need an analysis, and no kind of ‘reflexive’ analysis. Methodology might be limited to a ‘naïve’ level where the existence of the world and a plurality of subjects be taken as a bedrock of uncritically accepted evidence. Philosophical reflection on ultimate evidence, instead, would take a different approach, maybe the one Wittgenstein was putting into practice in the same years when Mind and the world order was written, namely it would be bound to question the very meaning of the idea of ‘mind’ as an undue fiction – the same carried out by Descartes – when he assumed the Cogito to be at once a body of self-evident truths and a thing or substance, the familiar Platonic idea of psyche or soul. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the puzzling question of what motivates the radical epistemological shift necessary for engaging in transcendental phenomenology. Husserl touches on the problem of motivation on many occasions, but it becomes an explicit issue in Fink’s bold reimagining of the transcendental theory of method, as presented in the Sixth Cartesian Meditation. In the first section, I briefly introduce the problem as it appears in Husserl. The second section of the paper discusses Fink’s Hegelian dissolution of it. Finally, (...) I point to several historical, practical, and ethical aspects of transcendental phenomenology, and argue that a good account of motivation for phenomenology ought to find a way to address these without hastily bracketing them. (shrink)

In early 2014, Descartes’ Meditations joined the short but select list of Western Philosophy texts that have an entire Cambridge Companion dedicated to them. (The list includes Hobbes’ Leviathan, Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, Locke’s Essay, Nozick’s Anarchy, State and Utopia, Darwin’s The Origin of Species, Plato’s Republic, and Spinoza’s Ethics. Hume’s Treatise is also expected to be added to the list before the end of the year.) To set itself apart from the many existing volumes that offer guidance (...) and clarification to the Meditations, this new collection of essays aims to prove that the Meditations is not a repository of considered, fully-articulated and spelled-out Cartesian views but rather the exposition of the process, the sequence of steps for arriving at such views. To that end, the rhetorical aspects of the Meditations are especially emphasized: who is speaking, who is spoken to, the manner in which things are phrased, the setting as well as the intended goal of (the speaker of) the Meditations are carefully scrutinized. (shrink)

In the second Meditation, Descartes argues that, because he thinks, he must exist. What are his reasons for accepting the premise of this argument, namely that he thinks? Some commentators suggest that Descartes has a ‘logic’ argument for his premise: It is impossible to be deceived in thinking that one thinks, because being deceived is a species of thinking. In this paper, I argue that this ‘logic’ argument cannot contribute to the first certainty that supposedly stops the Cartesian doubt. (...) Rather, this certainty must be based on another type of access to our own minds, possibly a faculty of introspection. Applying this result to contemporary constitutive theories of self-knowledge (Wright), I show that these cannot be part of what justifies the ascription of particular mental states to a subject. -/- En la segunda de sus "Meditaciones metafísicas", Descartes argumenta que, porque piensa, debe existir. ¿Cuáles son sus razones para aceptar la premisa de este argumento, a saber el que piensa? Algunos comentaristas sugieren que Descartes tiene un argumento 'lógico' para su premisa: No es posible ser engañado en creer que uno piensa, porque el ser engañado también es una especie de pensamiento. En mi ponencia arguyo que este argumento 'lógico' no puede contribuir a la certeza que supuestamente para la duda cartesiana. Más bien, esta certeza debe fundarse en otro tipo de acceso, talvez de forma introspectiva, que tenemos a nuestra propia mente. Aplicando este resultado a teorías contemporáneas constitutivas del autoconocimiento (Wright), muestro que éstas no pueden contribuir a la justificación de la adscripción de estados mentales particulares. (shrink)

In the _Meditations_ and related texts from the early 1640s, Descartes argues that the self can be correctly considered as either a mind or a human being, and that the self’s properties vary accordingly. For example, the self is simple considered as a mind, whereas the self is composite considered as a human being. Someone might object that it is unclear how merely considering the self in different ways blocks the conclusion that a single subject of predication—the self—is both simple (...) and composite, which is contradictory. In response to this objection, this paper develops a reading of Descartes’s various ways of considering the self. I argue that the best reading of Descartes’s qualified claims about the self, i.e., about the self _qua_ mind or the self qua human being, presupposes an account of the unqualified self, that is, of the self _simpliciter_. I argue that the self _simpliciter_ is not a mind, and that it is not a human being either. This result might suggest the pessimistic conclusion that Descartes’s view of the self is incoherent. To avoid this result, I introduce a new metaphysical account of the Cartesian self. On my view, the self is individuated by a unified mental life. The self is constituted by the beings that jointly produce this mental life, and derives its unity from it. (shrink)

This work is a comprehensive attempt to know the most fundamental knowledge that we can practically know. (thing)exist, not (everything)exist. This work is indirectly related to Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy.

The purpose of this paper is twofold. First, it aims at introducing the ontological argument through the analysis of five historical developments: Anselm’s argument found in the second chapter of his Proslogion, Gaunilo’s criticism of it, Descartes’ version of the ontological argument found in his Meditations on First Philosophy, Leibniz’s contribution to the debate on the ontological argument and his demonstration of the possibility of God, and Kant’s famous criticisms against the (cartesian) ontological argument. Second, it intends to (...) critically examine the enterprise of formally analyzing philosophical arguments and, as such, contribute in a small degree to the debate on the role of formalization in philosophy. My focus will be mainly on the drawbacks and limitations of such enterprise; as a guideline, I shall refer to a Carnapian, or Carnapian-like theory of argument analysis. (shrink)

Contemporary discussions of epistemological skepticism - the view that we do not and cannot know anything about the world around us - focus very much on a certain kind of skeptical argument involving a skeptical scenario (a situation familiar from Descartes’ First Meditation). According to the argument, knowing some ordinary proposition about the world (one we usually take ourselves to know) requires knowing we are not in some such skeptical scenario SK; however, since we cannot know that we are not (...) in SK we also cannot know any ordinary proposition. One of the most prominent skeptical scenarios is the brain-in-the-vat-scenario: An evil scientist has operated on an unsuspecting subject, removed the subject’s brain and put it in a vat where it is kept functioning and is connected to some computer which feeds the brain the illusion that everything is “normal”. This paper looks at one aspect of this scenario after another – envatment, disembodiment, weird cognitive processes, lack of the right kind of epistemic standing, and systematic deception. The conclusion is that none of these aspects (in isolation or in combination) is of any relevance for a would-be skeptical argument; the brain-in-the-vat-scenario is irrelevant to and useless for skeptical purposes. Given that related scenarios (e.g., involving evil demons) share the defects of the brain-in-the-vat-scenario, the skeptic should not put any hopes on Cartesian topoi. (shrink)

In this paper, I aim to address a specific issue underpinning Cartesian metaphysics since its first public appearance in the Discourse right up until the Meditations, but which definitely came to the surface in the Second and Fifth Replies. It involves the possibility that to be thinking and to be extended do not actually contrast as two entirely different properties; hence, these two essences cannot serve as the basis for a disjunctive, real distinction between two corresponding substances, the (...) mind and the body. I dub this problem the ‘thinking matter issue.’ I suggest that Descartes’s concerns about the ‘thinking matter issue’ characterizes and structures the entirety of Meditation Two and its connection with Meditation Six, especially in the attempt to covertly implement what I refer to as Descartes’s ‘prejudice strategy.’ The core of the ‘prejudice strategy’ lies in the idea that the ‘thinking matter issue’ is just a false problem, one raised by the inadequate notions of the mind and the body that we apply to this problem. In section 1, I set out the way in which the ‘thinking matter issue’ emerged in Descartes’s philosophy after the first exposition of his metaphysics in the Discourse. Section 2 deals with the new argumentative path Descartes draws for the Meditations and with the new role that he assigns to the inference about the mind’s non-physical nature after the cogito. In section 3, I contend that the ‘prejudice strategy’ structures Meditation Two and, partially, Six. Section 4 shows that Descartes himself reveals this in his Replies to the Second and the Fifth Set of Objections. In section 5, I delve into Descartes’s foundational theory of the ‘prejudice strategy,’ i.e. his theory of infancy as set out especially in the Replies to the Sixth Set of Objections. -/- . (shrink)

Kant was never satisfied with the version of his “Refu- tation” published in 1787 (KrV, B 275-279). His dissatisfaction is already evident in the footnote added to the preface of the second edition of the Critique in 1787. As a matter of fact, Kant continued to rework his argument for at least six years after 1787. The main exegetical problem is to figure out who is the target of the “Refutation”: a non-skeptic idealist, a global skeptic of Cartesian provenance (...) or both. In this last case, the related problem is to know whether either of them is the Cartesian skeptic of the first Meditation, the idealist skeptic of the second Meditation and first part of the third Meditation, or some other non-skeptic idealist. I present and defend a new reconstruction of Kant’s “Refu- tation” as a successful argument against Mendelssohnian idealism of Cartesian provenance. This defense is based on a simple logical sketch of the proof provided by Dicker but essentially modified in light of Dyck’s insight about Kant’s opponent. How shall I support my reading? First, by appealing to overwhelming textual evidence according to which the proof is of the existence of mind-independent things, showing that Kant’s main opponent is Mendelssohn’s idealism of Cartesian provenance. Finally, I support my reading by showing that Kant’s “Refutation” is doomed to fail against all forms of global skepticism but is quite successful against Mendelssohn’s idealism. (shrink)

Consciousness is connected with the fact that a subject is aware and open to the manifestation of whatever appears. Existence, by contrast, is used to express the fact that something is given in experience, is present, or is real. Usually, the two notions are taken to be somehow related. This chapter suggests that existence is at best introduced as a metaphysical (or meta-experiential) concept that inevitably escapes the domain of conscious experience. In order to illustrate this claim, two case studies (...) are considered. The first case is provided by Descartes’s famous treatment of consciousness and existence in his Meditations on First Philosophy. The second case is meant to contrast the Cartesian approach by taking the opposite route, as delineated by Emanuele Severino (1929–2020) in his ‘fundamental ontology’. (shrink)

Rene Descartes (1596 – 1650) is considered the founder of modern philosophy. Profoundly influenced by the new physics and astronomy of Kepler and Galileo, Descartes was a scientist and mathematician whose most long-lasting contributions in science were the invention of Cartesian coordinates, the application of algebra to geometry, and the discovery of the law of refraction, what we now call Snell’s law.His most important books on philosophy were The discourse on method(1637) and The meditations(1642). Descartes’ writings display an (...) exemplary degree of clarity and an aversion to pedantry. I explore Descartes' break with Aristotle, but also shine a light on the intellectual continuity Descartes had with Aristotle's thought. I also draw attention to some overlooked but interesting possibilities for an experimental test of a dualistic theory of mind. (shrink)

In Descartes' Cogito, Saved from the Great Shipwreck, Husain Sarkar convincingly argues that the Cartesian cogito as it appears in Meditation Two cannot be an argument but must be understood as an intuition emerging from the process of ('extraordinary') doubt. Sarkar mentions in the Preface that only the negative part of his thesis in intended to be decisive (X). However, as the book unfolds it becomes evident that his "positive" effort, his interpretation of the cogito as an intuition although (...) not decisive, is no less important. Sarkar shows how his reading of the cogito can account for other aspects of Descartes' writings (memory, the will, the theory of deduction) and offers this as further proof for the correctness of his interpretation. (shrink)

Written in broad strokes, this paper attempts to draw form Krishnamurti’s life and teachings, a hermeneutics of the human soul’s quest-journey towards transcendent wholeness. It begins with an attempt to frame K’s “process” (the name given to the painful ordeals in his youth that many believe were the catalyst responsible for his metamorphosis) through a variety of disciplines and cultural perspectives, some of which underscore the impasse of scientific objectivity and the limits of phenomenalist categories in general. It then explores (...) the procedures and conceits of present technologies of self-transformation via pseudomeditative body work and suggests that this subject can only be confirmed by an experience so intimately and subversively (to its own object) subjective that it risks undermining its own legitimacy in the face of our body-phobic Cartesian cultural ethos that holds sacrosanct the mind-body split. It then explores the deeper origins and history of this problem from the pre-Socratics to the misconceptions of modern mathematics about the proper place of metaphor and paradox and underscores how present day false consciousness fails to discriminate between a “noumenal” world and its conditioned “phenomenal” counterfeit copy. It ends with a brief meditation on K’s process. (shrink)

The first article of the cycle “The role of skeptical evidence in the First and Second ‘Meditations’” compares the Cartesian and Sextus Empiricus’ concepts of doubt in, respectively, “Metaphysical meditations” and “Outlines of Pyrrhonism”. The article starts with the current state of the problem “Descartes and skepticism” and admits the existence of consensus about Cartesian perception of skeptical tradition: Cartesius (1) was influenced by all skeptical movements, known in his time, and (2) created a generalized notion (...) that contains elements of both Academic and Pyrrhonian origin. This consensus is the source of many contemporary studies on how different skeptical doctrines influenced certain parts of Cartesian philosophy. This article attempts to analyze possible Descartes’ use of Sextus Empiricus’ notion of phenomenon. Sextus clearly states in “Outlines of Pyrrhonism” that one cannot doubt phenomenon as something perceived directly. The article proves that (a) Sextus’ thesis about the “sensory” nature of phenomenon is metaphorical, so far as it includes (without distinction) both sensuality and the experience of thinking; (b) the phenomenon is realized through a wide range of passive states of mind that all have irresistible force of influence; (c) the impact of phenomena is always mediated by our self, because all skeptical phrases are strictly correlated with the first person singular. Some researchers distinguish Sextus’ isostenia, as one of such insurmountable states, from Cartesian doubt at the First Meditation, which is allegedly based on a purely volitional decision. The article proved that this argument is artificial, since Descartes’ volitional decision is caused by initial inability to take the dubious as if it were certain. Thus, Cartesian approach can be considered a specific kind of isostenia. Such parallelism is a reason to assume a key role of Sextus’ understanding of insurmountable power of phenomena in Cartesian anti-sceptical argumentation. This assumption will be tested in the following articles of the cycle. (shrink)

It seems that Buddhism and Western philosophy are completely different in terms of origin, methodology and viewpoint. -/- However, an original model to interpret “non-self” which is developed on the basis of both the scientific mechanism behind Buddhist meditation and the empirical materials of Theravada Buddhism makes it possible to bridge Buddhism and western philosophy. -/- In “The Science behind Buddhist Meditation”, we have proposed that the nature of Vipassana is enhanced awareness induced in Buddhist meditation, which makes contemplating the (...) five aggregates possible, just like “watching” a slow-motion film. -/- According to the empirical materials of Theravada Buddhism, if we regard each aggregate as an “awareness” which is the state of being conscious of something, then contemplating the five aggregates would reveal the existence of “awareness of awareness”, and discern that it arises a moment after each aggregate and they do not appear simultaneously. -/- Thus, it is clear that the notion that there is a constant entity always there knowing or experiencing all aggregates just results from the alternation of “awareness” (or “aggregates”) and “awareness of awareness”, something that under ordinary conditions happens very quickly. (That’s like a torch spinning so fast that it looks like a solid ring of fire exists.) -/- This would lead to the insight of “non-self”: no subject (or mental entity) of awareness at all. -/- Intrinsically, the illusion that there is a self underlying the five aggregates means a two-tier structure like that of “Cogito, ergo sum” or Cartesian Theatre. However, the slowing down of “speed” in Vipassana reveals that the reality is single-tier. (The “self” in Buddhism’s “non-self” is actually the “I” in Descartes’ “I think, therefore I am.”) -/- Obviously, this model bridges Buddhism and Western philosophy, demonstrating that mental entity does not exist, a fundamental problem in Western philosophy for hundreds of years. (The most famous long standing controversy is Descartes’ “Cogito, ergo sum” versus Hume’s “Bundle theory”.) -/- To go a step further, inspired by Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche’s view on “emptiness”, we summarize the progressive stages of “emptiness” in terms of an original three-tier structure (“subject”, “be aware of” and “object”), bridging different Buddhist schools in a unified analytical framework. -/- To summarize, from the perspective of Western philosophy, Theravada Buddhism is concerning “self-consciousness” (so called pudgala-nairatmya), while Mahayana Buddhism is concerning “consciousness” (so called dharma-nairatmya). (shrink)

Steve Sayles’s Charlie’s Problem: He Has Had a Falling Out with His Brain occupies a singular position in contemporary British literature. Beneath its surface of dialect humour and anecdotal absurdity, it conceals an intricate metaphysical structure. Sayles—known academically as S. C. Sayles for his Veritas Confirmata and The Recovery of the Soul series—transposes the philosophical concerns of his rational, field-centred ontology into a register of cultural comedy. The book’s titular hero, Charlie Clitheroe, embodies the philosophical everyman who quarrels with his (...) own mind. Through stories such as “The Flipping Brain,” “Two Bummed Tingled,” “Stonker Raisen Was Here,” and “Climb Like Monkeys,” Sayles constructs a comic phenomenology of consciousness, exploring trust, error, guilt, and humane clarity. This review reads Charlie’s Problem as both literary artifact and philosophical experiment. It argues that Sayles’s humour functions not merely as entertainment but as epistemology: laughter becomes a medium for metaphysical inquiry. Blending the tonal warmth of Northern English storytelling with the logical precision of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus, Sayles demonstrates that comedy can illuminate the same ontological tensions that academic philosophy treats with solemnity. The following analysis situates Charlie’s Problem within traditions of British working-class wit and existential satire, showing how its author converts folly into insight and everyday speech into a language of metaphysical confession. -/- Introduction When Charlie’s Problem opens with the declaration that its protagonist has “had a falling out with his brain,” the reader is immediately warned that the battleground will not be the streets of Doncaster but the corridors of consciousness. What appears to be a collection of comic sketches soon reveals itself as a philosophical anatomy of the modern self. Sayles’s humour—earthy, self-mocking, and colloquially precise—serves as the instrument by which deep metaphysical questions are rendered audible in the cadences of ordinary life. In the landscape of British letters, Sayles’s work belongs to a lineage stretching from Laurence Sterne’s playful epistemologies to Alan Bennett’s moral ironies. Yet its deeper ancestry lies with Wittgenstein’s insight that “a serious and good philosophical work could be written consisting entirely of jokes.” Sayles, who elsewhere writes systematic metaphysics under the name S. C. Sayles, takes this aphorism literally. His comedy is not ornament to philosophy but philosophy’s embodiment in dialect and story. Charlie’s Problem transforms the comic anecdote into a metaphysical laboratory where ideas about mind, language, and moral order are tested through laughter. The book presents itself modestly: a sequence of loosely connected tales, each accompanied by its own “Philosophical Analysis.” Yet this self-commentary is integral to the design. It recalls the structure of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, in which propositions are followed by clarifying sub-propositions. Sayles extends the same scaffolding to narrative form: first the event, then the reflection. The humour triggers thought, and the analysis formalises it. Through this rhythm of anecdote and exposition, Charlie’s Problem proposes that comedy itself may be the truest mode of philosophy in an age that no longer trusts solemnity. Set within recognisably Northern social worlds—pit villages, schoolyards, pubs, and seaside escapades—the stories celebrate the oral texture of working-class speech. Sayles preserves the idiom of the people he portrays, collecting dialect terms such as gormwazzock, twizzleheed, and dunderplank in “The Idiot’s Lexicon.” The glossary is more than linguistic play; it functions as anthropology of the comic mind, mapping the vocabulary of foolishness that underwrites all human self-knowledge. In Charlie’s Problem, every insult conceals an ethic of leniency: to call oneself a fool is to acknowledge participation in the universal comedy of error. The thematic core of the book lies in the dialectic between intellect and instinct—between the brain that calculates and the intuition that orientates. Charlie’s “falling out” with his brain becomes a microcosm of modernity’s estrangement from itself. The Freudian, Cartesian, and tribal models of mind parodied in “The Flipping Brain” dramatise the confusion between the biological and the metaphysical, the mechanical and the moral. Sayles’s prose renders this ancient dualism in domestic absurdity: the self arguing with its own organ, the thinker unable to trust the instrument of thought. To interpret Charlie’s Problem only as humour would therefore be to miss its philosophical ambition. Beneath its laughter runs a meditation on knowledge, culpability, and repair. The book’s recurring moral insight is that folly is not the opposite of wisdom but its apprenticeship. Each episode ends not with despair but with restoration through laughter—the recognition that self-exposure, however embarrassing, is the first step toward truth. (shrink)

This chapter considers the literature associated with explorations of consciousness in Indian philosophy. It focuses on a range of methodological and conceptual issues, drawing on three main sources: the naturalist theories of mind of Nyaya and Vaisesika, the mainly phenomenological accounts of mental activity and consciousness of Abhidharma and Yogacara Buddhism, and the subjective transcendental theory of consciousness of Advaita Vedanta. The contributions of Indian philosophers to the study of consciousness are examined not simply as a contribution to intellectual history, (...) but rather with a view to evaluating their relevance to contemporary issues, specifically to the mind-body problem. The presence of dualist positions with strong naturalist undercurrents in Indian philosophy, especially in the Nyaya and Samkhya traditions, rules out the possibility of treating the mind-body problem as an idiosyncratic feature of Cartesian metaphysics. (shrink)