Dissertation, University of Illinois at Chicago (
2018)
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Abstract
Descartes is not widely recognized for his ethics; indeed, most readers are unaware that he
had an ethics. However, Descartes placed great importance on his ethics, claiming that ethics is
the highest branch of his philosophical system. I aim to understand the systematic relationship
Descartes envisions between his ethics and the rest of his philosophy, particularly his
metaphysics and epistemology. I defend three main theses. First, I argue against the recent trend
in the literature that claims that the chief virtue in Descartes’ ethics—generosity—is acquired in
the Meditations. On this view, the presence of moral virtue in the Meditations shows that ethical
practice is intertwined with metaphysics and epistemology. I argue that generosity cannot be
acquired in the Meditations because acquiring generosity presupposes several metaphysical and
physical truths that the meditator cannot access given her epistemic position. Thus, I maintain
that metaphysics and epistemology is foundational to ethics. Second, I resolve the tension
between Descartes’ description of distinct virtues, and his insistence that there is only a single
virtue—the disposition to judge well. Drawing from his theory of conceptual distinction in his
metaphysics, I argue that Descartes offers a unique account of the unity of the virtues. Although
Descartes describes different virtues, he thinks that all of them are identical to each other because
they are reducible to the disposition to judge well. Nonetheless, we can conceptually distinguish
between the virtues because we can regard the disposition to judge well in different ways given
the various applications it has in different types of moral situations. Third, I show that some of
Descartes’ ethical concepts inform his epistemology. I draw from Descartes’ theory of virtue to
address “the problem of knowledge preservation,” that is, how to render perfect knowledge—
scientia—stable in light of the instability of clear and distinct perceptions. I argue that Descartes
intends to preserve scientia by grounding items of scientia in virtuous habits of belief. These
habits of belief are established through repeated engagement with cognitive routes to clear and
distinct perceptions, and are ultimately grounded in memory. This reading has the advantage of
explaining Descartes’ notoriously confusing remarks about memory in response to the Cartesian
circle.