Western Civilization II / Unit 5 WC2 0421 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Descartes: Doubt, "I Think, Therefore I Am", and a Non-Meddling God
Captions available
The idea
Descartes, who died in sixteen fifty, made doubt his method and found one certainty: I think, therefore I am. From the thinking self he deduced a benevolent, non-meddling God, deduction applied to theology. The witness calls him the first modern rationalist.
In practice
Rationalists, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz; empiricists, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, per the witness.
Where people slip
Descartes deduces; Bacon induces. The exam pairs them as opposites.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
Something wrong in this lesson? Flag it