Descartes Reinvented

This study rehabilitates unpopular views in analytic philosophy, serving as an interpretation of unreconstructed Cartesianism.

This study rehabilitates unpopular views in analytic philosophy, serving as an interpretation of unreconstructed Cartesianism.

Descartes is perhaps most closely associated with the title, “the Father of Modern Philosophy.” Generations of students have been introduced to the study of philosophy through a consideration of his Meditations on First Philosophy. His contributions to natural science is shown by the fact that his physics, as promulgated by the Cartesians, played a central role in the debates after his death over Isaac Newton’s theory of gravitation. Descartes also made major contributions to the field of analytic geometry; we still speak today of “Cartesian coordinates” and the “Cartesian product.” This second edition of Historical Dictionary of Descartes and Cartesian Philosophy covers the history through a chronology, an introductory essay, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 300 cross-referenced entries on various concepts in Descartes’ philosophy, science, and mathematics, as well as biographical entries about the intellectual setting for Descartes’ philosophy and its reception, both with Cartesians and anti-Cartesians. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about Descartes.

Focusing on the first four images of the Other mobilized in Descartes’ Meditations—namely, the blind, the mad, the dreamy, and the bad—Reading Descartes Otherwise casts light on what have heretofore been the phenomenological shadows of “Cartesian rationality.” In doing so, it discovers dynamic signs of spectral alterity lodged both at the core and on the edges of modern Cartesian subjectivity. Calling for a Copernican reorientation of the very notion “Cartesianism,” the book’s series of close, creatively critical readings of Descartes’ signature images brings the dramatic forces, moments, and scenes of the cogito into our own contemporary moment. The author patiently unravels the knotted skeins of ambiguity that have been spun within philosophical modernity out of such clichés as “Descartes, the abstract modern subject” and “Descartes, the father of modern philosophy”—a figure who is at once everywhere and nowhere. In the process, she revitalizes and reframes the legacy of Cartesian modernity, in a way more mindful of its proto-phenomenological traces.

The Discourse on the Method for Reasoning Well and for Seeking Truth in the Sciences offers a concise presentation and defense of René Descartes’s method of intellectual inquiry — a method that greatly influenced both philosophical and scientific reasoning in the early modern world. Descartes’s timeless writing strikes an uncommon balance of novelty and familiarity, offering arguments concerning knowledge, science, and metaphysics (including the famous “I think, therefore I am”) that are as compelling in the twenty-first century as they were in the seventeenth. Ian Johnston’s new translation of the original French text is modern, clear, and thoroughly annotated, ideal for readers unfamiliar with Descartes’s intellectual context. An approachable introduction engages both the historical and the philosophical aspects of the text, helping the reader to understand the concepts and arguments contained therein.

Considered a foundational text in modern philosophy, the Meditations on First Philosophy presents numerous powerful arguments that to this day influence debates in epistemology, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of religion. This new translation incorporates revisions from the second Latin edition (1642) and the later French translation (1647) to make Descartes’ reasoning as lucid and engaging as possible. Also included in this edition is a brief introduction to Descartes and the Meditations, revised and expanded from Andrew Bailey’s acclaimed anthology, First Philosophy. The introduction helps the reader to understand the context and purpose of Descartes’ project without over-explaining his arguments.

Invisible Language: Its Incalcuable Significance for Philosophy reveals that although the use of language is visible or audible, the medium employed boasts neither of these attributes. Garth L. Hallet suggests that from Plato until now, the intangibility of language has exercised a far more profound influence in philosophy than even Wittgenstein came close to demonstrating. Indeed, without that pervasive factor of language, the history of philosophy would have been undeniably different. Yet philosophy is, and can legitimately aspire to be, much more than a struggle between language and human comprehension of it. Ultimately, this book suggests that philosophy’s positive possibilities, so often obscured by linguistically-inattentive practice, reach as far as human thought can reach.

The Cartesian Split examines the phenomenon of Cartesian influence as a psychological complex in the Jungian tradition. It explores the full legacy of Cartesian rationality in its emphasis on abstract thinking and masculinisation of thought, often perceived in a negative light, despite the developments of modernity. The book argues that the Cartesian creation of the Modern Age, as accompanied by a radical dualism, is better understood as a myth while acknowledging the psychological reality of the myth. The Cartesian myth is a collective dream, and the urgency of its rhetoric suggests that an important message is being left unheeded. This message may lead us to answers in the most unexpected place of all. The book brings forth the Cartesian myth in a new context and shows it to have potential meaning for us today. The book will be of great interest for academics, researchers, and post-graduate students in the fields of analytical psychology, mental health, comparative mythology, and Jungian studies.