For a Comment: Create this as a comment on a thread for the given week. A comment should be no more than 300 words. This should directly address whichever response you are writing on and should provide further discussion or answer whatever question they posed. Do you agree or disagree with anything they said? Why or why not? Other Student Response: In fifth meditation, Descartes suggests two questions: Target of the new method of clear and distinct ideas: The essence of. material things, and the existence of God considered a second time. Now that a way to know the truth has been found: not to judge anything except what is provided clearly and clearly. Then we should try to use this method now, get rid of the general suspicion before, and try to recognize something meaningful from material things. What is the clarity of the concept of the physical things of the pixels? Some of the concepts of the physical things of the pixels are clear and some are hazy. What is the truth of one thing? Is objective facts or subjective truths. But Descartes mention that truths and exists are same thing. The authenticity is manifested by the “I” knowing them clearly. In other words, although the reliability of the concept is not depending on people’s spirit, it is denied in the first meditation, but can be clearly understood by people, I assume it is a respond to the doubts of the first meditation. Also it explain the question of the existence of God. Because of us understand what God means which within our spirit, since we understand it, God is exist. In the sixth meditation, Descartes got himself before with head, hands, feet, and feelings of joy, anger, sorrow, and joy; about the outside world, there are the extent, shape, and movement of objects, as well as soft and hard dry and wet, light and dark, smell, taste, and sound. The biggest difference between feeling these concepts and imagining these concepts is that the appearance of these concepts in my mind does not depend on my desire, or is not subject to my will. Secondly, the concepts derived from these senses are much more vivid and stronger than imagined concepts. So Descartes came to the conclusion that all human ideas are obtained through the previous senses. And for what these feelings tell us: pain will cause sadness, pleasure will cause happiness, dry mouth will lead to water, and hungry will lead to food. All this comes only from nature. Gradually, Descartes came to a crucial step: “I” has the function of being moved. Because of it, “I” can recognize and perceive things. What is it perceiving? The “active” function is the object that makes the function feel when being moved. Because these feelings can be passed on to my thinking without relying on the consent of “I”, so it must not belong to the thinking of “I”. It is also impossible to come from God. If there is no existence in the outside world, but “I” has the concept that arises from it, isn’t God a liar? Therefore, it can be concluded from the fact that “I” has a feeling of being moved that there must be an existence in the outside world. Although this being is not exactly what we see through our senses
Respond to Alfred.
COLLAPSE
The overwhelming theme throughout Dialogues 9-12 was of God’s creations and volitions. Malebranche describes the world that God created as perfect and simple. Though the word perfect, in this case, does not mean flawless. It instead means that his work of creating the universe accomplishes its purpose. This purpose being a work that honors him and represents his features. In this philosophy, God created the laws of nature, but in a passive mannerism. The example Theodore gave in the dialogue to help explain this theory was the rain analogy. Rain comes in a systematic fashion and does not bend to the desires of humans. If rain only came when it was needed for fertile crop farming, it would require constant effort from God, indicating an imperfection in the universe. This somewhat relates to Spinoza’s theory of God that he is synonymous with nature, except Malebranche believed that God is a separate creator who made the laws of nature we spoke about. Another concept I found very interesting was God’s distribution of Grace. Theodore proposes that God may have an unequal distribution of grace, giving out more to those who are less wicked, and less to those that are more wicked. This begs the question of what makes someone more wicked than another person. From my understanding, some of it has to do with how much someone worships God, and the morally good deeds one does throughout their lifetime. Lastly, one piece of dialogue that perplexed me was in Dialogue 12 when Aristes asked Theodore what God’s intentions were when creating the outside universe, stars, and cosmos. I thought this was a very good question, but the response Theodore gave was somewhat confusing and it almost seemed like he avoided the question.
In Malebranche’s Treatise on Nature and Grace, the postulation that captured my attention the most was about our eternal greed. As humans, we crave the happiness we get when we accomplish our desires. However, once we succeed in getting what we want, our desire is converted into pleasure. This feeling of pleasure is described as deceitful because it fades away leaving us with a troubled feeling, inevitably resetting the cycle of desire. This remark was very wise in my opinion, and I think that most people can relate to being in this routine of desire. Furthermore, Malebranche offers a solution to break out of this cycle, and that is to channel our love into God. He says that when men find pleasure in loving God, they are both perfect and happy. A question I have about this theme is exactly how does loving God translate to the feeling of perfection and happiness? It could possibly be to acquire more grace from God, but in what ways would the grace then translate into real life? Maybe this grace is what we think of as good luck.
