Descartes vs. Dost

[adleberg]

Who first announced, who was the first to proclaim that man does dirty only because he does'nt know his real interests - Dostoevsky, Notes From Underground

"For if I always recognised clearly what was true and good, I should never have trouble in deliberating..."
The power of will I have received from God...is very ample and very perfect of its kind." - Descartes, Meditation IV

In Notes from Underground, I feel Dostoevsky makes a clearly existential response to Descartes Method and Meditations. He further passes judgement on Descartes Cogito Ergo Sum and refers to the invisible demon.

Has anyone discovered this previously or is interested in Descartes ideas and how Dost related to them?

[MikeK]

He further passes judgement on Descartes Cogito Ergo Sum

I think that all of Dostoevsky's work (certainly his post-exile work, at the very least) can be viewed as a refutation of Descartes' Cogito Ergo Sum.

Certainly in "Notes From Underground", as you mentioned, but almost everywhere else: "The Brothers Karamazov", "Crime and Punishment", "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man", "Winter Notes on Summer Impressions"...these are just a few examples of books where the refutation of Cogito Ergo Sum is a dominant theme.

[underworld men]

Excellent point MikeK! I agree.

So do you think Descartes went to far in his simplication of consciousness?

[MikeK]

I'm afraid that I can't speak too intelligently on Descartes.  My only knowledge of him is the superficial formulas that I learned in school; like Cogito Ergo Sum.  I've never read any of his work first-hand.

But, if you ask me what I think about that formula...just that phrase, then yes, I do think that he greatly oversimplified things.  One of the best expressions of my feelings towards that phrase comes from a different part of "Notes from Underground" from which adleberg quoted earlier.  In Chapter 8 of Part I (using the online text from this website), the underground man says:


You see, gentlemen, reason is an excellent thing, there's
no disputing that, but reason is nothing but reason and satisfies only the rational side of man's nature, while will is a manifestation of the whole life, that is, of the whole human life including reason and all the impulses.  And although our life, in this manifestation of it, is often worthless, yet it is life and not simply extracting square roots.  Here I, for instance, quite naturally want to live, in order to satisfy all my capacities for life, and not simply my capacity for reasoning, that is, not simply one twentieth of my capacity for life.  What does reason know?  Reason only knows what it has succeeded in learning (some things, perhaps, it will never learn; this is a poor comfort, but why not say so frankly?) and human nature acts as a whole, with everything that is in it, consciously or unconsciously, and, even if it goes wrong, it lives.

That seems to me a fine (and correct) refutation of "I think, therefore I am" by Dostoevsky.

[An aside:  The Peaver version that I have translates this a bit differently and has one of my favorite lines.  Where it says above "And although our life, in this manifestation of it, is often worthless, yet it is life...", Peaver renders that:
"And although our life in this manifestation often turns out to be a bit of trash, still it is life..."
I love that touch - "a bit of trash".  It seems more poetic than the word "worthless".  I wonder if that is more true to the original Russian?]

[underworld men]

Lerik could answer that you know.

[lerik]

Lerik could answer that you know.

Well,here I am I personally,havent read Descartes's works,just know the basics like Cognito ergo sum.I haven't read 'notes from the underground' yet,so i cant really say which translation is more closer to the original

[underworld men]

Lerik could answer that you know.

Well,here I am I personally,havent read Descartes's works,just know the basics like Cognito ergo sum.I haven't read 'notes from the underground' yet,so i cant really say which translation is more closer to the original

Well I can say I am patient besides other then BTK -"notes" is the best thing in literature. It's not like you won't enjoy the hell out of it. Its damn funny.

PS Lerik is your avatar a picture of Cameron Diaz?

[adleberg]

I suggest you all pick up a copy of Descartes Meditations. I found mine in the local library in an Encyclopeadia Brittanica edition. It is actually a lot easier to read than you would expect. Descartes says some wonderful things about reason and perception, its just too bad he is so intent on squeezing god in through the back door. I am an Atheist but I still have to pay respect to some of the ideas he put forward..

Think about this..If nothing in this world last forever, I mean nothing, you know that even stars and galaxies have a lifespan. Where does your idea of an infinite being come from? The same can be said for perfection. Its all in the meditations

[adleberg]

BTW the avatar is gwen stefani

[underworld men]

I suggest you all pick up a copy of Descartes Meditations. I found mine in the local library in an Encyclopeadia Brittanica edition. It is actually a lot easier to read than you would expect. Descartes says some wonderful things about reason and perception, its just too bad he is so intent on squeezing god in through the back door. I am an Atheist but I still have to pay respect to some of the ideas he put forward..

Think about this..If nothing in this world last forever, I mean nothing, you know that even stars and galaxies have a lifespan. Where does your idea of an infinite being come from? The same can be said for perfection. Its all in the meditations

Yes that would be Platonic (sort of the theory of forms and ontology). Cool though that you are balanced in your approach. Athiesm to some russian people through the passed 60 years has been unspeakable.  But no one is stupid to believe such a thing makes one evil. Maybe though it makes them abit too impossible to please.

[lerik]

To answer the avatar question,it is cameron diaz.

[Kafkaesque]

Well, as someone who has read both Descartes and Dostoevsky, I don't know what there is to compare. No offense, but the other posters do no seem very informed. Descartes did not simplify consciousness to 'cogito ergo sum.' That is just a nice catchphrase that his commentators attributed to him. I don't think he even says it anywhere in the Meditations. In my translation, he says, "thought exists; it alone cannot be separated from me. I am; I exist---this is certain." And he goes through a series of steps, first to prove that he exists, and second what the 'I' that exist is, i.e. a thinking thing; etc., etc.

(I wouldn't dismiss his proof of God so easily though. He is working within a certain framework of Medieval Philosophy. Well, I studied the Meditations 3 years in a row, 'til I got sick of it. But in the last year, finally, a prof was able to explain it to my satisfaction. At the moment, I can't remember it fully, but if you would like to discuss it, you could start a new thread.)

I think The Notes from Underground attacks a series of social-political-philosophical assumptions that were simply in the air in the 19th-century. The most Western thinkers that may have been the target are Mill, Rousseau, Fourier (even some Russian interpretations of Kant's Sublime and the Beautiful) -- due to their influence on Chernyshevsky, who was D's main target in the NFU.
Descartes shared some of those views, but again, I think Descartes' views were mostly inherited from the scholastics.

"For if I always recognised clearly what was true and good, I should never have trouble in deliberating..."
The power of will I have received from God...is very ample and very perfect of its kind."
If you want to read some contemporary reponses to this, you could try Mersenne. But I don't know if this view was specific to Descartes. You can trace it back to Socrates, who claimed all evil was solely the result of ignorance. I'm not inclined to agree with this, but I don't think there is necessarily any special significance in this assumption. All philosophers in the West have tradtionally overestimated human rationality to some extent.

However, maybe I've overlooked something... where do you think that Dostoevsky comments on Descartes' invisible demon? I don't remember anything like that in NFU.

[underworld men]

Well, as someone who has read both Descartes and Dostoevsky, I don't know what there is to compare. No offense, but the other posters do no seem very informed. Descartes did not simplify consciousness to 'cogito ergo sum.' That is just a nice catchphrase that his commentators attributed to him. I don't think he even says it anywhere in the Meditations. In my translation, he says, "thought exists; it alone cannot be separated from me. I am; I exist---this is certain." And he goes through a series of steps, first to prove that he exists, and second what the 'I' that exist is, i.e. a thinking thing; etc., etc.

(I wouldn't dismiss his proof of God so easily though. He is working within a certain framework of Medieval Philosophy. Well, I studied the Meditations 3 years in a row, 'til I got sick of it. But in the last year, finally, a prof was able to explain it to my satisfaction. At the moment, I can't remember it fully, but if you would like to discuss it, you could start a new thread.)

I think The Notes from Underground attacks a series of social-political-philosophical assumptions that were simply in the air in the 19th-century. The most Western thinkers that may have been the target are Mill, Rousseau, Fourier (even some Russian interpretations of Kant's Sublime and the Beautiful) -- due to their influence on Chernyshevsky, who was D's main target in the NFU.
Descartes shared some of those views, but again, I think Descartes' views were mostly inherited from the scholastics.

"For if I always recognised clearly what was true and good, I should never have trouble in deliberating..."
The power of will I have received from God...is very ample and very perfect of its kind."
If you want to read some contemporary reponses to this, you could try Mersenne. But I don't know if this view was specific to Descartes. You can trace it back to Socrates, who claimed all evil was solely the result of ignorance. I'm not inclined to agree with this, but I don't think there is necessarily any special significance in this assumption. All philosophers in the West have tradtionally overestimated human rationality to some extent.

However, maybe I've overlooked something... where do you think that Dostoevsky comments on Descartes' invisible demon? I don't remember anything like that in NFU.

Why hello Kafkaesque welcome! I adore Kafka.

I don't remember stating that Descartes however, stated "I think therefore I am" in Mediations. The statement was made however in Discourse on Method. Also what is to be validated must be done via obeservation/examination. This is the reductionism I was referring to. Everything of the mind. That the whole of now be reduced to moment to moment. This is to deny the fondness of a young love or the brutally of a passed mistake. This as much as instinct are a part of the essence of each of us. And none of these components as much as the "now" should be neglected.

Or the fear of the future even and the potential that MIGHT bring.

Welcome nice to have you on the board.

[Kafkaesque]

Hello underworld men,

I haven't visited the Discourse in awhile, and just checking it, sure it is there. But he's still summarizing one of his conclusions from the Meditations. Anyway, that comment was not directed towards you, as you've obviously read Descartes.

Still, I'm not sure what the criticism is. At least in the Meditations, knowledge grounded on certainty has to be arrived at by pure thought alone, since he concluded that he was a thinking thing, i.e. only knowledge of his mental activities are certain and not his body. That there is a problem with this account was recognized by his contemporaries, especially the Empiricists like Locke. My point is that I don't think Dostoevsky in NFU was replying directly to Descartes.

I don't know what "the whole of now" you are referring to is. Can you elaborate?

[underworld men]

Hello underworld men,
 My point is that I don't think Dostoevsky in NFU was replying directly to Descartes.

I don't know what "the whole of now" you are referring to is. Can you elaborate?

First let me say I completely agree with you on the Dostoevsky comment. I think that what happened was Descartes' ideas got hijacked by a whole of agendas outside his own.

The hijacked Descartes is still getting torn to ribbons by the east.

As for the whole of now. Now is the only thing thats real.
Real as an object with limitations.