Descartes's Concept of Mind

Inbunden, Engelska, 2003

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Descartes's concept of the mind, as distinct from the body with which it forms a union, set the agenda for much of Western philosophy's subsequent reflection on human nature and thought. This is the first book to give an analysis of Descartes's pivotal concept that deals with all the functions of the mind, cognitive as well as volitional, theoretical as well as practical and moral. Focusing on Descartes's view of the mind as intimately united to and intermingled with the body, and exploring its implications for his philosophy of mind and moral psychology, Lilli Alanen argues that the epistemological and methodological consequences of this view have been largely misconstrued in the modern debate.Informed by both the French tradition of Descartes scholarship and recent Anglo-American research, Alanen's book combines historical-contextual analysis with a philosophical problem-oriented approach. It seeks to relate Descartes's views on mind and intentionality both to contemporary debates and to the problems Descartes confronted in their historical context. By drawing out the historical antecedents and the intellectual evolution of Descartes's thinking about the mind, the book shows how his emphasis on the embodiment of the mind has implications far more complex and interesting than the usual dualist account suggests.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum2003-10-14
Mått156 x 235 x 35 mm
Vikt689 g
FormatInbunden
SpråkEngelska
Antal sidor384
FörlagHarvard University Press
ISBN9780674010437
UtmärkelserNominated for Roland H. Bainton Book Prize 2004

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Filosofiska discipliner inom Filosofi och religion

Preface Abbreviations Introduction ONE: FROM METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCE TO PHILOSOPHY OF MIND 1. The Early Writings 2. The Regulae ad directionem ingenii and the Quest for Certainty 3. Intuition, Method, and Its Application to the Mind 4. New Suppositions in Cognitive Psychology and an Old Metaphor 5. The Objects Known 6. The Method and Its Application 7. "A Little Grander Project": From Methodology to Metaphysics 8. A New Foundation of Physics: God's Creation of Eternal Truths TWO: THE MIND AS EMBODIED: A TRUE AND SUBSTANTIAL UNION 1. Three Perspectives on the Mind and the Body 2. The Mind-Body Union and Its Conceivability 3. Privileged Access, Indubitability, and Introspection 4. The Pure Mind and the Embodied Mind 5. Three Primary Notions: Extension, Thought, and Mind-Body Union 6. Clear and Distinct versus Obscure and Confused Thoughts 7. Knowing Our Mental States: Inconceivability or Indeterminacy? 8. The Limits of Cartesian Dualism THREE: THOUGHT, CONSCIOUSNESS, AND LANGUAGE 1. Mind and Consciousness 2. Propositional Thoughts and Sensations 3. Sensory Awareness and Perceptual Judgments 4. Human Thought and Artificial Intelligence 5. Transparency and Immanent Reflexivity 6. Thought, Language, and Normativity FOUR: INTENTIONALITY AND THE REPRESENTATIVE NATURE OF IDEAS 1. Ideas as Acts and Ideas as Objects 2. Ideas and Images 3. Likeness, Similarity, Identity 4. Objective Reality and Possible Being 5. Degrees of Objective Reality 6. Objective Reality and the Veil-of-Ideas 7. The Problem of Representation in the Aristotelian Tradition FIVE: SENSORY PERCEPTIONS, BELIEFS, AND MATERIAL FALSITY 1. Impressions, Ideas, and Representations in the Early Work 2. "Idea" in the Later Work: The Problematic Intentionality of Sensations 3. Judgment, Truth, and Falsity in Sensory Perception 4. Material Falsity SIX: PASSIONS AND EMBODIED INTENTIONALITY 1. The Context and Novelty of Descartes's Approach to the Passions 2. Passions as a Subclass of Thoughts 3. Actions and Passions 4. The Functions Attributed to the Body 5. The Functions of the Soul and Perceptions Referred to the Soul in Particular 6. The Psycho-Physiology of Passions 7. Representing and Referring Passions to the Soul 8. The Function and Classification of Passions 9. The Institution of Nature as the Key to the Mastery of Passions 10. Reason versus Passions SEVEN: FREE WILL AND VIRTUE 1. From Conflicts of Soul to Conflicts of Will 2. The Elements and Antecedents of Descartes's Moral Psychology 3. Voluntary Agency, Assent, and Will 4. Reason as the Power of Judging Well 5. Descartes's Notion of a Free Will 6. From Free Decision to Free Will: Medieval Debates about Agency 7. Toward a Non-naturalistic Account of Moral Agency 8. Interpreting Descartes's Voluntarism 9. Generosity: The Passion of Virtue Notes Index

Alanen takes the embodied Cartesian mind as her central topic, and it is refreshing to read an account of Descartes’ psychology that treats his famous argument for the real distinction between mind and body only in passing… Alanen’s account of how notions of will and agency become internalized in Descartes, and the important differences between the Cartesian account of the will as agent and Aristotelian accounts of the will as that in virtue of which a human being is an agent, is interesting and illuminating.