Essay Rene Descartess View on God - 1300 Words

Rene Descartess View on God In 1996, songwriter Joan Osborne performed a song called One of Us that was nominated for three Grammy Awards. What made this song so successful and interesting were the powerful lyrics that basically asked, What if God were a human being? As she was writing the lyrics to One of Us, she was wondering about God and how the world would be different if God did exist in real life and not just a supernatural force. You may be asking yourself, What does this have to do with the seventeenth century? Well, in the seventeenth century, there was a man, named Rene Descartes, who was interested in God and wondered about His existence. After an unforgettable night in November 10, 1619, his interest†¦show more content†¦This came after he discovered more than just the principles of a single science and realized the unity of all the science of all knowledge. During that night, he experienced three dreams he felt had been sent to him by the spirit of truth which had deigned to enlight en him as to the future (Vrooman 58). He believed that God revealed to Descartes his mission, which was to seek the unity of all truth, a universal science that had been symbolized by a dictionary in his dream. Thus, Descartes began his efforts to seek the truth to become a famous philosopher, mathematician, and scientist. He felt that all of this could not have happened if God had not inspired him during those three dreams. As the biographer Jack R. Vrooman writes, that in a span of a few hours, Descartes had moved from the discovery of the unity of the sciences, pass through various stages of enthusiasm and anguish, experienced the intuition of God, and begun the elaboration of a philosophy (63). Rene Descartes published a book called Discourse on the Method in 1637 in which he stated that Reason does not insist that whatever we see or imagine thus is a truth, but it tells us clearly that all of our ideas or notions must have some foundation of truth. For otherwise it could not be possible that God, who is all perfection and truth, should have placed them within us (Descartes 106). On the creation of the world he writes: It is much more probableShow MoreRelatedThe Dream Argument by Rene Descartes Essay1008 Words   |  5 PagesOne of Rene Descartes’s most famous arguments, from his not only from his first meditation but all of the meditations, is his Dream Argument. Descartes believes that there is no way to be able to distinguish being in awake from being in a state of dreaming. In fact you could actually be in a dream right now. Rene Descartes’s theory that one is unable distinguish being awake from dreaming, as interesting as it is, can be at times a little farfetched, along with a few contradictions to himself, Descartes’sRead MoreA Comparison Of Rene Descartes And The Matrix754 Words   |  4 Pagesof Which We May Doubt by Rene Descartes, there is a subtle difference in regards to being informed by others or seeking answers constantly yourself about what is real. The possibility for someone else controlling human reality has been around since 380 BC based on Plato’s Allegory of the Cave. Socrates and Glaucon are conversing about the prisoners who are restrained and can only look in the forward direction and nowhere else. Puppeteers are limiting the prisoner’s view to only the shadows fromRead MoreThe Views On The Senses, But At The Same Time1368 Words   |  6 PagesMichael Geathers Philosophy S. Yeng 10/2/15 The topic of paper will involve an in-depth discussion of two differing views on the senses, but at the same time. These two epistemological and ontological views have been discussed by French philosopher Rene Descartes and Greek philosopher, Socrates. The first view, where Socrates proposes that in understanding knowledge, the senses should not be of great importance to humanity. He instead believes that understanding the world of ideas is the theoryRead MoreAnalysis Of Rene Descartes s Meditations On First Philosophy1066 Words   |  5 Pagesanswers: what is reality? Among these writers were Renà ¨ Descartes and George Berkeley, who respectively argued that everything perceived must be real due to God being unable to deceive, and that the physical world only exists in one’s mind. In my view, it is not certain that the physical world is real, but one should act as if it is. Renà ¨ Descartes, in Meditations on First Philosophy, wrote each section after successive â€Å"meditations.† In Descartes’s first meditation, he claims it is unable to beRead MoreEnlightenment And Scientific Discovery Of The 17th Century1620 Words   |  7 PagesDuring the period of enlightenment and scientific discovery of the 17th century, differing concepts of the scientific method emerged. Amongst these, Renà © Descartes and Sir Isaac Newton had some of the more prominent ideologies. Through The Discourse On Method Descartes describes his rules for â€Å"discovering the truth†(Sherman. P.74) based on his mathematical background. Many of these are based on logical deductions and examining individual sections of a hypothesis to determine their truths. A few decadesRead MoreHow did Descartes Explain the Relationship between Mind and Body? 1092 Words   |  5 PagesSome of them believed that the mind-soul is something different from the body and each of them works by themselves without any interaction between them (Radner, 1971). The other point of view said that body and mind works together as a unity and mutually influences each other and the result is the human being. This view had been held by great figures like the Greek philosopher Aristotle and Aquinas (Radner, 1971). Who argued that there should be a connection between mind-soul and body, because only inRead MoreDescartes s Theory Of Skepticism And The Cogito1469 Words   |  6 Pages Descartes’s Project Rene Descartes was a philosopher that lived from 1596 to1650. In Meditations of First Philosophy, Descartes leaves the reader with two main themes: skepticism and the cogito. In this paper, I will be examining Descartes’s writings. Mainly, what Descartes’s project consisted of, skepticism, the arguments he gave as means to his project, and the cogito. In doing so I will explain how he left the reader with the two important philosophical notions of skepticism and cogito. TheRead MoreDescartes’ Arguments for the Real Distinction of Mind and Body1154 Words   |  5 Pagesnot think or pretend he had no mind, as merely having a doubt that he had a mind proves that he does. * The Argument from Clear and distinct understanding: Descartes argues that if two things can be separated even if only by god then they must be two different things. Descartes says that as he can perceive minds and bodies clearly and distinctly from each other they must be two separate things we just dont know how to separate them. Read MoreEssay about Rene Descartes Faith and Reason1292 Words   |  6 PagesRene Descartes Faith and Reason The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries witnessed a colossal transition in the scientific view of the universe. During this period a profound rethinking of scientific theory as well as moral and religious matters took place. Traditional ideas were reconsidered by religious thinkers. Philosophers began applying rational scientific thought to problems that they considered. The main concept of the Scientific Revolution was to question everything. The ScientificRead MoreThe Theory Of The Mind Body Dualism1232 Words   |  5 PagesRenà © Descartes was a French mathematician, scientist, and philosopher of the 16th Century, who, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, â€Å"was one of the first to abandon scholastic Aristotelianism and created the first version of the modern mind-body dualism or emotion† (Encyclopedia Britannica). Born on March 31, 1596, he was dubbed as the Father of Modern Philosophy. His theory on the mind-body dualism, also known as Cartesian Dualism, created a stem of the modern problem of the relationship between