Rene Descartes The Method Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Rene Descartes The Method - Essay Example Four years earlier, before Descartes wrote and tried to publish The Method, Galileo was tried (persecuted) by the so-called Inquisition of the Catholic Church for his treatise on the solar system and the planetary movement, and was forced to retract all of his assumptions and theories. Galileo was teaching Copernicanism, and Descartes' book was Copernican in nature. It was one of the reasons why Descartes tried not to publish this treatise on reasoning, so as not to suffer the same fate as Galileo's. Nevertheless, the controversy and the many interpretations forced Descartes to make the move - let the world know of what should reason be all about. Descartes explains reason or reasoning as an application of what one thinks, or that which comes of his intellect or mind. It is not only important that you have a "rigorous" mind, Descartes argues, but that you know how to apply it in everyday life. Most thinking of today is influenced by Descartes' way of reasoning. Descartes deals on metaphysics, but also on the scientific way. The Method is divided into six parts, as follows: first touching the topic on the Sciences; in the second, the rules of the Method; the third, certain of the rules of Morals which he has deduced from this Method; in the fourth, the reasonings by which he establishes the existence of God and of the Human Soul; in the fifth, the order of the Physical questions which he has investigated, and in the last what Descartes believes to be required in order to have greater advancement in the investigation of Nature, or the experiments. Each of the chapters in The Method, relies on the reasonings, and so explained by the Author with logic and proofs prevalent in his times of reasoned thinking. Philosophers and thinkers dominated this era of world history. They wanted to dominate the world through reason, so that almost every aspect of man's endeavor at that time was influenced by it. The time is known as the age of enlightenment which refers to the enlightenment of the eighteenth century, down to 17th century, in European and American philosophy. It advocates reason as a means to establishing an authoritative system of aesthetics, ethics, government, and logic. Thinkers argued that some kind of systematic thinking as the Newtonian kinematics could be applied to all forms of human activity. This influenced almost every major activity or movement all throughout Europe and other areas of the world including the United States. It was during this time when the solar system was truly discovered. Descartes' theory or conce pt on skepticism and inquiry into the nature of "knowledge" was a 'product' of the enlightenment. Main target of the thinkers of the movement was religion, particularly the Catholic Church. In turn they were regarded as radicals. There were opposing thinkers however, and one of them was Edmund Burke who is known as the father of modern conservatism. Burke opposed the implementation of governing based on abstract ideas. He espoused liberal conservatism, supported organic reform, and openly attacked metaphysics. Descartes published a short work which was metaphysical rather than scientific. The Discourse on Method is best known as the source of the famous quotation "cogito ergo sum", "I think, therefore I am." In the first chapter, Descartes says: "For to