Descartes begins his metaphysical quest with doubt. He doubts everything he knows right down to the smallest little detail. All he is then left with is his doubt, which he realizes cannot exist unless he is a thinking think, or the cogito. This is the first thing Descartes proves to be real through reason. Next, Descartes proves the existence of God. He does so through his principles of causality in an effort to overcome solipsism. After his proof of the existence of God, Descartes is left to prove the existence of the physical world

. He proves that the physical world exists as the cause of our ideas of it. This all said and done, we are left with three things in the universe that are known to be real: cogito (unextended), physical world (extended), and God. This leaves Descartes with a very dualistic metaphysical scheme. You have the physical world in one hand, a very measurable world that exists physically; and the mind (or cogito) on the other, an immeasurable thing that takes up no space. These are the two primary substances of the world, with God as an infinite substance. This leads us into the mind-body problem.

Descartes did have a response to this question though. He says that it is possible for body and mind to interact even through a strictly dualistic view. Descartes responded, but didn’t actually solve the problem. Descartes proposed the Interaction Theory of Mind and Body. He claims that nature (or God) has arranged that we feel sensations although they are not actually “felt”. There is a direct correspondence between sensation in the mind and the impression affecti

Some topics in this essay:
Mind Body, God Descartes, mind body, physical world, metaphysical scheme, body mind, descartes’ followers, solve descartes, existence god, world exists, descartes proves,