nm0183: right we've got a lot of material to cover in today's lecture so er 
it's best i make a start straight away i'll try and speak as clearly as 
possible and er go at a reasonable pace as you may have gathered today's 
lecture's being filmed so i'd be immensely grateful if people could look as m-, 
er more enthusiastic [laughter] and more keen than they usually do [laughter] i 
know this will be difficult but [laughter] do try [laughter] er the most 
important thing is that you laugh at my jokes [laughter] but er as you know 
they are few and far between er okay if anybody wants to take out their pocket 
mirror for a last [laughter] look at their face here's your chance [sniff] no 
okay w-, let's start er what we're going to do today in today's lecture today's 
lecture's divided into two main parts the first part we'll look at some of the 
essential aspects of meditation six and the second part er we'll examine er 
Descartes' notorious mind body dualism okay so it's divided into two main parts 
[sniff] it's in meditation six that Descartes seeks to bring everything 
together and to harmonize 
all the different elements of his analysis so far okay so this really is the 
kind of crowning point the summation of the entire meditations [sniff] 
Descartes believes that he now enjoys a limited certainty okay at this point he 
thinks he's now attained a limited certainty he's sure that God exists he's 
sure that God exists and he trusts geometry he trusts geometry because God 
guarantees the truth of things that are perceived clearly and distinctly okay 
he trusts geometry because God guarantees the truth of things that are 
perceived clearly and distinctly so i'm just going to hand out some more of 
these sheets can you take that please [sniff] so at the beginning of the 
meditation we have a key quote okay this is the point where Descartes says he's 
now going to extend his analysis beyond the realm of the intellect and 
reconnect the mind to matter he says [sniff] i'll just read from this er 
passage he says now that i know that God exists [sniff] i have the means of 
acquiring a perfect knowledge of an infinitude of things not only those which 
relate to God and other intellectual matters but also those which pertain to 
corporeal nature in 
so far as it is the object of pure mathematics i'll say that last sentence 
again because that's the crucial part of the quote okay so he says i have 
[sniff] er the ap-, capacity of acquiring a perfect knowledge of things not 
only of intellectual things but also those which pertain to corporeal nature to 
bodily or material nature in so far as it is the object of pure mathematics 
[sniff] so that sentence is revealing in in two respects [sniff] firstly it 
indicates quite clearly that Descartes' now going to ex-, extend his analysis 
to another realm of substance entirely oth-, that is substance other than 
intellectual substance [cough] he's going to ens-, extend it to nature and to 
matter and secondly he says he's going to extend it and create a knowledge of 
the material world in so far it is i-, as it is the object of pure mathematics 
okay now also the question we might ask is to what extent is Descartes going to 
bend nature so as to suit a mathematical model to what extent is he going to 
impose er an alien mathematical 
mo-, model on an resistant matter but he himself believes that the two will 
correspond okay so that's one of the main things that's going on in this 
meditation to arrive at comp-, complementary theories of mind and of matter 
okay this is perhaps one of the crucial aspects of Descartes' meditations one 
of the distinctive aspects that he believes we can have a correspondence 
between the mind and matter so he's going to ve-, develop complementary 
theories of mind and of matter in this meditation [sniff] now meditation five 
has reached the conclusion that corporeal things if they exist okay this is the 
previous meditation has reached the conclusion that corporeal things if they 
exist are geometrical in nature [sniff] and hence quantifiable they're 
geometrical in nature and hence quantifiable [sniff] what does he mean by this 
he means that they have shape size position shape size position motion and 
number and these are all properties he believes that can be expressed in 
mathematical terms these are all 
properties that can be expressed in mathematical terms they have these 
properties if they exist they have these properties these material objects if 
they exist the task in meditation six is to show that they do in fact exist 
[sniff] the task is to show that these geometrical objects do in fact exist 
that is corporeal things have geometrical properties [sniff] now one of the 
other main things that's taking place in meditation six as i say it's the point 
where Descartes brings to a summation the whole of the meditations but there 
also takes place a significant or major reversal of the entire argument so far 
it takes place an entire reversal of the argument so far namely a reversal of 
doubt [sniff] so that many of the operations many of the operations that were 
commenced in meditation one are now deemed says Descartes we can now deem them 
to be risible or laughable many of the operations many of the experiments or 
hypotheses we conducted in meditation one can deem to be risible or laughable 
he says [sniff] for example the things which in the past i 
took to be certain for example the things which in the past i took to be 
certain beliefs and principles but which turned out to be illusory or false 
were he says and we can now recognize that those things were simply things that 
i did not perceive clearly and distinctly okay they were simply things that i 
did not perceive clearly and distinctly so i can now appreciate he says at this 
point that anything in the past which i held to be certain and true but which 
turned out to be false or illusory i can now recognize okay with the benefit 
that the journey the progress i've made and the discovery of knowledge i can 
now recognize that they were based er on principles or ideas that were not 
clear clear and distinct [sniff] so for example Descartes says we can now 
abandon or jettison the dreaming hypothesis we can now abandon or jettison that 
hypothesis we no longer have to take it seriously why simply because we're now 
he says in the realm of the pure mind we've emancipated the mind from the 
contamination of the senses or the deception er that our senses are subject to 
we're in the realm of the pure mind and therefore we're not subject any longer 
to that kind of deception we're no longer subject to the same kind of deception 
[cough] okay what i'm going to do now is [sniff] follow Descartes' deduction of 
the existence of material things okay how does he proceed in his deduction of 
the existence of material things now i should stress that what i'm going to say 
or what Descartes has to say may not be readily clear and transparent it's a 
very dense and convoluted part of the meditation so what i suggest i mean what 
i've done here is to try and break it down into three key components what i 
suggest is that people follow up the argument themselves by reading the crucial 
passages that i'm drawing upon after the lect-, after the lecture and before 
next week's seminar and the the page references are pages fifty-four to fifty-
five in the Cambridge edit-, University Press edition of the 
meditations okay what i'm going to say now in this key paragraph split into 
three key points or components is taken from those pages fifty-four to fifty-
five firstly point A we can say er d-, point A of Descartes' deduction i am a 
thinking substance he says i am a thinking substance that's what primarily and 
essentially i am i am a thinking substance [sniff] and i can clearly and 
distinctly conceive of myself i can clearly and distinctly conceive of myself 
in separation from other things okay i can clearly and distinctly conceive of 
myself in separation from other things such as my body for example [cough] in 
other words i can isolate or bracket off [sniff] an essential component of my 
existence namely this thinking substance [sniff] now reflecting on myself 
reveals that i have a passive faculty Descartes says reflecting on myself 
reveals or reflecting on what it is to be a thinking thing reveals that i have 
a passive faculty for receiving ideas [sniff] okay there's a receptivity to the 
cogita i have a pa-, and this is a passive faculty says Descartes for receiving 
ideas this is the faculty of 
perception this is the faculty of perception now Descartes then goes on to say 
that this passive faculty this passive faculty of perception would be inert it 
would be inert if there was not also if there was not also an active faculty an 
active faculty to set it in operation to set it in operation okay so there's a 
passive faculty a receptive faculty of perception but this requires to be put 
into operation an active faculty [sniff] okay now point B that's point A point 
B Descartes argues that this latter faculty this latter faculty the active 
faculty is not essential to me is not essential to me as a thinking thing 
[sniff] okay it's not essential to me as a thinking thing since if it was he 
says it would pertain to my will if it was an essential aspect of me it would 
pertain to my will and therefore i could control it [sniff] i could control it 
and that's what Descartes' arguing we cannot do on an initial foundation this 
is going to become clearer as the paragraph unfolds it cannot pertain to my 
will 
he says this faculty cannot pertain to my will since ideas [sniff] are often 
produced against my will ideas or images that er come alive in my head are 
often produced against my will he says okay they'd often come when i'm not 
anticipating or expecting them [sniff] so he reaches the conclusion as the key 
part point B of his deduction he reaches the conclusion that this faculty must 
reside in a substance this faculty must reside in a substance that is different 
from me [cough] [sniff] okay so we've got a thinking substance that's the first 
part point of the deduction the second point is to deduce the idea or the sorry 
the claim that there's another substance a second substance and this substance 
is different from me [sniff] now point C is to try and locate the identity of 
this other substance point C of the deduction is to try and locate the identity 
of this other substance [sniff] [sniff] Descartes does this by arguing that we 
can infer we can fer-, its we can infer its identity by examining the 
operations of this faculty we can infer its identity by examining its 
operations namely the ideas that are produced in the imagination namely the 
ideas that are produced in the imagination [sniff] now Descartes says now says 
something which is already outlined in meditation three namely that these ideas 
must possess objective reality their status must be an objective one these 
ideas that are produced in the imagination by an external substance they must 
have objective status and they must have causes they must have causes with 
greater or equal formal reality they must have causes with equal or greater 
formal reality [sniff] and he says the only substances that satisfy this 
constraint the only substances that satisfy this constraint are three firstly 
bodily substance secondly mental substance and thirdly God there are three 
substances that satisfy this constraint that is that a objective reality and 
which must have causes with greater or equal formal reality firstly bodily 
substance secondly mental substance and thirdly God now Descartes argues that 
God does not equip equip us with the material to recognize God does not equip 
us 
with the material to recognize the latter two as the immediate cause of ideas 
he does not equip us with the material to recognize the latter two mental 
substance and God as the immediate cause the immediate the first or spontaneous 
cause of those ideas what we find he says what we find is that we are strongly 
inclined here the key word is inclined we are strongly inclined he says to 
believe that it's bodies other than our own mind substances or bodies other 
than our own mind which produce the images that take place within our mind 
through the imagination and he says adding another crucial component to his 
argument that we can be sure of this we can be sure of this of the truth of 
this claim [sniff] that there are bodies outside of us producing images in our 
own mind we can be sure of this because God is not a deceiver which he believes 
he has clearly and conclusively established God is not a deceiver [sniff] so 
even though i mean there's a kind of paradox there even though God is not the 
immediate cause of ideas in this instance says Descartes [sniff] he does play 
the role of guaranteeing that we're not going to be con-, ultimately deceived 
about the nature of those ideas that they come to us spontaneously upon our 
receptive faculty er through bodily substances so he says the causes of images 
of things the final conclusion he reaches is that the causes of images of 
images of things belong to the category of bodily substance the causes of the 
images of things belong to the category of bodily substance and hence he says 
perhaps a bit too quickly in his final deduction bodies therefore exist [sniff] 
let's try and unpack that er a bit more to try and make it a bit clearer but 
clearly obviously the important move that's taking place is that Descartes' 
trying to deduce the existence of an external substance an extended or corporal 
substance which is radically different and distinct from his own substance as 
an intellectual substance in effect what Descartes is doing is making an er a 
distinction an important distinction between the modes of things [sniff] 
he's making an important distinction between the modes of things and the thing 
itself okay he's making an important distinction between the modes of things 
and thing itself [sniff] [sniff] so our intellectual faculty for example our 
intellectual faculty synthesizes it synthesizes the material that is presented 
to it synthesizes the material or the information that is presented to it 
[cough] and in this regard the most important [sniff] er function of the 
intellect is to make judgements is to make judgements about the information it 
is receiving [sniff] now Descartes then argues that there are also other f-, 
faculties in operation there are other faculties in operation and here his 
usage of faculties is quite curious okay because what he means are things like 
change in positions when he says there are faculties other than this 
intellectual faculty this faculty that synthesizes information says there are 
other faculties like changing positions and assuming different shapes okay 
these kind of er capacities Descartes calls 
faculties changing position and assuming shapes which is what bodily corporeal 
objects he says do all the time but they do not involve he says this is the key 
point he makes they do not involve these operations do not involve any 
intellectual act [cough] [sniff] they do not involve any intellectual act and 
therefore it follows for him that they have to be understood as residing in 
some other substance namely a corporeal or extended substance if they don't 
involve any intellectual act then they don't belong to the mind the mental 
substance therefore they belong to another substance the corporeal or extended 
substance [sniff] now let us note what Descartes is doing in trying to prove 
the existence of a material world okay and there's two key aspects to what's 
going on in his argument [sniff] there's two key aspects firstly his certainty 
his certainty the certainty that he's trying to develop that material things do 
in fact exist that material fa-, things do in fact exist is due his 
certainty that material things do in fact exist is due to reflecting on the 
kind of capacity he thinks sense mus-, sense perception must be okay so his 
certainty that material things do in fact exist is due [sniff] to his 
reflecting on the kind of capacity which he thinks sense perception must be the 
kind of capacity that sense perception must be [sniff] he notices as i've 
already said that sensible ideas come into existence against his will he 
notices that sensible ideas come into existence sorry come into hi-, his 
consciousness against his will sensible ideas come into existence and come int-,
enter his consciousness against his will so this means or this shows he s-, he 
argues this shows he argues that his capacity for sense perception the capacity 
he has for sense perception [sniff] is set into operation by something outside 
of his consciousness [sniff] his capacity per-, sense perception is set into 
operation by something outside his consciousness and hence which is distinct 
from his mind okay [sniff] set into 
operation by something outside of his consciousness and which can therefore be 
claimed to be distinct from the mind [sniff] he is conscious he says of the 
effects he is conscious of the effects of the operation of this active faculty 
he's conscious of the operation of this active faculty namely the ideas that it 
produces he's conscious of that operation and therefore he says he can infer 
from the existence of those ideas he can infer from the existence of those 
ideas the existence of material things which have the power which have the 
power to produce certain ideas within us [sniff] okay so he says from being 
conscious of the active operation o-, sorry from the operation of that active 
faculty namely that it produces in us certain ideas he can infer from the 
existence of those ideas the existence of material things which have the power 
to produce those ideas that's the first key aspect 
now comes the second one which is crucial for modifying what he's just claimed 
the second one what he cannot do he says what he cannot do is to safely draw 
conclusions about the nature what he can't do is to safely draw conclusions 
about the nature of material things from the ideas that arise under their 
influence okay that's the key point i'll say it again what he cannot do is to 
safely co-, draw conclusions about the nature the specific detailed nature he 
cannot draw conclusions about the specific detailed nature of those material 
things from the ideas that arise under their influence okay so he can co-, 
contemplate the ideas that are being produced in his mind he's aware that his 
mind is thinking he's aware that his mind is being activated by something 
outside of itself but what he cannot then do in any simple sense is to grasp or 
understand the nature the detailed nature of those material things which are 
producing the ideas within his mind [sniff] so this is the point for example 
the this is the point that he's making when he says that corporeal 
things this is the point he is making when he says in meditation six that 
corporeal things are perhaps this is the quote he says are perhaps not exactly 
what we perceive by the senses [sniff] corporeal things are not exactly what we 
perceive by the senses since this comprehension by the senses is in many cases 
obscure and confused okay so these corporeal things this is what he means he 
says corporeal things are perhaps not exactly what we perceive by the senses 
since they c-, this comprehension by the senses is in many cases or instances 
obscure and confused [cough] [sniff] so what Descartes' got to try and do is to 
extr-, extrapolate from the information the mind is receiving he's got to try 
and extrapolate what is clear and distinct therefore making a separation 
between what is clear and distinct from what is obscure and confused and this 
is what's motivating his move in the direction of a certain geometrical 
precision about the essential nature of objects which is not going to be 
revealed to us simply through sensory perception [sniff] okay so in order to 
have reliable thoughts about nature or the components of nature we have to rely 
not on what we sense but on what we conceive in order to 
have reliable [sniff] knowledge of nature we have to rely on what not on what 
we sense but on what we conceive that is we have to rely on the understanding 
or the pure intellect now for Descartes as i've indicated this means having 
recourse to the realm of the clear and the distinct which is the realm for him 
of pure mathematics we have to have recourse to the realm of the clear and the 
distinct that is the realm of pure mathematics [sniff] in other words what 
we'll be concerned with in our theory of knowledge or our epistemology what 
we'll be concerned with is what is general to things trying to identify what is 
general to things as opposed to what is particular about in short as i al-, 
already er repeated a number of times our attention will be focused on those 
primary qualities of objects not on the secondary qualities [sniff] things like 
shape size and motion as opposed to things like sound taste and pain [sniff] 
for example he says we can be sure we can be sure of ge-, our general 
principles of the sun we can be sure of our general principles of the sun 
namely that it 
has a cer-, certain shape and size and that it is er it exists extended in 
space this kind of knowledge is knowledge that is certain [sniff] as for things 
like sounds and pain he says these seem to pertain to matter as for things more 
secondary qualities like sound and pain sound and pain these seem to pertain to 
matter he says in virtue only of the particular sensibilities of our own 
existence as human beings okay those secondary qualities of things seem to 
pertain to matter only in virtue of the particular or peculiar sensibilities of 
ourselves as human beings [cough] [sniff] and do not exist independently they 
do not enjoy an independent existence now let's be clear about what Descartes' 
saying there clearly he's saying there is some basis in objects there is some 
basis in objects for me to have experiences of colour sounds smells and taste 
clearly there is some basis in objects for me to have those subjective 
experiences experiences of colour sound smell taste and so on but the point 
he's making is that we cannot be sure on the evidence of sense experience what 
that basis is we cannot be sure on the evidence of sense perception what that 
basis is [sniff] what we can be sure of says Descartes is that bodies have 
general properties what we can be sure of is that bodies have general 
properties and that they can be discovered by the mind independently of the 
senses okay what we can be sure of is that bodies have general properties all 
bodies have general properties that can be discovered by the mind working 
independently of the senses [sniff] [sniff] now the key question to ask 
obviously [sniff] is whether there are such things the key question to ask of 
Descartes' argument [sniff] is obviously whether there are such things as 
geometrical objects the key question to ask is whether there are such things as 
geometrical objects [cough] which apply which apply to concrete empirically 
identifiable bodies and not just to abstract figures okay do these geometrical 
ide-, er objects and the ideas we have of them do they apply to concrete 
empirically 
identifiable and often complex bodies and not just to abstract figures [sniff] 
in other words how do we know that we're not simply imposing upon a more 
complex reality simply our own geometrical prejudices some need that we have to 
have a neat and tidy conception or understanding of reality okay [cough] how do 
we know that it's not ultimately part of our own subjective make-up just like 
the secondary qualities okay now if tha-, i-, if we can sustain that argument 
then Descartes' whole position is placed into peril simply 'cause it means we 
haven't got over what he wants us to overcome namely subjectivism solipsism and 
the whole doubt that he's opened up the whole question of doubt that he's 
opened up [sniff] it also calls into question his need and desire to arrive at 
a non-biologically based conception of science or knowledge a non-biologically 
based conception of science or knowledge in other words a conception of 
knowledge which would be species spe-, specific it would be 
peculiar to our own human er existence as you recall this is one of Descartes' 
major aims is to develop a system of knowledge that is er mathematically based 
and which is objective that is it's independent of our particular biological 
con-, constitution [cough] [sniff] now what we cannot be sure of is that 
Descartes has ever accomplished the task that he set that he has set himself 
okay how do we know that this emphasis on geometrical precision is not simply 
the re-, er the product of some peculiar need or desire of the human animal to 
control external reality to domesticate nature control or tame nature and one 
of the ways of doing that is by having a very neat and tidy conception of the 
material world okay which has this clarity and distinctness that Descartes' 
aiming for how do we know that that's not simply a human prejudice or er a 
human pre-, predisposition [sniff] what we can say is that Descartes' attempt 
to exclude Descartes' attempt to exclude sense based properties Descartes' 
attempt to exclude sense based properties from scientific knowledge results in 
a very 
austere understanding of the world its attempt to exclude from scientific 
knowledge sense based properties results in very austere conception or 
understanding of the world which is reduced to essentially the properties of 
extension and motion that is essentially what the world is according to 
Descartes so it's reduced to extension and motion it gives us a very austere 
conception of the world [sniff] now later philosophers after Descartes people 
like Leibniz and Locke added more primary qualities notions of force and 
solidity for example but even though they added a few more primary properties 
they still argued they still agreed with Descartes they still agreed with 
Descartes that ultimately reality was made up of very simple components or 
simple properties and that any complexity that the world has is merely a 
surface phenomena okay so even though the list of pro-, primary properties was 
extended by later philosophers after Descartes such as Locke and Leibniz they 
still agreed with him that in 
essence the world was composed of simple natures or one or two essential 
components and therefore any complexity of the world er that we perceived in 
the world was an entirely surface phenomena [sniff] now Descartes' desire to 
reduce the world to a few essential features Descartes' desire to reduce the 
world to a few essential features is all part of his ambition it's all part of 
his ambition to know the world as it is in itself to know the world as it is in 
itself that is independently of his particular constitution independently of 
his particular constitution that is as Descartes was an embodied person living 
in a particular society at a particular point in time with a certain history 
and memory and with a certain biology it's all part of his ambition to 
transcend that particularity of constitution [sniff] and he says to do this 
we've got to subtract from our view of the world we've got to subtract to do 
this he says we find it necessary to subtract from our view of 
the world whatever is contributed by our biology whatever is contributed by our 
biology we've got to subtract from that whatever's contributed by our biology 
so it's an incredible sort of ambition that Descartes' undertaken to arrive at 
the conception of so-, science that he's he wants to arrive at [sniff] okay so 
both er er in substance is a very bold move but also because of its boldness it 
makes his position very vulnerable [cough] [sniff] okay what i want to do now 
is to turn to the second part of the lecture and offer some reflections or some 
insight and then reflections on Descartes' notorious dualism of the mind and 
the body okay per-, perhaps the er the thing that Descartes or Cartesian 
philosophy is most er renowned for for advocating a strict separation of mind 
and body a principle task of meditation six a principle task of meditation six 
is to show that material things exist [sniff] material things exist but that 
they are not in themselves as they appear to the senses okay so a principle 
task of that final meditation as we've just seen is to show that 
material things material things exist but they but that they are not in 
themselves as they appear to our senses so that the sense based view of nature 
or matter requires correction by a superior understanding the sense based view 
of matter requires correction and modification by a superior understanding 
[sniff] now Descartes in the rest of the meditation then goes on to make the 
same kind of claims about the self about the identity of the self what he'll do 
is to talk about the self in two modes he'll talk about the self in two modes 
firstly he'll offer a sense based understanding of the self and show that 
that's deficient and then he'll offer a m-, well he called it takes to be a 
superior rational rational or reason based conception of the self [sniff] okay 
so there's a certain isomorphism there between what Descartes' just said about 
material bodies and now what he's going to say about his own body [sniff] he 
says i feel myself to be he says i feel myself to be a mixture or an 
intermingling of a body and a mind i feel that's what i feel myself to be 
[sniff] a mixture or a hin-, 
intermingling of mind and body but what he wants to show or argue is that this 
is not in fact the case what there is is a union there's a union not an 
intermingling a union of two distinct components [cough] [sniff] more than that 
not only w-, does he want to argue that the mind and body are two distinct 
components but he also wants to argue that only the mental component is 
essential to a self to what it means to be a self only the mental component is 
essential [sniff] okay so the sense based conception of the self what i feel 
myself to be and what i perceive that i have a head er feet and so on all of 
this forms the inessential self for Descartes okay all of this this what i what 
i perceive through my senses to be my body forms the inessential self he says 
okay even though this body belongs strictly to me and is the site even though 
this body belongs strictly to me and is the site of all my affections and 
appetites [sniff] the site of all my appetites and affections the source of my 
pleasure and pain he says 
it forms the inessential part of what i truly am the inessential part of what i 
truly am in other words be-, because we cannot rely on the senses we cannot 
also rely on this sense based conception of the self to arrive at an adequate 
conception of the self okay if in fact we cannot rely on the senses which is 
what the meditations has tried to demonstrate conclusively up to this point we 
cannot rely on the sense based conception in order to arrive at a true identity 
of the self and this is true he says in the case of both external sensations of 
the body this is true in the case of both external sensations of the body and 
internal sen-, sensations he makes that distinction between external sensations 
of the body and internal sensations so external sensations will be things like 
that are dependent upon the stimulation things that are dependent on the 
stimulation of our sense organs such as our eyes and our ears and our nose 
these produce beliefs about the sizes and shapes of things as seen from various 
distances but 
are always subject to illusion okay those external sensations are subject to 
illusions those sensations which are dependent upon the stimulation of my sense 
organs which give me certain ideas of the shapes and positions of things in 
relation to various distances but produce illusions like looking at the sun 
just looking at it and thinking it's a very small object but there are also 
internal sensations says Descartes such as pain which we can locate in a part 
of the body internal sensations such as a pain in a part of the body all of 
these sensations int-, external and internal belong to the inessential self 
[sniff] so what he does now is is to introduce a reason based self he 
introduces the idea of a reason based self which is designed to show that the 
mind and body can be separated and seen to be distinct components can be seen 
to be distinct components [sniff] now what Descartes does is to acknowledge e-, 
even though he says we can't have reliable we can't form r-, we can't base 
reliable knowledge on our sense based self he does acknowledge or 
concede that the sensory information we receive plays an important role in our 
survival the sensory information we receive and act upon plays an important 
role he says in our survival but it's limited to our biological constitution so 
his argument there is in fact quite close strangely enough to more later 
nineteenth century Darwinian ideas [sniff] about our er senses and faculties 
evolving over time in accordance with the needs the n-, the needs we have as an 
animal to adapt to changes in circumstances Descartes acknowledges that point 
and says that that's what our senses do they enable us to survive they respond 
to certain situations and provoke certain responses okay gives us a sense of 
danger or warning for example but he says they are not sufficiently clear and 
distinct they are not sufficiently clear and distinct and only teaches what is 
confused and obscure they only teach what is con-, confused and obscure in 
other words their role if y-, one can say is entirely instinctual or 
instinctive okay the sense based impressions and 
perceptions that we're picking up on have a survival value but they are 
relative to our biological constitution they play an important role but it's 
precisely the role that's limited to the er evolutionary need to survive and to 
adapt [sniff] okay so it's inadequate Descartes' claim is his claim that he 
deduces from that is to say that it's inadequate to base a scientific 
conception of matter or nature on the needs we have to survive and adapt it's 
inadequate to base a scientific conception of nature on the on the sense based 
aspects of our self which we need in order to survive and adapt okay scientific 
investigation cannot be based on this sense based concep-, er sense based ac-, 
er aspect of our existence [sniff] now Descartes then develops a crucial 
premise in his argument he develops a crucial premise in his argument which is 
designed to separate and make clearly distinct the components of mind and body 
for example namely he argues that if bodily a-, attributes if bodily attributes 
can be subtracted from the conception of the self 
if bodily attributes can be [sniff] subtracted from the conception of the self 
if these bodily attributes can be subtracted from the conception of the self 
without taking away a clear and distinct conception of the self without taking 
away a clear and distinct conception of the self then bodily attributes can be 
regarded as extraneous and inessential to the self okay that's basically the 
essential premise in the meditation the final meditation regarding the er 
regarding the separability of mind and body and regarding the the need to treat 
them as distinct components if we can subtract bodily attributes [sniff] from 
the conception of self without taking away the idea of the self being clear and 
distinct then those bodily attributes can be regarded he says as inessential 
and extraneous to our notion of the self now in answer to the question is it 
possible to conceive of ourselves in answer to the question is it possible to 
conceive of ourselves as being devoid of powers of imagination and sensation 
and yet still have a sense of self Descartes' 
answer is yes it is possible to regard ourselves as beings devoid of 
imagination and sensation and still have a sense of ourselves as a self is this 
still possible Descartes' answer is is yes what he argues what he argues on 
this point is that completeness does not reside in the number of components of 
a thing the completeness of a thing such as our self does not reside in the 
number of components or attributes but only in their essential ones okay to 
have a sense of a completeness of something such as a self does not he says 
reside in the number of components but rather only in the essential attributes 
or components of a thing and this is what he's trying to do in his theory of 
the self he's trying to deduce what are the essential attributes of a self and 
to isolate them and say if we can extract them from the other components namely 
bodily components or attributes and if we're still left with something that we 
can identify as clear and distinct then what we've got is 
what is essential to that thing in this case the self namely thought and 
consciousness and Descartes believes we can do all of that we can extract or 
subtract [sniff] these essential properties from the bodily attributes and 
still be left with a clear s-, a conception that is clear and distinct [cough] 
now in the final part of the lecture i just want to end on a critical note and 
then go out with a bang by er reading a passage from Nietzsche er i've resisted 
all along that i hope you respect from bringing Nietzsche into these lectures 
but i'm afraid my resistance is now low and er i've brought some Nietzsche in 
for us to read er so we'll end on that point we'll we'll re-, we'll finish by 
reading the passage from Nietzsche but that passage will hopefully follow from 
what i've now got to say in the final part of the lecture offering some 
critical reflections on Descartes' curious notion of the self [sniff] what 
we'll see i mean i'm introducing Nietzsche at this point but in in many 
respects what Nietzsche has to say about 
the self and the subject er is prefigured in Hume who we're going to look at 
next week now in response to Cartesianism Hume argues that basically its 
position amounts to nonsense in short he says this is nonsense a mental 
substance alone he says is not sufficient a mental substance alone is not 
sufficient to constitute a self a mental substance alone isolating a mental 
substance is not sufficient for constituting a self [sniff] and the idea of a 
soul which Descartes also wants to develop from this isolation of the soul 
because if you've isolated the soul from the body then clearly you've isolated 
something which is immaterial okay which enjoys an a a radically different 
existence to a bodily existence which is finite mortal and so on he argues the 
idea of a soul is not scientific but an assumption at best and a piece of 
superstition at worst okay the idea of a soul is an assumption i-, is not 
scientific but is an assumption at best and a piece of superstition or 
prejudice at worst [sniff] i mean as we can discuss in the seminars one of the 
major problems that Descartes faces in arguing for the radical distinctness of 
mind and body is to try and show how if they are radically distinct they are 
interconnected how are the mind and body interconnected because surely they 
have to be and as we'll see his response is an entirely intellectualist 
response his response is an entirely intellectualist response what do i mean by 
that well for example he says that apparent bodily sensations such as a pinch 
in the stomach are not things apart from intellectual events so apparent bodily 
sensations are really he says intellectual events a special case of thoughts so 
the pinch in the stomach for him is a desire to eat and this has to be 
something that the intellect carries out not the body [sniff] now the final key 
question which will lead us nicely into Nietzsche is to ask whether the fact 
the fact that we do appear to be able to conceive of ourselves 
independently of our bodies the fact that we do appear to be able to conceive 
of ourselves independently of our bodies and therefore isolate some essential 
moi or me might this be an illusion generated might this simply be an illusion 
generated by our consciousness okay so might the fact that we do appear to be 
able to conceive of ourselves independently of our bodies might this simply be 
an illusion generated by our consciousness and therefore nothing true at all 
[sniff] okay i may consider for example my body to be an essential part of my 
existence but that does not mean that it is okay simply the fact that you 
consider your body to have been an essential part of your existence doesn't 
mean that it is illness and disease for example often make us aware well not 
often but all the time make us aware of the prime importance of our body which 
for the most time we simply ignore like a machine and assume and hope that it's 
functioning entirely er smoothly so how is the 
illusion the question we need to ask is how is the illusion of the subject or 
the self generated if it is an illusion as Hume and Nietzsche will argue how is 
this illusion generated [sniff] in whi-, er clearly Descartes on one level is 
hitting onto something that we can all perhaps immediately recognize that with 
sense that are our bodies are perhaps inessential and that there's a little 
sort of homonculus in our heads which is which is our essential identities it's 
our minds and that's what's essential by us but what Hume and Nietzsche want to 
er try and the idea they want us to try and entertain is the idea that it might 
be an illusion generated by consciousness but how what's the mechanism for the 
generation of this illusion within consciousness well for Hume as we'll see in 
detail in the coming weeks it's created by the force of our habits and customs 
our social habits and customs and our mental habits and customs [sniff] it 
simply re-, resides in our customary practices which have er which have accrued 
over time and which we 
take to be er revealing something true about reality but w-, m-, which may 
simply conceal prejudices for Nietzsche the illusion lies in the sedimentations 
of our grammar and our linguistic conventions the illusion resides in the 
sedimentations of our grammar and our linguistic conventions [sniff] as you 
know Nietzsche was a great Averroist and in one of his most pithy moments he 
says for example er we will not get rid of God he says which is clearly what 
his entire life was designed to do we will not get rid of God he says until we 
get rid of grammar we will not get rid of God until we get rid of grammar 
fantastic quote what does it mean i'll leave you to ponder that okay but er we 
will not get rid of God until we get rid of grammar now what we're going to do 
is just end the lecture by reading this passage from Nietzsche's Genealogy of 
Morality where he tries to expose this illusion of the self or subject and i'll 
just read it out and then we'll stop [sniff] okay it's just a final piece of 
entertainment in the conclusion to the lectures on Descartes okay it's just 
three lines down we're going to read most of the page on the left-hand side and 
just stop at the top of the right-hand side page so three lines down [sniff] 
Nietzsche says there is nothing strange about the fact i i hope this just gives 
you some food for thou-, thought over the er weekend he says this er there is 
nothing strange about the fact that lambs bear a grudge towards large birds of 
prey but that is no reason to blame the large birds of prey for carrying off 
the little lambs and if the lambs say to each other these birds of prey are 
evil then whoever i-, is least like a bird of prey and most like its opposite a 
lamb is good isn't he then there is no reason to raise objections to this 
setting up of an ideal beyond the fact that the birds of prey will view it som-,
view it somewhat derisively and perhaps say we don't bear any grudge at all 
towards these good lambs in fact we love them nothing is tastier than a tender 
lamb 
this is just abs-, as absurd okay so Nietzsche's point is a kind of culinary 
point but now he's off going on to make a philosophical one he says it's just 
as absurd to ask strength not to express itself as strength not to be a desire 
to overthrow crush become master to be a thirst for enemies resistance and 
triumphs as it is to ask of weakness to express itself as strength a quantum of 
force is just such a quantum of drive will action in fact it is nothing but 
this driving willing and acting and only the seduction of language in the 
fundamental of r-, errors of reason that are petrified in it which construes 
and misconstrues all actions as conditional upon an agency a subject can make 
it appear otherwise and just as the common people separates lighting from its 
flash and takes the latter to be a deed something performed by a subject which 
is called lightning popular morality separates strengths from the 
manifestations of strengths as though there were an 
indifferent substratum [sniff] behind the strong person which had the freedom 
to manifest strength or not but there is no such substratum there is no being 
behind the deed its effect and what becomes of it the deer the doer sorry the 
deer i'm on this er food er poi-, aren't i the doer i'm obviously anticipating 
what i'm going to have for tea tonight [laughter] but anyway the doer is 
invented i have a very rich existence er i'll have you know [laughter] i eat 
deer every night the doer is invented as an afterthought the doing is 
everything okay the doing is everything basically the common people double a 
deed and when they see lightning they make doing a deed out of it they posit 
the same event first as cause and then as effect so Nietzsche's saying there 
there is only the one event there's no cause and effect there's no subject and 
object no subject or substance as subject this is the final part now the 
scientists do no better when they say force moves force causes and such like 
all our science in spite of its coolness and freedom from emotion still 
stands exposed to the seduction of language and has not ridded itself of the 
changelings foisted upon it the subjects for example the atom just such a 
changeling likewise the Kantian thing in itself no wonder then he says if the 
entrenched secretly smouldering emotions of revenge and hatred put this belief 
to their own use and in fact do not defend and believe more passionately than 
the strong are free to be weak and the birds of prey are free to be lambs in 
this way they gain the right to make the birds of prey responsible for being 
birds of prey profound quotation i hope you agree and basically Nietzsche's 
point is that it's only the weak who need to believe in a self or a subject and 
i'll leave you with that thought