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Philosophy Metaphysics

Insight and Inference

Descartes's Founding Principle and Modern Philosophy

by (author) Murray Miles

Publisher
University of Toronto Press, Scholarly Publishing Division
Initial publish date
Dec 1999
Category
Metaphysics, Epistemology, Modern, Rationalism, Criticism
  • Hardback

    ISBN
    9780802043153
    Publish Date
    Mar 1999
    List Price
    $192.00
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781442615021
    Publish Date
    Dec 1999
    List Price
    $47.95
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9781442676190
    Publish Date
    Feb 1999
    List Price
    $188.00

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Description

In this major re-examination of Descartes's founding principle, cogito, ergo sum, Murray Miles presents a portrait of Descartes as the Father of Modern Philosophy that is very different from the standard one.

Viewing Descartes in both a historical and a systematic perspective, Miles presents a wealth of original analyses, arguments, and re-interpretations of key texts. The result is a fresh and illuminating account of Descartes's metaphysical project and theory of the mind. Descartes's achievement is a radical reversal of the order of knowing, a subjectivism that places knowledge of the mind ahead of knowledge of material things, yet is free of the metaphysical idealism that some of his successors went on to embrace.

A meticulous, scholarly, and exhaustive analysis, this book provides a minutely detailed reading of each word of Descartes's founding principle, exploring in great depth the underlying epistemology and ontology. The book will fully repay a careful reading by any serious student of Descartes's philosophy.

About the author

Murray Miles is a professor of philosophy at Brock University.

Murray Miles' profile page

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