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Descartes Meditations On First Philosophy

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This essay seeks to provide a critical commentary on Descartes’ disquisition titled ‘Meditations on first philosophy’, based on Descartes’ arguments about ‘human nature’ and what makes one human. For Descartes, what makes one human is the ability to be aware of one’s self; using reason and rationality to comprehend information and the world around us. Descartes’ famous quote exemplifies this argument, he stated ‘cogito ergo sum’ ‘I think therefore I am’ concluding that the first thing that one can be certain of is one’s existence. In passage three of the second meditation the meditator seeks to identify exactly what ‘I’, ‘a thing that thinks’ is. This essay will provide an analysis of Descartes ' philosophical theories expressed in passage three of the "Second Meditation."
The passage emerges with the meditator trying to find a source for his existence. The meditator begins by asking ‘but what am I then? A thing that thinks. What is that?’ (He concludes that he is not only a thinking substance, but he is also able to doubt, understand and will; along with being able to have ‘sensory perceptions’. This could be a result of the meditator 's supposed physical sensory organs triggering responses in his mind. The mind and body working together enables him to question the senses in which he believes he is experiencing. This brings forward the philosophical concept of Cartesian Dualism. A concept proffered by Descartes, in which he argues that the nature of the mind, a

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