En este artículo se desarrolla la hipótesis de que el conocimiento de la sustancia pensante en las Meditaciones sobre la filosofía primera y en Objeciones y Respuestas no es claramente explicitado por René Descartes. Se entiende que tal exposición es necesaria para una comprensión integral delestatus de la filosofía cartesiana en el momento de redactar las Meditaciones y, principalmente, paraasimilar cómo concebía Descartes el conocimiento de la sustancia pensante en los años 1641 y 1642.El conocimiento de la sustancia pensante es, (...) como se sabe, un elemento fundamental para toda la filosofía cartesiana. Para ello, se recurre, primeramente, a los dos modos en que Descartes presentael conocimiento de la sustancia pensante en las Meditaciones, destacando los problemas que cadauno de estos conlleva. Posteriormente, a partir de las Objeciones y Respuestas, principalmentela quinta y la séptima, se presenta las críticas de Pierre Gassendi y Pierre Bourdin sobre elconocimiento de la sustancia pensante. Tanto Gassendi como Bourdin subrayan que el texto deMeditaciones no es suficiente para esclarecer de qué manera la sustancia pensante es conocida. En este sentido, Gassendi y Bourdin cuestionan la posibilidad de este conocimiento, destacando la ambiguedad y oscuridad de las respuestas cartesianas. Se concluye que en las Meditaciones,Descartes enfrenta una brecha insalvable entre la ontología de la sustancia y su conocimiento, loque lo llevará a desarrollar y explicar mejor su teoría en escritos posteriores. (shrink)

It is a matter of continuing scholarly dispute whether Descartes offers a metaphysics of the material world that is “monist” or “pluralist.” One passage that has become crucial to this debate is from the Synopsis of the Meditations, in which Descartes argues that since “body taken in general” is a substance, and since all substances are “by their nature incorruptible,” this sort of body is incorruptible as well. In this article I defend a pluralist reading of this passage, according to (...) which there are indefinitely many bodies-taken-in-general, each of which counts as an incorruptible material substance. However, I also consider some surprising features of the argument in the Synopsis. One is that this argument conflicts with the implication in Descartes that any two “really distinct” substances can each exist without the other existing. Another is that the argument tends to undermine his suggestion that there is room at a fundamental metaphysical level for ordinary material objects. (shrink)

Jean-Luc Marion, in his latest book, “Sur la pensée passive de Descartes,” recently published in an English translation, challenges something he refers to, in the English subtitle, as “the Myth of Cartesian Dualism” and counters it with his original interpretation of Descartes’ notion of meum corpus. This article explores the reasons he adduces for this purpose. The case is made that Marion fails to provide sufficiently solid argumentative and textual support for his construal in this respect and that traditional substance (...) dualistic interpretative resources allow for a more straightforward and systematic reading. It is argued that Marion’s central dualism-deflecting claim, that in the Meditations, “my body” is not an extended thing but a mode of thought, is undermined by an analysis that carefully considers the context of those Descartes’ statements to which Marion appeals. (shrink)