Hobbes Vs. Descartes Term Paper

Open, View, and/or
Download this Document

Total Length: 1184 words ( 4 double-spaced pages)

Total Sources: 1+

Page 1 of 4

Philosophy

Thomas Hobbes believed that all matter was in motion and would remain in that state until and unless another force changed it (Hobbes 1651). He saw that thought reflected the motion of things in the material world and affected the senses and the brain until this new motions degraded a previous one. To Hobbes, 1) everything, including the mind and the soul, is material; 2) man is born with a blank or tabula rasa mind; and 3) all mental activity proceeded from the senses.

Hobbes established a hierarchy of abstract thought levels. At the base was the representation or appearance, the first motion transmitted by the senses to the brain. Upon entry into the brain, it followed a "trayne (Hobbes)," which was the course of its motion in interacting with other representations. The power or influence of each motion decreased as it interacted, and he called this interaction imagination, which he viewed as the "first internal beginning of all Voluntary Motion." All the different traynes in the mind at one time and not yet deteriorating constituted memory.

He established the distinct types of imagination as the simple and the compound: simple, referring to particular traynes; and compound, the interaction among separate traynes. Individual traynes were either regulated or unguided. Unguided traynes were free from passion or desire, while regulated traynes were influenced by passion or desire.

He perceived that imagination changed form from "mere mental discourse" to a verbal discourse through speech. From this, he established that understanding was conception caused by speech (Hobbes). It was not a separate function or level of cognition, but a particular group of traynes, initiated by one's exposure to the sense of speech.

Hobbes viewed reason as conceiving the sum total - of a series of parts, a remainder from subtraction, the consequence of the parts in relation to the whole, or of the whole, from one part to another.

Stuck Writing Your "Hobbes Vs. Descartes" Term Paper?

View All Our Example Hobbes Vs. Descartes Term Paper

Have A Custom Example Essay Written

Voluntary Motions affected the inner organs of a person, and different stimuli resulted in different types of Voluntary Motions, which he called endeavors. Endeavors directed at an external object turned into a desire or aversion. The highest cognitive level, the will, translated the desire or aversion into physical motion.

Summarizing, Hobbes saw all things, including thought, as material. Ironically, he also maintained that human beings actually never experienced the true materiality of what they sensed (Hobbes). Sense was an external conveyor that made its way through the nerves, other stings and body membranes, towards the brain and the heart, where a resistance developed into an expression of itself. The appearance was fancy or a dream, which was one thing and the object of it was another. Hobbes skeptically believed that all human or life experience was really and merely a perception and that no one could ever acquire real knowledge of this material world (Hobbes).

In contrast, Rene Descartes thought that the human mind and God were alike in that both could think but had no physical realities (Chew 1996). He believed, though, that God created the universe and held the sole power in maintaining it. The difference was that the human mind, though distinct from God, was finite and dependent on God, Who was infinite and did not depend on anything outside Himself for existence.

Descarte also held some kind of movement in the human mind's reaction to external events. External motions affected the nerves, displacing central ends and rearranging "interfibrillar" space, and, in the process, animal spirits were directed into the nerves (Chew). Descartes believed that the rational soul was distinct from the….....

Show More ⇣

     Open the full completed essay and source list


OR

     Order a one-of-a-kind custom essay on this topic


sample essay writing service

Cite This Resource:

Latest APA Format (6th edition)

Copy Reference
"Hobbes Vs Descartes" (2004, March 05) Retrieved June 4, 2026, from
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/hobbes-descartes-164475

Latest MLA Format (8th edition)

Copy Reference
"Hobbes Vs Descartes" 05 March 2004. Web.4 June. 2026. <
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/hobbes-descartes-164475>

Latest Chicago Format (16th edition)

Copy Reference
"Hobbes Vs Descartes", 05 March 2004, Accessed.4 June. 2026,
https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/hobbes-descartes-164475
   

Open, View, and/or
Download this Document
order custom essay example