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Study On Descartes' S Intuition

Posted on:2011-01-20Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:L J YangFull Text:PDF
GTID:2215330362956988Subject:Foreign philosophy
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Rene Descartes, founder of modern philosophy, has been the focus since 17th century, no matter philosophy's direction for epistemology by him or his methods of exploring knowledge. Descartes showed us two ways of seeking truth, that is intuition and deduction, in his book The Guiding Principle of Getting the Truth,however, he put more emphasis on intuition. The article tries to explore the effect of intuition on certain knowledge construction and moreover, its practical significance.Intuition is a pure spiritual action which means mental-seeing. Knowledge that stems from our heart is certain. Rene Descartes considered both intuition and deduction as methods and sources of reaching truth. However, the first principle can be reached only by self-evidential intuition. Doubtness, an important method for Descartes to construct philosophical thought, has the same direction as intuition, which is to get certain and distinct knowledge. It is considered that Descartes begins his journey of contemplation from doubtness, and then he finds out a way for certain knowledge by intuition and deduction. Also, Descartes enlightens his first principle Cogito ergo sum by self-evidential intuition. Then we have to ask: Is intuition qualified for certain knowledge construction? It is the core of this paper.As far as intuition's evidence is considered, Descartes'intuition theory serves as direct source of Hussel's theory of intuition of essence. However, there have some differences, even though they both pursue knowledge from the inside. In contemporary times, there appears a large number of problems in our spiritual life, as contradiction of science and human culture the core. How to communicate them for the development of human thinking ways and improving our spiritual life? Descartes'intuition method helps us to find a way out from the state nowadays.
Keywords/Search Tags:intuition, deduction, certain, science, human culture
PDF Full Text Request
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