Lawrence Nolan

The Ontological Status of Cartesian Natures

: 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’.

Cogito Ergo Sum

“I think, therefore I am” is the popularized formulation of Descartes’ famous cogito ergo sum (hereafter, “ cogito ”). The cogito s epistemological significance is supposed to derive from its status as an utterly self-evident truth – “the first and most certain of all to occur to anyone who philosophizes in an orderly way” (AT VIIIA 7, CSM I 195). “Orderly” philosophizing involves a program of methodic doubt – doubt resistance, or indubitability , being the central criterion of knowledge . Some texts express the cogito s underlying point in terms of doubt (itself a form of thinking): “It is not possible for us to doubt that we exist while we are doubting; and this is the first thing we come to know” (AT VIIIA 6f, CSM I 194). Barry Stroud (2010, 518) remarks that the cogito “is certainly among the most important and longest-lasting ingredients of Descartess legacy.” Though Descartes’ treatment of the cogito is historys most famous, it is arguably not the first. Augustine of Hippo presented a remarkably similar version of his own: “If I am mistaken, I exist” ( Si fallor, sum ). The differences in formulation are not insignificant. Lively debates persist concerning Descartes’ own formulation. The most serious debate about formulation concerns inference . Versions of the cogito appear in each of Descartes’ three main published philosophical works. The “canonical” formulation (as I shall call it) includes an explicit inference – “I am thinking, therefore [ ergo ] I exist.” This version appears in two of the works: the Discourse (1637) ( je pense, donc je suis ), and the Principles (1644) ( ego cogito, ergo sum ). However, Descartes’ masterpiece, the Meditations (1641), presents a rather different formulation. The formula there occurs early in the Second Meditation in the context of an effort to find an indubitable truth: “So after considering everything very thoroughly, I must finally conclude that this proposition, I am , I exist [ Ego sum, ego existo ], is necessarily true whenever it is put forward by me or conceived in my mind ” (AT VII 25, CSM II 17). Which of these represents Descartes’ official formulation? What follows are three main interpretive options. One option is a noninferential interpretation. The most influential account comes from Jaakko Hintikka, who argues that the cogito should be understood as a performative utterance.

Caterus, Johannes (Johan Kater or de Kater) (ca.1590–1655)

Johannes Kater (better known under his Latinized name Caterus) was probably born in Haarlem, around 1590. He enrolled at Leuven (Louvain) in 1620 to study theology. He returned to Holland as a secular priest, reporting himself as such (conforming to regulations) to the Amsterdam magistrate in January 1629. In 1632 he was elected to the Haarlem Chapter on condition of obtaining a doctorate in theology. Accordingly, he returned to Louvain in 1634 and obtained degrees in law and theology. In 1638 he became “archpriest” (some sort of dean) of Alkmaar to supervise all pastoral activities in the northern part of the Province of Holland. He was praised for his learning and piety as well as his zeal on behalf of the Catholic religion, which brought him several times in conflict with the civil authorities. Probably at the suggestion of two Haarlem priests, Joan Albert Bannius (1597–1644) and Augustinus Alstenius Bloemaert (ca.1585–1659), two friends of Descartes, who were also members of the Haarlem Chapter, Caterus became the author of the First Objections (see AT III 267, CSMK 164). There is no evidence that at that point Descartes knew Caterus personally, although there is nothing to exclude that possibility either. In any case, Descartes probably knew him somewhat later, because after 1642 he lived almost permanently at Egmond, which is within walking distance (eight kilometers) of Alkmaar. In the First Objections, Caterus concentrates on Descartes’ proofs of the existence of God , starting with the cosmological argument and the attendant notion of objective being (see being, formal versus objective ). According to Caterus, objective being is the thing insofar as it is thought or perceived, not a reality caused by that thing – an “ extrinsic denomination that adds nothing to the thing itself” (AT VII 92, CSM II 66–67). As a result, the causal principle does not apply. As for the second cosmological argument for Gods existence, which proceeds from the existence of the meditator who possesses the idea of God, Caterus agrees that if a thing is the cause of itself in the positive sense of the word, that is, if it is truly and fully the cause of itself, it would necessarily give itself all the perfections of which it has an idea.

The Cambridge Descartes Lexicon

Abbreviations List of figures Introduction and notes on how to use this book Acknowledgments Chronology Biography List of contributors Entries.

The Third Meditation

I will now shut my eyes, stop my ears, and withdraw all my senses. I will eliminate from my thoughts all images of bodily things, or rather, since this is hardly possible, I will regard all such images as vacuous, false and worthless. I will converse with myself and scrutinize myself more deeply; and in this way I will attempt to achieve, little by little, a more intimate knowledge of myself. I am a thing that thinks: that is, a thing that doubts, affirms, denies, understands a few things, is ignorant of many things, is willing, is unwilling, and also which imagines and has sensory perceptions; for as I have noted before, even though the objects of my sensory experience and imagination may have no existence outside me, nonetheless the modes of thinking which I refer to as cases of sensory perception and imagination, in so far as they are simply modes of thinking, do exist within me—of that I am certain. In this brief list I have gone through everything I truly know, or at least everything I have so far discovered that I know. Now I will cast around more carefully to see whether there may be other things within me which I have not yet noticed. I am certain that I am a thinking thing. Do I not therefore also know what is required for my being certain about anything? In this first item of knowledge there is simply a clear and distinct perception of what I am asserting; this would not be enough to make me certain .f the truth of the matter if it could ever turn out .hat something which I perceived with such clarity and distinctness was false. 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. Yet I previously accepted as wholly certain and evident many things which I afterwards realized were doubtful. What were these? The earth, sky, stars, and everything else that I apprehended with the senses. But what was it about them that I perceived clearly? Just that the ideas, or thoughts, of such things appeared before my mind. Yet even now I am not denying that these ideas occur within me. But there was something else which I used to assert, and which through habitual belief I thought I perceived clearly, although I did not in fact do so. This was that there were things outside me which were the sources of my ideas and which resembled them in all respects. Here was my mistake; or at any rate, if my judgement was true, it was not thanks to the strength of my perception.