THE METAPHYSICS OF AUGUSTINE AND THE FOUNDATION OF THE CARTESIAN SCIENCE

The aim of this paper is to show to what extent Descartes can be situated within the Augustinian metaphysical tradition and to what extent he has departed from it. To this end, we will argue that Descartes has borrowed his main Meditations’ arguments from Augustine’s philosophy. However, in spite of...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor: Teixeira, William de Jesus
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2017
País:Brasil
Institución:Universidade de São Paulo (USP)
Repositorio:Cadernos Espinosanos (Online)
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:revistas.usp.br:article/137402
Acceso en línea:https://revistas.usp.br/espinosanos/article/view/137402
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Descartes
Augustine
Metaphysics
Cogito
Science.
Descripción
Sumario:The aim of this paper is to show to what extent Descartes can be situated within the Augustinian metaphysical tradition and to what extent he has departed from it. To this end, we will argue that Descartes has borrowed his main Meditations’ arguments from Augustine’s philosophy. However, in spite of all factual and textual evidence we will provide against the originality of Descartes’ metaphysical discussions, it will be stressed, on the other hand, that in borrowing not only the cogito argument, but also some general features of his philosophy from Augustine’s works, Descartes intends to frame a metaphysics which will be the ground on his new mechanistic physics. Having this in mind, we will hold that no claim can be put forward against the originality and far-reaching scope of Descartes’ philosophical intentions. Indeed, Descartes’ purpose is to build a new science under a metaphysics, even though this metaphysics is the Augustianian one.