I agree that the will is problematic in ways that Descartes does not acknowledge. This is why he argues for willfully setting limits to the will. What...
Descartes describes the will in two ways - a) freedom of choice, b) the ability to do or not do something. The shift from the former to the latter is ...
I think historians present the wrong picture when they set Descartes' rationalism against experimentation. Descartes was an experimental scientist wor...
A skeptic should be read skeptically. When Descartes claims that he is only a thinking thing we should be skeptical. What is he intentionally leaving ...
Although I had read Descartes before, I think it has more to do with developing interpretive skills. Reading between the lines of philosophers who wan...
Nah. I make it up as I go along. Seriously. Of course it is based on what is found in the text, but the connections are things I am working out as I w...
Natures: In the sixth meditation Descartes touches on the concept of nature: and: So, what is his own nature? On the one hand: but on the other: If na...
@"frank" For Aristotle to be is to persist. According to Joe Sachs' article "Aristotle: Metaphysics" in the IEP: On the face of it, Descartes rejects ...
With regard to the question of existence and dependence, in the third meditation Descartes says; This argument should be compared to one in the sixth ...
Toward the beginning of the fourth meditation Descartes claims: Why would Descartes claim that every moment of his existence depend on God? Is this ju...
Throughout the long history of the term there have been various things ascribed to "matter". By particular things I mean some of the things that are s...
As I understand it, he is saying that he wants his readers to become accustomed to his way of thinking before they sense what the consequences are. Th...
Good point. Limiting the will seems to be unnecessarily self-limiting. There is something else going on here. Descartes has a universal method for sol...
. At the end of the fourth meditation he says: He has within himself the ability to become more perfect by avoiding error. Note that he allows for deg...
I think we have gone about as far as we can with going over the same things again. I appreciate that despite our differences the discussion remained c...
I don't know how to go about looking for something that probably does not exist. That is why I keep returning to living things as the place to look fo...
We will have to agree to disagree on this as well. You might expect that. I don't expect that. The majority of the medical community does not expect t...
This is only part of it. You are leaving out important information that cannot be gained simply by looking at an arrangement of parts. An engine does ...
An engine is not an assemblage of found parts. The parts are designed and manufactured as parts of a whole. Even something as simple as a bolt cannot ...
Yes, I am aware of the claim. The third person report is first person. I'll leave it to them to tell you what they are eliminating and why. My great, ...
According to Aristotle biological beings are a single physical entity. There are no separate forms and hyle floating around waiting to be combined. Th...
The point is that reduction is only a part of the process. You cannot understand an engine if you do not understand the parts. That is the reductive p...
Getting someone to realize that they do not know something they think they know can be very productive. You have it backwards, it is not that physical...
It is not the analysis of the firing of nerve fibers but the actual firing of nerve fibers through stimulus that could cause a third person to report ...
I have not read enough of the information on information to have formed an informed concept. I agree that without physical processes there would be no...
Right, you have said that several times. But that is not something you know. Right. You are claiming that we can never provide a physical explanation....
I am simply saying that we should not deny the possibility. It is not a question of the "rightful investigator of the hard problem". The term is Chalm...
An object and a fact are two different things. No facts without subjects because facts are propositions. Objects are not. If, as you claim, we can't g...
And yet you quote Pinter making a claim about the mind-independent world The very notion of anything at all implies something having a notion. But exi...
Here is what I said, and your response: How does what I say differ from the hard problem as described by Chalmers? He concludes: If experience arises ...
Do you mean that the infinite is conceived by what is not infinite? If so, this is the opposite of what Descartes is claiming. Is there some equivocat...
Starting, as Descartes does, with doubt, what is first is that he exists. The reason he doubts is because he desires to find something certain and ind...
No. What appears in experience is not the object but the object as it appears. How it appears to me might be different from how it appears to you. How...
The expression, "sell the sizzle not the steak" comes to mind. Another is about men and big or fancy cars and compensating. Of course it depends on th...
I differential, as you did, between the thing I show to you and what will also appear in your experience. I can hold that thing and bring it to you, b...
Start by banning the philosophers. Seriously, general agreement, if and when it occurs, might be along the same lines as has occurred with animal cons...
Descartes' example of the wax is instructive. His senses do not yield a clear and distinct perception of the wax. In the second meditation he says: Cl...
Intelligence and consciousness are not the same. Suppose it gets to the point where there is general agreement that AI has become conscious. This woul...
There is a difference between a stone or mountain and phenomenal experience. By definition the phenomena occur within experience. The things shown and...
According to Aristotle, living beings, ousiai (substances is a misleading translation from the Latin) are formed matter. Form, eidos, and matter, hule...
In Chalmers own words, from "The Hard Problem of Consciousness": This example works against your claim. If I am anesthetized I do not dream. Signals i...
The question of why and how biological functions give rise to experience has everything to do with science! Blocking such inquiry because it does not ...
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