René Descartes and natural science
René Descartes was a french philosopher, mathematician, scientist, priest and lawyer, born in 1596. On invitation of queen Kristina of Sweden he moved to her court in Stockholm 1649 but died there of pneumonia after only one year. Nowadays he is perhaps known mostly for his philosophic conclusion ”cogito ergo sum” (I think, thus I exist). In this he saw a secure way to evaluate knowledge and its value in respect to truth. Man cannot spontaniously know anything about anything if he would not able to think and to doubt his thoughts. And Descartes believed that the ability to think is not possible if you don’t exist.
About 1630 Descartes presented his thesis ”Rules for the Direction oft he Mind”. There he described four rules for seeking the truth. These four rules eventually became the basis for the evolution of natural sciences:
1) Never accept anything as truth if you do not clearly perceive it as truth.
2) Split up each one of the problems wich are examined in as many parts as possible.
3) Start with the easiest and simples questions and proceed thereafter in steps to the most complicated.
4) Make enumerations and general surveys so complete that you can be sure that nothing has been omitted.
It has been said that Descartes insight came to him during a vision in high fever. But this feverish dream resulted in a revolutionary and functioning method to expand, test and evaluate ideas by means of logic thought, which then became the basis of what today is known as natural science. It can perhaps be seen as ironic that the tremendous progress of natural science in western societies eventually also gave rise to an increasing rejection of intuitive inner knowledge and the potential power of awareness and insight. Descartes himself had not arrived at his insight using rational analysis and logic asessment but, as he himself said, through some sort of dream in an illnes with high fever. The conclusion here would then be that inspiration is not the same as analysis but can be equally important. The first can perhaps be seen as an outspring mainly of the subconcious mind and the other as a product of the conscious reasoning mind. But both are equally important in the process of greater understanding and will therefore complete each other.
Thomas Edison, inventor of the light bulb, considered creativity to be 10% inspiration and 90% transpiration. The four rules of Descartes may perhaps diminish transpiration when seeking the truth, but they cannot replace inspiration. Logic thinking can split a from the beginning totally unknown whole into understandable parts and give us, when the parts are gathered, some understanding of the the whole. Inspiration in the form of inner experience can give us an insight of the whole without a direct understanding of the parts. Usually we believe that a lot of parts together is the whole. But in complicated problems a sum of parts is often not the same as an understanding of the whole. The sum needs to be transformed to a synthesis for the whole to be understood. This is what inspiration together with logic thinking can achieve. These two abilities, considered to be unique to mankind, have to be balanced with each other to be of use to our growth and our capabilities, as individuals and in society.
No one can deny the enormous potential of natural science to develop and improve the material world of man and so create a better world for us all. But, like anything else also this has its drawbacks. Today this seems to become more and more obvious in western societies.