René Descartes is the founder of rationalism as a special direction in the philosophy of the New Age, one of the greatest mathematicians and physicists of his era. He was born in 1596 in the city of La Haye (province of Touraine) into a noble family. He studied at the Jesuit college of La Flèche, then at the University of Poitiers. Scholastic teaching did not satisfy the young Descartes: the knowledge he received seemed insufficient to him, and in large part, questionable. “That is why, as soon as age allowed me to get out of submission to my teachers, I completely abandoned book studies and decided to seek only that science that I could find in myself or in the great book of the world” (1.1, 255). He goes to Holland and enters military service there.
Subsequently, he went to Germany and transferred to serve in the Bavarian army. For several years, he was a participant in the events associated with the course of the famous Thirty Years’ War. But ultimately, the desire to continue scientific studies prompted Descartes to leave military service. He made a long journey to Italy, then spent several years in France and, finally, settled in Holland, believing that a solitary life in this country would provide him with the most favorable conditions for improving his scientific knowledge. He spent twenty years in Holland and wrote his most important works: “Discourse on Method” (1637), “Meditations on First Philosophy” (1641), “Principles of Philosophy” (1644). Descartes spent the last few months of his life in Stockholm, where he arrived at the invitation of Queen Christina to participate in the organization of the Swedish Academy of Sciences. Descartes died in 1650.
The doctrine of method. Descartes was convinced of the unity of scientific knowledge. “All sciences are so interconnected that it is much easier to study them all at once than to separate one from the others… for they are all interconnected and dependent on one another” (1: 1, 79). Just as in geometry long chains of proofs and conclusions are interconnected, so all scientific knowledge in general that the human mind is capable of finding could well be built in the form of an extensive series of necessary inferences. Objects of knowledge can be arranged in a certain sequence corresponding to the order of their correct study. For Descartes, mathematics is a model that other disciplines should follow. He says that there should be a “universal mathematics” that includes not only arithmetic and geometry, but also all those branches of knowledge within which “order or measure” are studied. Objects subject to “order and measure” can be very diverse, while the method of studying them is quite universal. Descartes insists that “method is necessary to discover the truth of things” (1:1, 85). He condemns the “disorderly pursuits” of those scholars who rely on luck without any reliable system to guide them. Of course, such people can make accidental discoveries, but for the most part they are engaged in “reckless” wanderings and “obscure reflections.” According to Descartes, the world is entirely knowable, “penetrable” to the human mind—provided, of course, that people use the correct method of investigation. “There can be no truths so remote that they are unattainable, nor so hidden that they cannot be discovered” (1:1, 261). By comprehending the essence of things, man can express his knowledge of them in a complete, final form: “there is only one truth concerning each thing, and whoever has found it knows all that can be known about it” (1:1, 262).
Since all scientific truths are interconnected, special significance belongs to the “first principles” of human knowledge, which constitute the subject of study of a separate discipline – metaphysics (“first philosophy”). The previous metaphysics, according to Descartes, was not a real science. In his opinion, endless disputes among philosophers can serve as proof of this. All provisions of existing metaphysics are questionable, because they do not have the reliability that would convince all philosophers. Different judgments of thinkers on the same subjects indicate that the majority, and even all the disputing parties, were wrong (after all, there can only be one true opinion). In this regard, he likens philosophers of the past to travelers who left the main road for narrow paths and got lost there “among thorns and cliffs.” Descartes connects the failure of the previous metaphysics with the fact that philosophers did not use the true method of studying things. The French thinker is particularly sharp in his criticism of the dominant “school philosophy” – scholastic Aristotelianism. In his opinion, the falsity of Aristotle’s philosophy follows from the fact that over the course of many centuries of its teaching, it marked time, without advancing human knowledge. Aristotle’s followers always used unclear “distinctions and principles”, unjustifiably claiming knowledge of everything.
The new philosophy, according to Descartes, should bring man power over nature (in this matter he fully agrees with F. Bacon). “Instead of the speculative philosophy taught in schools, it is possible to create a practical one, with the help of which, knowing the power and action of fire, water, air, stars, heavens and all other bodies around us… we could… thus become, as it were, lords and masters of nature” (1:1, 286).
Thus, the true method will allow us to adequately understand nature, as well as to gain power over it. Descartes’ method is rationalistic. The essence of things can be comprehended by reason, but not by the senses. To substantiate this thesis, Descartes gives an example with wax. Wax is one of those material objects that, as it seems to us, are perceived by the senses quite clearly. When taken out of a honeycomb, a piece of wax seems cold, white, with clear outlines, and smelling of honey. However, it is enough to bring this wax to the fire and all of these properties disappear – it becomes liquid, hot, loses its color and the smell of honey, and loses its former outlines. Of course, heating does not destroy the essence of a thing: wax remains wax. But if all of its sensory-perceived qualities have changed, this means that its essence is not connected with them and, therefore, it is inaccessible to human senses. The essence of wax, like that of any material object, is extension, and only our reason tells us about it. Clear knowledge of reason always gives more reliable information than the senses; for example, people see the sun well, but only thanks to reason do they know that its dimensions are significantly larger than those suggested by sensory perception. Rejecting the famous principle of the supporters of empiricism, “there is nothing in the mind that was not previously in the senses,” Descartes refers to the fact that the ideas of God and the soul could not be taken from sensory experience.
Descartes distinguishes two “actions of reason” by which true knowledge of things is achieved. These actions are intuition and deduction. “By intuition I do not mean the uncertain testimony of the senses, nor the deceptive judgment of an incorrectly formed imagination, but the understanding of a clear and attentive mind, so easy and distinct that no doubt remains at all about what we understand” (1: 1, 84). Thus, we are talking about intellectual intuition, which is characterized by simplicity and self-evidence. Deduction consists in the “artful deduction of knowledge. According to Descartes, deduction differs from intuition in two respects. Firstly, deduction presupposes a certain sequence, a movement of concepts, which is never characteristic of intuition. Secondly, deduction does not require immediate evidence, without which intuition is impossible. The chain of deductive reasoning can “borrow” evidence from memory, which will easily confirm the reliability of the results in relation to each individual link of this chain. A correctly constructed deduction never gives erroneous conclusions. In addition, when solving any scientific problem, there is always only one shortest and most effective way to construct a deduction. The initial principles of human knowledge can be comprehended by intuition, their most distant consequences – only by deduction. In general, the entire system of scientific knowledge is a certain sequence of intuitions and deductions. True knowledge must be clearly discerned or reliably deduced.
The French thinker said that previous metaphysicians often used the rules of formal logic as a method of research. In his opinion, such a path could not bring success – the rules of logic are suitable mainly for transmitting already known knowledge to other people. In addition, these rules often turned out to be a valuable means in the hands of pseudo-scientists to “reason senselessly” about those things that they did not understand at all. In general, “although logic does indeed contain many very true and good rules, so many harmful and superfluous ones are mixed with them that separating them from the latter is almost as difficult as extracting Diana or Minerva from a piece of rough marble” (1:1, 260). In place of the numerous rules of scholastic logic, he proposes to establish a small number of true, truly useful principles of method. Defining the method as a set of reliable rules that allow one to establish the truth and expand scientific knowledge, Descartes puts forward four rules of method:
1) consider as true only what is obvious, i.e. clearly and distinctly perceived by the human mind;
2) divide a difficult theoretical problem into as many parts as are necessary to solve it;
3) adhere to a strict order of research, moving from simple subjects to knowledge of complex ones;
4) to compile general overviews and complete lists – to eliminate omissions during the study of a particular issue (as well as to give completeness to the entire science).
According to Descartes, the true method explains how to use the intuition of the mind correctly, without making mistakes (the first rule), and also how to correctly construct deductive conclusions. Since intuition and deduction are the most reliable means of finding the truth, the method formulated must be “the most perfect.”
Establishing the first rule as a criterion of truth, clarity and distinctness of ideas, Descartes explains: “I call clear perception that which is clearly revealed to the mind that listens… Distinct I call that perception which, being clear, is so clearly separated from all other perceptions that it does not contain any admixture of the unclear” (1: 1, 332). In his opinion, the perception of the mind can be clear without being distinct, but not vice versa.
Descartes’ method required the exclusion of any probable and “plausible” knowledge from the composition of science. In his opinion, real science should consist only of reliable and indubitable positions, otherwise it is easy to fall into error.
The French thinker defines the subject of philosophy quite broadly: “all philosophy is like a tree whose roots are metaphysics, its trunk is physics, and the branches coming from this trunk are all the other sciences, which can be reduced to three main ones: medicine, mechanics, and ethics” (1:1, 309). Metaphysics is the foundation of the entire system of human knowledge: the fact that it could not become a science for a long time prevented the fruitful development of other disciplines. Descartes believed that this situation could be corrected with the help of a true method that would finally allow us to build a scientific metaphysics. Since scientific knowledge is a certain system of interconnected provisions, metaphysics must be built on the basis of the initial principles, the criteria of which are: a) clarity and self-evidence, b) dependence of all other knowledge on them.
It is important to note that Descartes did not deny the need to use sensory experience in the process of scientific knowledge. Of course, from his point of view, the essence of things is revealed only to reason, but experience is also of great importance for philosophy. “As for experiments, I have noticed that they are all the more necessary the further we advance in knowledge” (1:1, 287). In constructing metaphysics, one should rely on the means at the disposal of reason. The data of metaphysics allow us to draw basic conclusions regarding the structure of the physical world. Furthermore, the more specific a particular scientific discipline becomes, the greater the role played by external experience. Experience is necessary to distinguish “the forms and types of bodies” that actually exist on Earth from those that could only be on it. With the help of deduction, one can obtain an excessive variety of particular consequences, and in order to identify those of them that are related to our earthly world, one must use “numerous experiments.”
Metaphysics. Its task is to establish the “basic principles” of human knowledge. In fact, Descartes’ metaphysics includes consideration of the problems of ontology and epistemology.
Descartes begins the construction of metaphysics by applying the procedure of doubt. “A man who investigates the truth must doubt all things at least once in his life” (1: 1, 314). He identifies several grounds for such doubt. First of all, he notes that in childhood people learn judgments about things before they achieve “full possession” of reason. This is where a variety of prejudices and false opinions originate. Further, one can doubt the existence of sensory things, since we know very well that the senses sometimes deceive us (for example, towers seem round from afar, but often turn out to be square when viewed from close up, etc.). Of course, it would be too imprudent to trust something that has misled us at least once. In addition, in a dream people seem to perceive various things, but upon waking they understand that such objects did not actually exist. To a person who doubts the things of the senses on this basis, it might well seem that “no signs are given by which he can reliably distinguish the state of sleep from that of wakefulness” (1:1, 315). Finally, even mathematical proofs, which always seem to be the most reliable knowledge available to man, can also be called into question. After all, there are people who make mistakes in solving problems in the field of arithmetic and geometry. Even more important in this case is the fact that we have heard about the existence of an omnipotent God. It is quite possible to suppose that God could have created people who are constantly and completely mistaken. True, many believe that God is a good being, and therefore the creation of people who are always mistaken would be in conflict with his good nature. But where is the guarantee that God does not at least sometimes deliberately cause people to make mistakes? Moreover, even if we accept the wise God as the source of truth, it may turn out that there is another, very powerful and at the same time “evil genius” that constantly misleads man. These are the reasons that give reason to doubt the knowledge acquired by man. Descartes emphasizes that this doubt should extend only to the area of theoretical knowledge, but not to the sphere of practical human behavior. The procedure of doubt has a limited application, its purpose is to facilitate the search for scientific truth. Doubt is not important in itself, it does not lead to absolute skepticism, its goal is “to achieve certainty and, casting aside the shifting sediments and sands, to find solid ground” (1:1, 266).
Descartes overcomes doubt by pointing out that it would be absurd to consider something thinking as non-existent precisely at the time when it thinks. Therefore, the basis of human knowledge is the “first and most certain” proposition: “I think, therefore I exist.” From this, Descartes concludes that the soul exists. The absence of any properties is characteristic only of non-existence; thinking is a property, and if it exists (and this is proven at least by the doubts experienced), then there must also exist a certain bearer of this property, a certain thing, a real ontological object. This bearer of thinking is the soul; the human I is a “thinking thing.”
Thinking is not just one of the characteristics of the soul, it is its essential property: “I am, I exist – this is obvious. But how long have I existed? As long as I think” (1: 2, 23). The soul thinks constantly, although this thinking is not always clear. Descartes interprets thinking quite broadly: “By the word “thinking” I understand everything that happens in us consciously, insofar as we understand it. Thus, not only to understand, to will, to imagine, but also to feel is the same as thinking” (1: 1, 316). He distinguishes two main modes of thinking: the perception of reason and the action of the will. Other manifestations of thinking are reduced to these two: imagination, feeling, reasoning are varieties of the action of reason, and desire, doubt, affirmation and denial are varieties of the action of the will. (Thus, feelings and reason, opposed to each other within the framework of the doctrine of method, turn out to be different levels of mental activity. In the “Principles of Philosophy” both of these levels – “feeling” and “reasoning” – are covered by the broad designation “perception of reason.”)
Having considered the question of the existence of the soul, the French thinker moves on to the problem of the existence of God. In his opinion, before reasoning about the world, it is necessary to establish whether God exists and whether he created people in such a way that they would always make mistakes. In this sense, the knowledge of external things depends on the knowledge of God. Descartes defends the ontological proof of the existence of God. The existence of God follows from the idea of him, present in the mind of man. In the human mind there can be no ideas that do not have their own – external or internal – prototype. But the idea of God, or an all-perfect being, cannot have any prototype within man. Man is a very imperfect being, not at all possessing those characteristics that are associated with the idea of God. This means that the idea of an all-perfect being is not formed by us ourselves (after all, more perfect is not a consequence of less perfect). Thus, there must be an external prototype of the idea of God in relation to man, who would possess all the perfections associated with the said idea. This external prototype is God. To a possible objection: there is no single prototype of the idea of God, but a multitude of things by which we learn about perfections, which we then combine into the idea of an omnipotent being, Descartes replied that the signs of perfection are uniformity and simplicity, therefore the prototype of the idea of an all-perfect object can only be one. He formulates the ontological argument in another way: the idea of an all-perfect being contains the “perception of the necessity” of God’s existence. It is absurd to think of an all-perfect being as devoid of existence (one of the perfections). Just as the idea of a mountain can only be formed together with the idea of a valley, so God can only be thought of as existing. “From the fact that we cannot think of God without existence, it follows that existence is inseparable from him, and therefore he really exists” (1:2, 54). According to Descartes, the ontological proof of God’s existence is as reliable as geometric truths. By turning to the idea of an all-perfect being, a person can, according to the French thinker, learn the divine attributes. God is an infinite, omniscient, omnipotent, eternal thinking being, “the source of all truth and justice, the creator of all things” (1:1, 323). God is a spiritual being (materiality is associated with divisibility, which is imperfection). In addition, God is not like a man: he has no feelings (after all, sensation is a kind of “suffering,” a sign of dependence). Since God is the source of truth, he cannot intentionally mislead people, be a “deceiver.” God has given man the ability to know, the “natural light” of reason, so everything perceived by the mind clearly and distinctly will always be true. Thus, clear and distinct ideas are true precisely because of the existence of God (in this matter, Descartes’ methodology is closely connected with his metaphysics).
The knowledge gained about the existence and properties of God must be used, according to Descartes, to prove the existence of the external material world. The starting point of this proof is an appeal to the data of consciousness. In his mind, man discovers many perceptions independent of his will; they are “compulsory,” he has no power to avoid them, therefore, they come from a cause external to consciousness. We perceive this external cause, which affects our senses, as extended matter, the parts of which have various movements and forms. Of course, one could assume that the real cause of these forced perceptions is not matter at all, but, for example, God, or some other external entity unknown to us. But such an assumption contradicts the previously established principle: God cannot be a deceiver. It is certain that “we apprehend this matter as a thing distinct both from God and from our thought, and it seems to us that the idea which we have of it is formed in us in relation to the things of the external world, to which it is entirely similar” (1:1, 349). If God is not a deceiver, then neither he himself nor any other external cause, with the exception of matter, can cause the above-mentioned perceptions.
Thus, there are three types of ontological objects in the world: matter, God, and souls. Descartes defines substance as “a thing that exists without needing another thing for its being” (1:1, 334). Any substance has one specific attribute (an attribute is a basic property that constitutes the essence of a substance). The attribute of a spiritual substance is thinking, and of a material substance it is extension in length, width, and depth. According to Descartes, a person can easily form two clear and distinct ideas: a created thinking substance and a created extended substance (in connection with this, researchers often call his metaphysics dualistic). At the same time, we should not forget that in addition to the created, there is also an uncreated thinking substance, i.e. God. Moreover, as Descartes explains, the concept of substance is “ambiguously” applied to God and his creations. In the full sense of the word, only God does not need anything else for his existence. Created substances (spirit and matter) do not need any other created thing for their existence, but they are still dependent on God.
Considering the problems of epistemology within the framework of his metaphysics, Descartes devotes considerable attention to the question of the origin of errors. In his opinion, “falsehood as such… can be found only in judgments” (1:2,37). Moreover, an error is a lack of knowledge, its incompleteness. The general cause of human errors is free will. According to the French philosopher, every judgment combines the actions of reason and will. Reason perceives this or that thing, while the will expresses affirmation or denial in relation to what is perceived. Will, or freedom of choice, “consists only in the fact… that we relate to things presented to us by the intellect, so that we affirm or deny them, seek them or avoid them, in such a way that we do not feel any external compulsion to these actions” (1:2,47). Errors arise because the will is “larger” than the mind: by extending one’s will to things not perceived clearly and distinctly, a person easily falls into error. Thus, errors are the result of a person’s incorrect use of his freedom of choice.
The French thinker distinguished three types of ideas that a person encounters during the cognitive process. “Of these ideas, some seem to me innate, others acquired, and others formed by myself; for my understanding of what a thing is, what is truth, and what is thought, comes, apparently, exclusively from my very nature; but the fact that I hear a noise or see the sun, feel a fire – this, as I have judged until now, comes from some things that are outside of me; finally, sirens, hippogriffs, and the like are invented by me myself” (1: 2, 31). It should be noted that innate ideas, according to Descartes, are not at all present in a finished, clear form already in the mind of an infant, initially they are rather “sprouts of truths”, some potentials that can clearly manifest themselves under certain conditions.
In analyzing the problem of universals, Descartes states that universal concepts are creations of the mind, they are not present in the things themselves. Universals are formed by the mind on the basis of the similarity of individual things.
Descartes insisted on the subjectivity of sensory qualities – colors, tastes, smells, etc. (continuing in this matter the line of reasoning of Democritus and Galileo, anticipating Locke’s formulation of the problem of primary and secondary qualities). Size, figure, movement, number – qualities that really exist in objects and can be adequately comprehended by us. Colors, tastes, smells – are subjective, there is no reason to consider these qualities to be in the objects themselves, they characterize the way of human perception of material objects.
Physics. This is the science of material things (or nature). The most important provisions of physics are determined by metaphysics, namely the doctrine that the essence of a material substance is extension. The main feature of Descartes’ physics is its mechanism. He reduces all changes in the natural world to the spatial movement of material particles. Being extended, matter is divisible, hence the ability to assume various states due to the movement of its parts.
The material universe is infinite (indefinitely large), since even if we assume its boundaries, we must admit that beyond them there will be some space, i.e. some extension, in other words, matter. Descartes claimed that there is only one world. There cannot be many worlds, since even assuming the opposite, we must agree that each of these worlds would consist of matter. Since the essence of matter is always the same (extension), then all these imaginary worlds would be encompassed by the same matter, i.e., they would belong to the same universe.
The French thinker denied the existence of emptiness: admitting empty space, one has to accept a certain extension as a characteristic of this space, and where there is extension, there is always a material substance (i.e. there is no emptiness). He also rejected the existence of atoms (indivisible bodies): every part of matter has a certain extension, therefore, it is divisible; there can be no indivisible elements. Denying the atomic theory, Descartes accepts the corpuscular theory. In his opinion, the bodies we see are composed of particles inaccessible to sensory perception. These particles are corpuscles, divisible to infinity (which is how they differ from atoms). Substantiating the thesis on the existence of the smallest corpuscles, he considers the process of tree growth. It is impossible to understand how a tree increases in size unless we assume that it grows by adding some particles. Since we do not directly observe these particles, it remains to conclude that their sizes are extremely small. Corpuscles have mechanical and geometric properties: shapes, sizes, movements.
Descartes puts forward a unique cosmogonic hypothesis: having created the world, God did not give it a finished, harmonious form. The created matter was initially in a chaotic state. God communicated unchanging laws of motion to this created matter, and then nature, obeying these laws, without any miracles, comes to an ordered state. As a result of the movement of material particles, the “tangled and unimaginable” chaos is gradually replaced by “beautiful” order. The universe acquires the familiar, “perfect” appearance: matter is distributed in it, forming star systems, which include planets. Each star turns out to be the center of a kind of vortex of particles moving around it; there are many such vortices in the universe. It should be noted that it was Descartes’ cosmogonic hypothesis that gave many researchers the reason to classify this French thinker as a representative of deism.
Descartes reduces the laws of mechanical motion communicated to the world by God to three basic ones. The first law states that any body will retain its inherent state until it is changed by external influence. In the absence of influence from external forces, a particle will never decrease in size, will not change its shape, and will remain motionless if it is at rest. The second law states that any moving thing will strive to move in a straight line. The visible movement of a huge number of bodies in a curved line is explained by the fact that these bodies experience the influence of other material objects. This second law, according to the French thinker, is confirmed, for example, when observing a rotating wheel: if one of its parts breaks off, it will move in a straight line, not in a circle. Finally, the third law states that “if a moving body meets another, stronger body, it loses nothing in its motion; if it meets a weaker one, which it can move, then it loses as much motion as it communicates” (1: 1, 371). This law, according to Descartes, is confirmed by all experiments in which the stop and motion of bodies caused by collisions with other bodies are observed. The French philosopher distinguished three main forms of matter, three “elements of the visible world”. Visible bodies consist of particles of fire, air and earth. Particles of fire are the smallest and fastest, particles of air are larger and slower, and particles of earth are the least mobile and most massive. The sun and stars are composed of the element of fire, the “heavens” are composed of the element of air, and the Earth, planets and comets are composed of the third element. Distinguishing the “elements of the visible world”, Descartes refers to the laws of light propagation in the universe: stars emit light, “the heavens transmit it”, and planets reflect it. These are the three “main parts” of the Universe. Particles of the three elements mix on the surface of the Earth, but the third element always predominates here.
The doctrine of man. Man consists of two principles: soul and body. The human body, considered in isolation, without its connection with the soul, is a mechanism in which bones, nerves and muscles function instead of wheels and plumb lines. The actions of the body, not guided by the soul, are as necessary as the movement of the clock hand, caused by weights and wheels. The presence of a rational soul, according to Descartes, is precisely what distinguishes man from animals. Animals are machines consisting of arteries, veins, bones, etc. The proof of this, according to the French philosopher, is the absence of speech in them. After all, speech is a “reliable sign” of thinking, therefore, the absence of speech indicates the absence of a rational soul.
In examining the problem of the connection between soul and body in man, Descartes states that the fact of interaction between these two dissimilar principles is fully proven by our reliable experience. To explain the mechanism of this interaction, he refers to the pineal gland and “animal spirits.” Although the soul is in some way “connected with the whole body,” its activity is directly and primarily realized only in one place – in the part of the brain where the pineal gland is located. The rest of the brain, like the heart, cannot be considered a privileged place where the activity of the soul is most strongly manifested. Justifying the thesis about the special relationship of the pineal gland with the soul, Descartes refers to the fact that all other parts of the brain, as well as the sense organs, “are paired.” Due to this, we should receive a double image from any object, but if the soul has not two thoughts about an object, but only one, then there is an organ where two impressions seem to be combined into one. But it is impossible to imagine another such place in the human body, besides the pineal gland. “Animal spirits” are the smallest particles of blood circulating from the heart to the brain and further – through the nerves to the muscles. When passing through the brain, “animal spirits” produce various vibrations of the pineal gland, thus influencing the soul. In addition, the soul itself can cause peculiar vibrations in the pineal gland. In this case, it determines the direction of movement of the “animal spirits”, they cause contractions of certain muscles, and thus the soul influences the actions of the body. Descartes’ proposed solution to the problem of the interaction of the spiritual and the physical has caused numerous disputes and refutations. Indeed, this solution seems completely unsatisfactory, taking into account Descartes’ teaching on the qualitative difference between spiritual and physical substances. It remains unclear and doubtful how the material gland could be connected with the non-spatial soul.
By establishing the “absolute difference” between the soul and the body, Descartes says that this difference inclines one to the conclusion that the soul is immortal. The body is divisible, the soul is indivisible. The body does not think, the soul has no extension. If the body and the soul are opposite in nature, then the death of the body should not lead to the destruction of the soul. According to the French thinker, it is impossible to find natural causes that could cause the destruction of the soul after the death of the body. (True, he states that for God, of course, everything is possible, including interrupting the existence of the soul, therefore, “natural reason” cannot provide absolutely complete proof of its immortality. However, within the framework of “natural philosophy”, it would still be more correct to adhere to the conclusion about its immortality) In general, “the mind does not represent some kind of combination of accidents, but is a pure substance … and as for the human body, it changes at least because some of its parts are subject to change in shape. From this it follows that the body perishes very easily, but the mind by its very nature is immortal” (1:2, 13).
Moral Rules. In his Discourse on Method, the French philosopher says that he has drawn up moral rules for himself, which he has sought to follow in practice. In the Principles of Philosophy, he calls for being guided by these rules of his ethics, “until they know of a better one.” These rules are as follows: “First, to obey the laws and customs of my country, steadfastly adhering to the religion in which, by the grace of God, I have been brought up from childhood” (1:1, 263). In this case, one must rely on the most “moderate” of the common opinions – they are the most useful in practice. Secondly, Descartes calls for being constant in one’s actions, consistently being guided by those opinions that we have accepted as true. “My third rule was always to strive to conquer myself rather than fate, to change my desires rather than the order of the world” (1:1, 264). The ancient sages saw that man has only his thoughts in complete control, that it is useless to strive beyond the limits “prescribed by nature” and that true blessings are in the soul; in this way they achieved happiness. Finally, the French thinker speaks of the need to improve the mind, which is accomplished through the knowledge of truth. Virtues are connected with true knowledge: correct judgments give rise to correct actions. Considering the given rules, the absence of any political theory in Descartes’ system becomes quite understandable: in his opinion, the imperfect course of public affairs is much “easier to bear than their changes.”
Descartes’ teaching had a significant impact on the further development of both philosophy and science. His ideas influenced the formation of Spinoza’s worldview. The Cartesians (followers of Descartes) were Deroy, Reneri, Fontenelle, Clauberg, Becker, Regis, Rogo, Tschirnhausen, Borelli, Stenon, Laforge, Cordemoy, Arnauld, Nicole, Geulincx, Malebranche. Descartes’ physics is one of the theoretical sources of enlightenment philosophy. The influence of Descartes’ various ideas in one form or another can be traced in almost all the great systems of rationalistic philosophy of the New Age.
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