Descartes/Nietzsche Final Exam Study Guide Flashcards

Flashcards based on Descartes and Nietzsche lecture notes.

Who is Descartes?

The father of modern philosophy

What is the difference between rationalism and empiricism?

Rationalism is the belief that we can know our world only through pure reason. Empiricism is the idea that we can only know the world from our sensory experiences.

What is the difference between ancient and modern philosophy?

Ancient philosophers don’t claim to know (Socrates) while modern philosophers claim to know through science. Descartes claims to know clear and distinct ideas.

What is scholasticism?

A form of philosophy that combines aspects of Christianity and Aristotle, officiated by Thomas Aquinas.

Who created the philosophical system of scholasticism?

Thomas Aquinas

Who is the most important philosopher of the Middle Ages?

Aristotle

What did Descartes like about the scientific revolution (Copernicus, Galileo)?

It was advocating a new mathematics (the language of nature is mathematical). It emphasizes observation and experimentation.

What language is the Meditations written in?

Latin

What does First Philosophy mean?

Metaphysics

What is the full title of the Meditations?

Meditations on First Philosophy, in which the existence of God and the immortality of the soul are demonstrated

How many Meditations are there?

There are 6 Meditations.

Who did Descartes write the Dedicatory Letter to?

He wrote it to the theology faculty of the University of Paris (Sorbonne) of the Catholic Church

What is the easiest thing to know according to Descartes in the Dedicatory Letter?

God

What are the four stages of doubt?

1. Senses 2. Are we dreaming 3. Math 4. Evil genius

What does it mean to doubt?

To suspend judgment.

Why can’t you be sure you’re not dreaming right now?

You thought you were awake while dreaming

What specifically does the evil genius undermine your ability to do?

The evil genius undermines our ability to think clear and distinct ideas.

Why can’t God be a deceiver for Descartes?

God cannot be a deceiver because he is perfect therefore, he must be good.

What is the difference between a simple and a combined science?

Simple sciences are arithmetic and geometry (mathematical) because they don’t require the existence of the body to be true. Combine sciences need the existence of a body such as physics.

What does Descartes mean by Archimedean Point?

The existence of You/”I think”. It is called so because, Archimedes said that if you give him a point he can revolve the world around it.

What does Cogito Ergo Sum mean?

I think therefore I am

Why does Descartes doubt that we have a body, but not that we have a mind?

The evil genius might be deceiving him about his body’s existence. But to have a doubt that we have a mind is a form of thinking. You cannot explain what the fact that you are thinking.

What’s another name for a substance? What kind of substance are we? What kind of substances are material things?

A substance is a thing. We are an immaterial substance, the thinking thing. Material substances are extended things (distinct from us).

What are the properties of a thinking thing?

It can doubt, understand, affirm, deny, imagine, and sense.

How do we know that we are a thinking thing?

Our ability to doubt shows that we are thinking things.

What does the wax example prove for Descartes?

The wax example shows Descartes that we don’t know things through the senses but through intellect. We Apprecate that the wax stays the same because it is a material substance.

What is the significance of the three dreams Descartes had when visiting Bavaria?

They inspired him to create a new system of knowledge that used human reason alone and break from Scholasticism.

Why did Descartes like Holland?

Holland was tolerant and quiet.

Who asked Descartes to tutor her in Sweden?

Queen Christina

How did Descartes die?

In his sleep from a bad cold at the age of 54 in 1650

What does Descartes mean by “read book of the world”?

He traveled a lot “well traveled”

What is the difference between objective and formal reality?

Objective reality is the idea of something while formal reality is the existence of something.

How do we know this idea of God comes from God?

We can tell that the idea of God comes from God because he has infinite formal and objective reality. The infinite nature of God makes God an idea that we could not create because we of are less reality than God. An infinite idea could only come from an infinite source

What does Descartes mean by something of less reality cannot cause something of more reality to come into existence?

Every effect has a cause Something can’t come from nothing Something of less reality cannot cause something of more reality (Principle of Sufficient Reason)

What kind of thought is the only one that has a truth value; that it can either be true or false?

Judgement

What are some of God’s attributes or qualities?

God is all-powerful, all-knowing, infinite, all-good, and eternal

Why can’t Descartes be God?

God cannot be doubtful like he is and it violates the principle of sufficient reason

Why are we more certain of our dependence on God for our existence than your parents?

We don’t even know if our parents exist at this point in Med 3. Something finite cannot sustain and conserve one throughout its existence. Only something infinite can do that.

How much formal reality does God have? How much objective reality?

He has infinite of both

What is an innate idea?

Innate ideas are ideas that we are born with. Inherent to your mind. (Ex. God, and you as a thinking thing)

What kind of substance is God?

An infinite substance

As finite creatures, what two things are we between?

We are between God and nothingness

Why didn’t God give us a flawed/defective intellect or a flawed/defective will?

God did not give us a defective intellect or will because God is perfect meaning that he is good and cannot deceive us because deception is a imperfection.

How do mistakes happen? Whose fault is it when mistakes happen

Our will outpaces our intellect, and is infinite in scope, it can apply itself to ideas that are not clear and distinct, thus prone to error. It is your fault if you misapply your will not God’s.

What kind of causes does Descartes say we shouldn’t worry about in physics? What kind of causes does Descartes say we should search for?

Don’t worry about Teleological causes. Worry about efficient causes.

Why can’t error/evil/mistakes be real?

Error and mistakes cannot be real because it is a defect that does not depend on God. If it did they would not be errors but things that are good and correct.

What is the difference between God’s responsibility and cooperation when it comes to bad things?

God is not responsible for our misuse of our will, but he will cooperate because it is a part of His cause. It is more perfect for us to make these mistakes than not.

Why didn’t God make us perfect?

God owes us nothing, so be happy that he gave you a mind in the first place. If everything was perfect it would be monotonous. Perfection needs the imperfect to better express itself.

What is the difference between essence and existence?

Essence is the clear and distinct idea of something’s properties and existence is the existence of something. Essence= definition Existence= being (something actually existing)

Does a clear and distinct idea necessarily have to exist? Give an example.

No it does not. For example, you can have a clear and distinct idea of a 1,000 sided shape but that shape does not exist in nature.

How is God not like other clear and distinct ideas?

Because you cannot separate the idea of God and his existence. To have a clear and distinct idea of God we must recognize his existence as part of that.

What is the mountain/valley example?

You cannot think of a valley without the idea of a mountain anymore than you can think of Gods essence without his existence.

What is the faculty of imagination?

It is a passive faculty. It is the part of the intellect that perceives bodies.

How do we know about bodies, including our own?

Imagination is a passive faculty and is dependent upon something active and independent. That active faculty is nature (the collection of finite bodies).

What can the imagination do? What can’t it do?

The imagination helps us perceive senses and our body. It cannot think clear and distinct ideas.

Can you have an imagination without an intellect? Can you have an intellect without imagination?

Imagination needs intellect. Intellect does not need imagination.

Why don’t we have to doubt everything all over again?

1. We are thinking things 2. There is a god 3. The imagination is a passive faculty which is dependent on the active faculty of nature 4. We can do math

What is the difference between your mind and your body?

Body is an extended, divisible, and perishable material substance while mind is an immaterial, indivisible, imperishable substance

How do the mind and the body interact for Descartes? What gland connects them?

They interact through the pineal gland.

What are the two reasons you’re not dreaming right now?

The continuity of experience and intensity of experience

How does Elisabeth criticize Descartes’ on mind-body interaction? How does Descartes respond? What is her solution?

She questions Descartes on how the material body can interact with the immaterial body if they are separate. Descartes tells her that her idea of mechanistic causation limits her understanding of movement and perhaps they work together similar to the the property of heaviness. Her solution is that the mind is a product of matter.

What was Schopenhauer’s argument about existence? How does art help us cope with it?

Schopenhauer said that we live in the worst possible reality and the world is full of unresolvable suffering. The will is at the heart of reality, and it can never be satisfied. Art, specifically music, is the only way we can make sense of this irrationality

What was Nietzsche’s first book?

The Birth of Tragedy

Which two Gods united to create Greek tragedy for Nietzsche? How does their union create art? Why does art decline in the ancient world?

Apollo and Dionysus. Apollo is the god of representation, reason, the sun, and form and Dionysus is the god of suffering, intoxication, song, content. Together art can represent suffering on stage as the chorus sings about the hero’s story and suffering. Art declines because as the Greek’s became complacent after the Peloponnesus war music was amen out of theatre, and Socrates becomes popular (he wanted things to conform to reason)

Why does Nietzsche say “God is Dead”? What murders God for Nietzsche?

Jesus said that he is the truth. Christianity was founded in the search for truth. This will to truth became a will to criticize things as untrue, and eventually, it wound up criticizing God himself as fiction.

What is the eternal return in Nietzsche?

The idea the everything repeats. Cosmic damnation. As infinitum.

What does Nietzsche mean by the Ubermensch?

Superman or over man which is a someone who can legislate their own beliefs and live by them. They do not need an external sourse of authority but are their own authority and commander.

Who are Nietzsche’s Last Men?

They are men that are the opposite of the Ubermensch that want nothing great. They want pleasure and entertainment.