Term
| I realized that it was necessary, once in the course of my life, to demolish everything completely and start again right from the foundations if I wanted to establish anything at all in the sciences that was stable and likely to last |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 1: Concerning Those Things Than Can Be Called Into Doubt |
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Term
| Reason now leads me to think that I should hold back my assent from opinions which are not completely certain and indubitable just as carefully as I do from those which are patently false. So, for the purpose of rejecting all my opinions, it will be enough if I find in each of them at least some reason for doubt |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 1: Concerning Those Things Than Can Be Called Into Doubt |
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Term
| Whatever I have up till now accepted as most true I have acquired either from the senses or through the senses. But from time to time I have found that the senses deceive, and it is prudent never to trust completely those who have deceived us even once |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 1: Concerning Those Things Than Can Be Called Into Doubt |
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Term
| I will suppose then, that everything I see is spurious. I will believe that my memory tells me lies, and that none of the things that it reports ever happened. I have no senses. Body, shape, extension, movement and place are chimeras. So what remains true? Perhaps just the one fact that nothing is certain |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 1: Concerning Those Things Than Can Be Called Into Doubt |
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Term
| But what then am I? A thing that thinks. What is that? A thing that doubts, understands, affirms, denies, is willing, is unwilling, and also imagines and [seems to have] sensory perceptions |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 2: Concerning the Nature of the Human Mind: That it is better Known than the body |
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Term
| I cannot stop thinking this – that the corporeal things of which images are formed in my thought, and which the senses investigate, are known with much more distinctness than this puzzling ‘I’ which cannot be pictured in the imagination. And yet it is surely surprising that I should have a more distinct grasp of things which I realize are doubtful, unknown and foreign to me, than I have of that which is true and known – my own self |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 2: Concerning the Nature of the Human Mind: That it is better Known than the body |
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Term
| I now know that even bodies are not strictly perceived by the senses or the faculty of imagination but by the intellect alone, and that this perception derives not from their being touched or seen but from their being understood; and in view of this I know plainly that I can achieve an easier and more evident perception of my own mind than of anything else |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 2: Concerning the Nature of the Human Mind: That it is better Known than the body |
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Term
| In this first item of knowledge there is simply a clear and distinct perception of what I am asserting…. So I now seem to be able to lay it down as a general rule that whatever I perceive very clearly and distinctly is true |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, that He Exists |
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Term
| I must examine whether there is a God, and, if there is, whether he can be a deceiver. For if I do not know this, it seems that I can never be quite certain about anything else |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, That He Exists |
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Term
| Thus the only remaining thoughts where I must be on my guard against making a mistake are judgments. And the chief and most common mistake which is to be found here consists in my judging that the ideas which are in me resemble, or conform to, things located outside me |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, That He Exists |
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Term
| I feel the heat whether I want to or not, and this is why I think that this sensation or idea of heat comes to me from something other than myself, namely the heat of the fire by which I am sitting. And the most obvious judgment for me to make is that the thing in question transmits to me its own likeness rather than something else |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, That He Exists |
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Term
| If the objective reality of any of my ideas turns out to be so great that I am sure the same reality does not reside in me, either formally or eminently, and hence that I myself cannot be its cause, it will necessarily follow that I am not alone in the world, but that some other thing which is the cause of this idea also exists. But if no such idea is to be found in me, I shall have no argument to convince me of the existence of anything apart from myself |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, That He Exists |
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Term
| So there remains only the idea of God; and I must consider whether there is anything in the idea which could not have originated in myself |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, that He Exists |
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Term
| All these attributes are such that, the more carefully I concentrate on them, the less possible it seems that they could have originated from me alone. So from what has been said it must be concluded that God necessarily exists |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, That He Exists |
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Term
| it must be concluded that the mere fact that I exist and have within me an idea of a most perfect being, that is, God, provides a very clear proof that God indeed exists |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 3: Concerning God, that He Exists |
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Term
| And since God does not wish to deceive me, he surely did not give me the kind of faculty which would ever enable me to go wrong while using it correctly. There would be no further doubt on this issue were it not that what I have just said appears to imply that I am incapable of ever going wrong. For if everything that is in me comes from God, and he did not endow me with a faculty for making mistakes, it appears that I can never go wrong |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 4: Concerning the True and the False |
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Term
| I realize that I am, as it were, something intermediate between God and nothingness or between supreme being and non-being: my nature is such that in so far as I was created by the supreme being, there is nothing in me to enable me to go wrong or lead me astray; but in so far as I participate in nothingness or non-being, that is, in so far as I am not myself the supreme being and am lacking in countless respects, it is no wonder that I make mistakes. I understand, then, that error as such is not something real which depends on God, but merely a defect. Hence my going wrong does not require me to have a faculty specially bestowed on me by God; it simply happens as a result of the fact that the faculty of true judgment which I have from God is in my case not infinite |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 4: Concerning the True and the False |
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Term
| From these considerations I perceive that the power of willing which I received from God is not, when considered in itself, the cause of my mistakes for it is both extremely ample and also perfect of its kind. Nor is my power of understanding to blame; for since my understanding comes from God, everything that I understand I undoubtedly understand correctly, and any error here is impossible. So what then is the source of my mistakes? It must be simply this: the scope of the will is wider than that of the intellect; but instead of restricting [my will] within the same limits, I extend its use to matters which I do not understand |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 4: Concerning the True and the False |
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Term
| If, however, I simply refrain from making a judgment in cases where I do not perceive the truth with sufficient clarity and distinctness, then it is clear that I am behaving correctly and avoiding error |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditations on the First Philosophy, Meditation 4: Concerning the True and the False |
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Term
| For it is surely no imperfection in God that he has given me the freedom to assent or not to assent in those cases where he did not endow my intellect with a clear and distinct perception; but it is undoubtedly an imperfection in me to misuse that freedom and make judgments about matters which I do not fully understand |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditations on the First Philosophy, Meditation 4: Concerning the True and the False |
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Term
| when the mind understands, it in some way turns towards itself and inspects one of the ideas which are within it; but when it imagines, it turns towards the body and looks at something in the body which conforms to an idea understood by the mind or perceived by the senses |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditations on the First Philosophy, Meditation 6: Concerning the Existence of Material Things, and the Real Distinction between Mind and Body |
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Term
| I know that everything which I clearly and distinctly understand is capable of being created by God so as to correspond exactly with my understanding of it. Hence the fact that I can clearly and distinctly understand one thing apart from another is enough to make me certain that the two things are distinct…. I have a clear and distinct idea of myself, in so far as I am simply a thinking, non-extended thing; and on the other hand I have a distinct idea of body, in so far as this is simply an extended, non-thinking thing. And accordingly, it is certain that I am really distinct from my body |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditation on the First Philosophy, Meditation 6: Concerning the Existence of Material Things, and the Real Distinction between Mind and Body |
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Term
| But since God is not a deceiver, it is quite clear that he does not transmit the ideas to me either directly from himself, or indirectly…. For God has given me no faculty at all for recognizing any such source for these ideas; on the contrary, he has given me a great propensity to believe that they are produced by corporeal things. So I do not see how God could be understood to be anything but a deceiver if the ideas were transmitted from a source other than corporeal things. It follows that corporeal things exist. They may not all exist in a way that exactly corresponds with my sensory grasp of them, for in many cases the grasp of the senses is very obscure and confused. But at least they possess all the properties which I clearly and distinctly understand |
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Definition
| Descartes, Meditations on the First Philosophy, Mediation 6: Concerning the Existence of Material Things, and the Real Distinction between Mind and Body |
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