Tagged: Mind

Creativity: John Cleese & Scientific American

While “creativity” is difficult to define, it seems fairly certain that something of the sort exists. We know little of its origins, but can observe the environments in which it thrives. Here is John Cleese’s take on it: Cleese successfully outlines “the 5 factors that you can arrange to make your lives more creative”. Here […]

One Of Us: Discussing Descartes & Animal Consciousness

Relating to CC201’s study of The Renaissance is the essay ‘One Of Us’ by John Jeremiah Sullivan on animal consciousness, in which he discusses Descartes’ views on the topic. Here is an extract: Descartes’ term for them [animals] was automata—windup toys, like the Renaissance protorobots he’d seen as a boy in the gardens at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, “hydraulic statues” that […]

Analects of the Core: Descartes on questioning existence

CC201 students will soon be discussing one of the foundations of Western discussions of knowledge, relying on the fact that the mind necessarily exists if it can question its own existence: Cogito ergo sum. “I think, therefore I am.” – René Descartes, Discourse on Methods and Meditations Read up some more context for Descartes and […]