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Treatise on the Human Mind (1666)

  • Book
  • © 1997

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Authors:
  1. Louis Forge
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Table of contents (28 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-31
    Download chapter PDF

  2. Plan and Division of the Treatise

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 33-34

  3. The Nature of the Human Mind, and that it is easier to know than the Body

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 35-37

  4. Everything which Thinks is Immaterial

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 38-43

  5. Proof of the Same Thesis, against those who admit both Bodily and Spiritual Substances

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 43-48

  6. Another Proof, against those who Admit only Bodily Substances

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 48-56

  7. Everything which Thinks, Thinks Continuously as long as it Exists

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 56-61

  8. The Mind is Immortal

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 61-66

  9. The Faculties which are Inseparable from the Mind, and those which are Specific to the Human Mind

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 67-73

  10. Knowledge in General

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 73-76

  11. Corporeal Species, and Intellectual Ideas or Notions

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 77-97

  12. The Will

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 97-112

  13. The Mind Considered with respect to Duration and Place

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 112-117

  14. How, in general, Mind and Body can be United

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 117-125

  15. How the Human Mind and Body are specifically United; and what informs us about their Union

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 125-133

  16. The Causes and Articles of this Union, and its Principal Location

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 134-142

  17. How the Mind and Body Act on each other, and how one Body moves another

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 143-152

  18. The Nature and Diversity of the Soul’s Sensations

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 152-158

  19. The Imagination

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 159-177

  20. Memory and Recollection

    • Louis De La Forge
    Pages 177-187
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Keywords

About this book

Descartes' philosophy represented one of the most explicit statements of mind-body dualism in the history of philosophy. Its most familiar expression is found in the Meditations (1641) and in Part I of The Principles 0/ Philosophy (1644). However neither of these books provided a detailed discussion of dualism. The Meditations was primarily concerned with finding a foundation for reliable human knowledge, while the Principles attempted to provide an alternative metaphysical framework, in contrast with scholastic philosophy, within which natural philosophy or a scien­ tific explanation of natural phenomena could be developed. Thus neither book ex­ plicitly presents a Cartesian theory of the mind nor does either give a detailed account of how, if dualism were accepted, mind and body would interact. The task of articulating such a theory was left to two further works, only one of which was completed by Descartes, viz. the Treatise on Man (published posthumously in 1664). The Treatise began with the following sentence, describing the hypothetical human beings who were to be explained in that work: 'These human beings will be com­ posed, as we are, of a soul and a body; and, first of all, I must describe the body for you separately; then, also separately, the soul; and fmally I must show you how these two natures would have to be joined and united to constitute human beings resembling us.

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