Father knows best

The will, also called freedom of choice, is the greatest perfection in us. It is not restricted in any way by God or any other force. In fact, Descartes’ almost puts the meditator on par with God concerning this freedom in the fact that “[God’s will] does not seem any greater than mine” (CSM 40). Descartes’ defines will as “our ability to do or not do something” (CSM 40). Ok, simple enough. Say, there is a pie cooling on the windowsill (I’m fairly certain this practice ended about the same time that “Father Knows Best” went off the air- but just work with me here). Complete freedom is our ability to choose to eat the pie or not eat the pie because there are no other options concerning the pie. Well, kind of. Being indifferent to the pie is also a freedom in itself, but a weak one. It is from this that Descartes’ two kinds of freedom are defined: by whether the will is used or not used in making a choice.

Warning! I’m about to go off topic in this paragraph. Please feel free to skip to the next one.
This concept of weak and strong freedom is, as I understand it, that if we are inclined to eat the pie (through clear understanding, divine grace, or natural knowledge) we are freer and if we are indifferent (no reason leading us one way or the other) this is the “lowest grade of freedom” (CSM 40). Wait… what? There are better or worse freedoms? But more than that, we are actually more free if we are moved by either inward or divine force to making a decision one way or the other? It seems to me that freedom is freedom and it can’t be varied especially if it is just in our knowledge or understanding of the thing we are making the choice on. In fact, just my gut reaction is that it is the exact opposite of what Descartes is claiming. We are freer to make decisions if we have no inclination either way. No bias, no “divine grace” pushing us, no inclinations- just us and our will. Yes, Father... I mean God... does know best because of his perfection, but I don't understand what freeom has to do with perfection. Freedom isn't correctly or incorrectly used, in my view. Freedom just is. But that’s beside the point…

So, there seems to be two major categories of freedom: the freedom of indifference and The Other freedom. It is this second kind of freedom that greatly confuses me. I don’t know exactly what to call it. I want to call it freedom of inclination, but this seems somewhat troubling. Hatfield specifically calls this second freedom “freedom in acting in accordance with our own will” or “freedom of spontaneity” (Hatfield 193). It is self-determinism. We are free, but at the same time our will has determined the right choice for us. So, we can be either have less freedom by not being having our free will determined or we can have more freedom by having our choices already made for us. Then my head explodes.

Rotten apple

What is it for an idea to resemble a thing? Resemble? Resemble… resemble… this mundane and commonplace word is suddenly foreign to me. Coming up with an adequate definition seems an impossible task. A copy. Like. Similar to. Well, that’s a start.

There is an apple (thing). There is a painting of an apple (an idea). The painting resembles the apple, but it seems to me that we cannot claim the reverse. An apple does not resemble a painting of an apple. They are indeed similar and alike, but because the painting is detached, secondary, and only created in reflection of the original object. It seems dependent on the existence of the original object. Even this idea doesn’t seem to hold water because what if a person is inspired by an apple and goes to create something that looks nothing like the apple, but has been colored, shaped, and abstracted to the point where an outside party would have no inkling as to the original inspiration of the work. Does it then still resemble the object? I am tempted to say that it resembles the object at least for the individual who created it. But if I look back at my original definitions it is neither a copy nor a likeness to the original. Therefore an abstract painting of an apple that is so distanced from the object of its inspiration as to be unrecognizable to any onlookers without some complicated and perhaps convoluted explanation by the creator it cannot be said to resemble the object. Then I would be calling the object false in its resemblance, calling the creator and the ideas of the creator false. I believe that ideas cannot be false therefore there must be something more to resemblance that stops me from denying that the abstract painting resembles the apple. The most I can come up with is that the painting (idea) resembles the apple (thing) in its essence or spirit. This holds true even if this essence is only seen by the creator, or has been greatly influence by other thoughts, ideas, images, emotions, volitions, judgments, and what have you in the creator’s mind. But my use of the apple as the thing and a painting as the idea could be closing me off to see this from a diferent light therefore I can only hope that my blog here resembles something semi-intelligible.

Naturally in the dark

Nature as teacher comes from the resemblance thesis (as it is called by Hatfield). It is one explanation for why we believe that things outside of us are the sources for ideas. We are lead to believe that nature is natural light, but what it really is natural impulse. The key difference here is that the light is indubitable while the impulse is fallible. Descartes explains that natural impulses (namely sensations) have already proven to lead us in the wrong direction in our judgment. Plus there is also the consideration that we make a judgment with the assumption that the idea was given to us through nature and natural light because we did not will it into our minds, but this does not prove that there are things outside us, which give birth to these ideas. What I thought was natural light revealed through impulse could have been “some other faculty not fully known to me, which produced these ideas without an assistance from external things” like dreaming (CSM 27).

Natural light is shown through the cogito. And, if I understand it correctly, may actually be the source that shows us that what nature teaches us cannot be trusted. Natural light must be made separate from the truth rule, or at least I believe them to be two separate things. Previous to this meditation natural light was brought up alongside reason and I assume that although not explicitly stated they are the same concept. Another question I have concerning natural light is that Descartes states that, “there cannot be another faculty both as trustworthy as the natural light and also capable of showing me that such things are not true.” (CSM 27). It is this “not” that makes me a little hesitant about what natural light exactly is. Could something we believe to be true because it has not been proven false by our natural light, still be false because it natural light has only as of yet not shown it to be false? Or is everything not shown to be false by natural light is necessarily true? Does distinct and clear perception play a role in deciding what is true once natural light has not proven something false? I may simply be confusing things more... which is something Descartes does to me, but hopefully there is a simple explanation that I have just missed.