A Net in Time

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philosophy

Seeking After Truth: Rene Descartes

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Rene Descartes has been dubbed the father of modern Western philosophy.  He was born in France 1596 to a mom who died shortly after birth and a father who was a member of parliament.  Descartes was not expected to survive, but he did, growing up to live with his gramma and great uncle. He was educated in accordance to his father’s wishes that he become a lawyer.  He gave it up though in his desire to travel and pursue a life in the military.   Overtime he pursued mathematics and physics.

rene descartes, seeking after truth

 

His basic premise:

November 1619  Descartes shut himself in a room with an “oven”  to escape the cold. While within, he had three dreams and believed that a divine spirit revealed to him a new philosophy. He formulated analytical geometry and had the idea of applying mathematics to philosophy.  He decided that the study of science would lead him to true wisdom and that all truths were linked together.   All he needed to do was discover the basic truth.  This basic truth for Descartes was “I think, therefore I am.” 

The process of his thinking is this

An evil demon may be making me believe things that are false.
There is nothing of which I can be certain.
But when I say “I am; I exist”, I cannot be wrong about this.
An evil demon could try to make me believe this only if I REALLY DO exist.
I am thinking, therefore I exist.

His goal was to remove skepticism from the field of scientific inquiry.  He uses “the method of doubt” where we start off doubting everything… that the world itself could be an illusion, and we can’t trust our senses, meaning that we are constantly deceived, and that perhaps we all just in reality dreaming. Hence the idea there is a powerful demon bent on deceiving us.  So if a demon could be trying to deceive us  we need to ask if it’s possible and if so, to set aside what we might want to believe.  This leads him to discover the one thing he can’t fool himself about…. his own existence!

“The demon could only make him believe that he exists if he does in exist; how can he doubt his existence unless he exists in order to do the doubting.”  Therefore the end result is “I think, therefore I am.”  This is as far as he can go with the first certainty. With this certainty, helping people see from their own perspective, that they exist. Removing all doubt, and helping them reach their own conclusion of their own reality. rene descartes: I think therefore I am

Seeking after truth:

As I was going through the basics of what Descartes thought, it struck me that he postulates that some demon is doing his very best to deceive him.   Because of this deception, Descartes needed to figure out what truth, what absolute truth could he believe without fail.  To him it meant that if he thinks, he exists.  There can be no deception in that very basic premise. 

It strikes me so true … because Satan is known as The Deceiver.   It’s what he does.  He deceives people all the time, trying hard to convince them that there is no God. He finds ways to turn our hearts away from God.  Descartes had an inkling of this fact. I find it unfortunate that in his thought process he couldn’t figure out the absolute truth of God being at the centre of it all.  He put himself at the centre. 

rene descartes quote

Want to think on this a bit more?   Consider pulling up my printable to help you in your thinking. 

Others in this series:

Thomas Hobbes.

Francis Bacon.

Seeking After Truth : Thomas Hobbes

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Thomas Hobbes was orphaned in infancy and taken in by a wealthy uncle.  Through the generosity of his uncle he received a good education, which in turn offered him a chance to travel.  He is perhaps best known for his political philosophies but he wrote on a wide range of subjects, included his philosophy of physicalism.

Thomas Bacon, seeking after truth

His basic premise:

Thomas Hobbes thought that people and animals were nothing more than flesh and blood machines. He lived in a time when great advances were being made in the physical sciences.

A rough outline of his progression in thought goes as follows

Nothing with substance can exist
So everything is the universe is physical
A human being is therefore entirely physical
Therefore man is a machine.

Using science and mathematics he thought was the perfect counter for scholastic philosophy so predominant in medieval times.  He saw no real need to balance the physical and the spiritual.  He saw zero limits to what science could achieve. Therefore saw the whole world as being physical having length, breadth and depth.  EVERYTHING in the universe was physical and nothing more.  He did believe in invisible spirits but still believed that just because we couldn’t see them didn’t mean they didn’t have length, breadth and depth.   He saw these spirits as moving through the body in a similar way we would view the nervous system today. 

The only differentiation he made was to God.  He believed that ONLY God could be described as an incorporeal being.   God’s divinity is something that a physical human being could never fathom.   Science and matters of faith were divergent and therefore God will always be beyond our comprehension. 

Hobbes never dealt with how the mind works or affects these physical only beings. He believed that in time science would explain this aspect of our physical beings.   He had a strong insistence that everything could be explained in the physical and in the end man is nothing but a machine. 

quote by Thomas hobbes "For What is the heart, but a spring; and the nerves, but so many strings; and the joints, but so many wheels, giving motion to the whole body."

Finding Truth:

Understanding the time that Hobbes lived in helps me to understand his philosophy regarding people.  Living a time when physical science was making great strides, it is easy to see why he believed that man was merely a physical machine and believed that eventually everything about us could be explained in a scientific manner. 

I see how he separated out God from the physical and made it very clear that God was different than all physical beings.  God was incorporeal and it’s not possible for human beings to understand him. I see much truth in this understanding because honestly, can we, as sinful beings ever truly understand God?  I just don’t see God as being as totally non-understandable as Hobbes makes him out to be. God’s word teaches us about God, and the example that Jesus set and how he lived, showed us God as well. The seeing God as different than everything else in the world is a pivotal thought that we often really fail to understand.  

To download a worksheet to help you think about Thomas Hobbes more, CLICK HERE. 

Others in the series
Francis Bacon.

Seeking After Truth: Francis Bacon

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Ah.. it has been a LONG time since I have written a philosopher post.  You can find the series I was writing over here. 🙂   Today we are briefly looking at Francis Bacon and learning a touch more about him.

Francis Bacon, seeking after truth series, with free printable

Did you know that Knowledge is Power?

It is!  (at least according to Francis Bacon).

Francis Bacon lived from 1561 to 1626, he was a brilliant man.  I was unable to find out if he was a true man of faith, his statements could lean both ways, and his choices in living leave room for doubt.   He was a strong proponent from separating faith from science.  He lived in a time when if the church didn’t agree with a scientific advance it would act against further research. He was a strong proponent of empiricism and the scientific method.  Bacon has been called the Father of Empiricism.

His basis premise 

Scientific knowledge builds upon itself.  It advances steadily and cumulatively, discovering new laws and making new inventions possible.  It then enables people to do things that otherwise could not be done, therefore knowledge is power.   Much of his struggle was to push against the traditions of thinking that we all hold.  We need to push past old thinking, formulate new thoughts and then prove them to be real.

Mr. Bacon always put an emphasis practical thinking and work.  Of being able to prove an idea rather than just thinking it might be true.   He advocated separating science from religion in order to let science advance more quickly to help people needing it, rather than needing to vet ideas through religious teachings.

He never saw the mind as a blank slate, but more of a mind with knowledge written on it that had to be overwritten for progress to be made.   So we have to write over what he calls “the Idols”.

The Idols

These Idols are
1. Idols of the Tribe – human nature leads to false concepts which leads to distorted reflections.
2. Idols of the Cave – the doctrines which are dear to the individual without knowing if they are true.
3. Idols of the Marketplace –  human communication and semantics and how words change
4. Idols of the Theatre – Ideas taught by other philosophies which create fictional worlds.

ALL these idols create problems with people fooling themselves all the time. The scientist needs to battle against all these idols in order to gain true knowledge of the world.

Finding Truth

As  I sit here pondering Francis Bacon and his idols I have to wonder… is he so far off the truth?   The truth is .. sin changes us in ways that we don’t even fully comprehend because we grow up in a world filled with it.  As Christians we have fight against our natural tendencies to live the way God would want us to, kinda like how Mr. Bacon saw scientists needing to fight against their preconceived notions in order to arrive at a proper scientific result.  To be mindful of their culture, word usage, doctrines and philosophical outlooks.   They needed to learn to keep an open mind and to rewrite how they thought.   So to we have to do the same eh?  Not just in science, but in lives of faith.

Mr. Bacon only applied this to the field of science and not to a persons whole and didn’t really take God into account (other than to dismiss him from the field of scientific inquiry).  

Divergence from Truth

Francis Bacon strongly believed the science needed to be separated from religion in order to make quicker advances.  I question whether this approach is truly effective.  I know it’s one that many ascribe to, that science needs to stand on it’s own. I just wonder if it limits.  For instance, many scientists fully embrace evolutionary theory as fact and often base their opinions around it.  It’s not really a religion…but it’s a tenet highly held to.  Should that premise then also be tested and removed from consideration?  If it was, would scientific advancement increase then? If religion needs to be removed, perhaps theories should be as well.  Just thinking, you may have your own thoughts. Does taking faith out of the equation truly limit advancement in science?

Sources:
Sir Bacon.
Philosophy Basics.
Stanford Philosophy.

Want to test your thinking and learn to seek after truth?   Check out my printable.

Francis Bacon Seek after truth series, printable download

Reasons to study the Philosophers of Old

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You know how it is said there is nothing new under the sun?    Well.. seriously there is indeed NOTHING new under the sun, the way people think and assume and turn away from one truth in search of another, you can call it one thing or another, but it’s still just a system of thought, and all systems get reworked.  SINCE there is nothing new under the sun, studying the philosophers of old will help us gain great insight into how people think now and to trace the development of such thought.   People want to find truth. 

This searching after truth is one of the goals I have in the education of my son.  I want so much for that to be a deep part of his life.  If he can, by the time he enters the work force, be able to look at the statements people make and suss out the truth… I’ll think well done lad, well done. 

With this end in mind, studying the philosophers of old, gives us a chance to search for the nugget of truth each of them possesses.  As we look at what the philosophers taught, we see where they follow eternal truth and where they strayed. reasons to study the philosophers of old

For a while we studied a new philosopher every week and then life got busy and it fell to the wayside.  I am looking to get back into studying them as my lad is getting older and is better able to articulate his thoughts to me. 

This means that we study philosophers I will ask him.. What is true in what they believe?   Where do you think they went wrong?

In that process he will be learning some important skills

  • Communication Skills.
  • Critical reasoning skills
  • Problem-solving skills 

He will be learning to remember how to piece things together.  It’s not always an easy thing,  To see how one idea connects to another.  I know I struggle with that sometimes, but as I was reading in John, sometimes if you remember one truth, it deepens your understanding and faith. 

In learning to seek out truth it gives believers a way to connect with those who don’t yet know God.  If you can see the truth, it gives you a common ground.  Also if you can see where truth is lacking, it gives you a place to steer people toward.  The more you understand where people are coming from, the more we are enable to shine the light of Jesus into their lives. 

Using the philosophers of old will be a good grounding for learning these skills. 

We’ve already studied a variety of philosophers some of which are: 

Consider Dinogenes of Sinope.  Who lived under a washing tub, giving up all he had in search of contentment and peace.   The truth… we do have give up ourselves, giving ourselves over to something else (God) in order to truly find peace.  His turning away from truth was in not realizing what we have give up TO God.  That without God true peace cannot be attained.

Or Epicurus who believed that losing the fear of death would make a person happy.   The bible tells us that death is conquered, we need not have any fear of it. (his seeing truth) This isn’t something we can do in our power though (His turning away from truth).

Then Mozi who thought that treating everyone the same would lead to universal peace.  Seeing the truth that God calls us to love our neighbours as ourselves.   But not seeing that it is God’s action that needs to peace between peoples. 

Studying the philosophers of old, Christian or Not, helps us to better define our worldview and helps us to understand the world view of others.  And in this changing world with folks making up their worldview as they go along, understanding how they get there helps us to form connections and thereby help us lead them seeing truth, as much as we can.

I hope you will join us as we embark on this journey.