Date: Tue, 04 Aug 1998 22:13:08 +0200
From: Henk van Tuijl <Henk.van.Tuijl-AT-net.HCC.nl>
Subject: Re: truth


Prof. Dr. Rafael Capurro wrote:
> 
> Dear Anthony,
> 
> I am interested in your realistic (?) interpretation of Descartes but I
> agree with Michael that the locus of truth is the _mens_. What I do not
> quite understand is Descartes' view of the connection (?) between _esprit_
> and _cerveau_. There is the passage (AT, IX, p.124):
> "mais seulement en tant qu'elles informent l'esprit mesme, qui s'applique à
> cette partie du cerveau"
> What does it mean: _s'applique_?
> As far as I understood, Descartes refutes Gassendi, who tries to conceive
> this relation in a, as we would say, more cybernetic manner
> cf. for instance AT VII, p. 292:
> "cum aliunde vero, ad notitiam alicujus rei eliciendam,necesse sit rem agere
> in facultatem cognoscentem, immitere neme in illam sui speciem, sive sui
> specie illam informare... seipsam transmittere"
> Well, _immittere_, _informare_, _transmittere_ are almost a trans-formation
> of scholastic terms (hylemorphic ones) into modern i.e. epistemological (and
> cybernetic) terms. This transformation (including the one of the scholastic
> term _informatio_!) is denied by Descartes, for whom all forms all already
> in the mind (cf. for instance, AT III, Correspondance, p. 404: "sequatur
> omnia corpora, atque adeo totum hunc mundum visibilem, ab humana mente
> produci posse") (just as a modern constructivist would say...)
> So, Descartes is denying the _forming_ (informatio) of the intellectus
> through the senses (information sensus et intellectus) as Scholastic
> postulated, but he is (or this is my question to you) postulating another
> (epistemological?) kind of _relation_ between the mind and the cerebrum.
> kind regards
> rafael

Rafael,

Marion points in a certain direction, showing - like you seem to do -
that Anthony may have a point; although one he might not want to make:  

Ainsi l'union de l'âme et du corps partage avec le libre arbitre, outre
le rang de notion primitive (ou première), le recours obligé, pour en
prendre la moindre connaissance, non à la cogitatio, mais à une
expérience plus confuse, qui ne livre pas d'objet au regard d'une
évidence présente. A ce repli de la cogitatio, tant comme mode que comme
objet de connaissance, répond la disparition de la substance, pour
définir l'ego: dans les Passions de l'âme, ce terme se réduit à un
hapax, qui ne désigne que le cerveau [...], jamais la mens ni l'ego.
(Marion, 1986:215, n 85; cf. AT, XI, 352)

Kindest regards,
Henk



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