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Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Meditations' and ''Ostrich Nominalism' or 'Mirage Realism'?'

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3 ideas

18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 2. Propositional Attitudes
In some thoughts I grasp a subject, but also I will or fear or affirm or deny it [Descartes]
     Full Idea: Other thoughts are different from ideas, as when I will, or fear, or affirm, or deny, there is always some thing that I grasp as the subject of my thought, yet I embrace in my thought something more than the likeness of that thing.
     From: René Descartes (Meditations [1641], §3.37)
     A reaction: Note that the class of mental events we call 'propositional attitudes' had already been identified by Descartes. His categories of thinking in Med. Three might be one of his most important contributions, because that is what matters in the mind.
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 5. Rationality / b. Human rationality
Descartes created the modern view of rationality, as an internal feature instead of an external vision [Descartes, by Taylor,C]
     Full Idea: Rationality is now an internal property of subjective thinking, rather than its consisting in (according to Plato) its vision of reality. This view of Descartes' has become the standard modern view.
     From: report of René Descartes (Meditations [1641]) by Charles Taylor - Sources of the Self §8
     A reaction: Greek 'logos' actually seemed to be both internal and external. We have certainly lost the idea that the universe is rational, even though it is ordered.
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 6. Judgement / b. Error
I make errors because my will extends beyond my understanding [Descartes]
     Full Idea: My errors are owing simply to the fact that, since the will extends further than the intellect, I do not contain the will within the same boundaries, but extend it to things I do not understand.
     From: René Descartes (Meditations [1641], §4.58)