After reading chapter 6 and 7 of the textbook, Philosophy the Power of Assignment

After reading chapter 6 and 7 of the textbook, Philosophy the Power of Ideas, answer the following questions - Assignment Example ne Descartes, however, realized that although he could doubt everything else, he could not doubt his very own existence because existence is a sine qua non for doubting. His doubting self/existence therefore became the starting point of his theory of knowledge. Having proved his existence, Rene Descartes went on to prove the existence of God. Descartes argued that since doubting is less perfect than to know/knowledge, he was an imperfect being; Descartes realized that there must be a perfect being that does not doubt, a being that knows everything. Descartes concluded that the perfect being is God. Descartes, therefore, argued that God is the truth and all other things share in the truth of God. God therefore became the metaphysical basis of Descartes’ Epistemology. Descartes concluded that everything that we can conceive clearly and distinctly is true because it is a participation God, the truth itself. An evaluation of Descartes theory of knowledge shows that the theory was a phenomenal milestone in Philosophy, the theory challenged Philosophers to base their arguments only on logical truths, rather than, on believes and doctrines that have no logical basis. Question 2. Thomas Hobbes was a thorough going materialist. Hobbes argued that all reality is material, including thoughts, feelings and ideas. Hobbes argued that all reality in the universe can be explained in material form, i.e. in terms of the motions and the interactions of material bodies. For this reason, Hobbes denied existence of any immaterial reality. For this reason, Hobbes saw human beings as machines, operating solely according to the physical laws; For Hobbes therefore all human actions can be explained in terms of cause and effect. An evaluation of this theory reveals one glaring shortcoming: Hobbes did not give a sufficient and convincing account of how human thoughts and ideas are material in nature; Hobbes did not give a convincing argument on how the motions and interactions of