Conatus: REVISED EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

C O N A T U S

is therefore opposed to Cartesian dualism (of which, again, more later) as this theory seems to put mind (consciousness) into the domain of things that cannot be known. As noted above, this view, along with naïve realism, is sometimes cynically known as ‘the myth of the given’. ‘Poetic naturalism’ is the view that there are no values innate in the universe, hence, no absolute morals or aesthetics. These descriptions of naturalism should not be confused with the ‘naturalistic fallacy, which we will meet in a later chapter.)

The experience of reality is always mediated through our senses. Objective things (that is, things assumed to be ‘out there’ in the real world) were once described as having qualities. Some of the qualities were understood to be inherent, intrinsic or primary, such as size and extension in space, shape, form, number and duration in time. (Sometimes the list is given as, figure, solidity, gravity, motion and rest.) Other qualities were described as emergent, or secondary, that is, not qualities belonging to the objects themselves but rather qualities that resulted from our experience of those objects. Amongst these would be colour, taste and smell. Descartes seemed to see both primary and secondary qualities as uncertain, but he suggested at least a degree of certainty with regard to ‘substance’ (which we’ll come to in more detail presently), duration in time and number. Descartes seemed to be thinking of a wider understanding of substance than extension in space and time, as he included mind as a substance. He described qualities as ‘the clothing under which corporeal substance appears to us’. Hence, some substance exists

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