What Is Real?

Well, we've have certainly gotten into the deeper aspects of CIE.... something that I think is pretty cool. On the order of discussion today: do animals think, distinguishing what reality is, and the implications of Descartes thoughts.

1. Animals rationalize...based on their instincts. Humans can rationalized based on common sense and reasoning, and we are aware that we can do this. Existing, in Descartes sense, implies that you can make decisions for yourself based on your own reasoning and sense, not on the genes that tell you to do this. (Not that Descartes knew about genes....Mendel was a bit after his time)

2. I think that defining what is real and what is not real differs from person to person. Just because your sense tell you that it real, the logical part of your mind may tell you differently. This is the difference between us and animals, I doubt that animals can consciously control their thoughts as they run away from a predator.

3. One of the questions today was: Why didn't Descartes publish his other works during his life. Apparently he was a hell of a lot smarter than Galileo. The Discourse had such strong implications that topping that could have been pretty hard. Or maybe he did not want to touch on the whole religion and science aspect and thus shyed away from distrubing anyone in order to keep his private life private. I think most people favored free thought during the time of Descartes books but never actually came and decided for themselves that they could question the reality of some issues.