Descartes
by existential Calvinist on 2008年03月09日 09:41 AM
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Descartes (1596–1650) was a French philosopher and mathematician. Descartes’ famous maxim, “cogito ergo sum” (I think therefore, I am), was written in his Meditations as part of his quest to find, “one thing, however slight, that is certain and unshaken.” It had previously been noted by St. Augustine. Having shown that our own individual existence as thinking, doubting things is a priori indubitable, he went on to attempt to prove that God exists, and thus the world is real and not an illusion. To do so, he first proposes that his idea of God must have a source outside himself and that the only possible source of such an idea is the actual God (an argument stolen from St. Aquinas). Then he provides a second argument that God must exist, because existence is a part of God’s nature, so to speak of a God that does not exist is to speak nonsense (an argument stolen from St. Anselm). Though philosophers generally agree that Descartes proofs are unconvincing, his attempt did generate a new enthusiasm for the self as the starting point for a priorii inquiry.