Nine Videos on Descartes' Discourse on Method

A few years back, I created a one-off video in my Core Concept series on Rene Descartes' famous four "rules of method".  I was developing resources for students in my online World Views and Values class at Marist College (there's also an inexpensive open-enrollment version of that class you can check out or enroll in), and I noticed that some of them were getting a bit confused about the Cartesian approach.  So I shot that video, intending eventually to create more content on Descartes.

My viewers and subscribers liked that video, and for quite some time have been asking me when I would start producing more content on Descartes.  So last month, I managed to set aside the time to shoot eight more videos on the Discourse on Method, creating an entire series covering most of the key ideas and passages of that work.

Here are the links to those nine videos:

• Academic Subjects and Foundations of Knowledge
• Reconstructing The Foundations of Knowledge 
• The Four Rules of Method 
• Maxims of the Provisional Morality
• What Can Be Doubted and What Cannot
• The Existence and Nature of God 
• Being and Nothingness
• The Truth of Our Waking Thoughts
• Machines, Animals, and Rational Beings

I do have to caution that these videos are not intended to substitute for actually reading the work.  In the case of the Discourse, you really don't want to deprive yourself of the experience of reading Descartes.  He's a very clear and readable writer, and it's a rather short work designed specifically to introduce his thought to a general public (he deliberately wrote it in French, rather than the Latin of many of his other works).

Later on down the line, I hope to also produce a whole slew of new videos on two other works by Descartes: his Meditations on First Philosophy, and his Passions of the Soul.  If you'd like to support my ongoing work - or if you find my videos valuable, and just want to give back a bit - consider becoming a Patreon supporter on my page.