Descartes Bundle Theory Analysis

Cavan Hagerty

Mr. Jurkiewicz

PHIL 202.33

3 March 2017

PHIL 202 Paper #1

Descartes spends a great deal of time examining what we know in his book Meditations on First Philosophy. By performing a series of meditations he challenges the very idea of previously known philosophical truth in an attempt to prove them as true or false. He spends a great deal of time discussing the idea of objects, how we can understand their existence, and how we perceive objects in the world. This is achieved by using two key examples to prove his views of the nature of objects; the wax example and the example of people walking outside of his window. Both of these examples can be used to show how Descartes sees the role of objects in the world around us.

The

first example that he uses is the example relating to a cube of wax. The example is quite simple to understand. Descartes begins by examining a cube of wax and taking note of its various qualities. He decides that the piece of wax is, “hard, cold, easily handled, and if you strike it with the finger, it will emit a sound.”(Descartes provide page numbers). Remembering these qualities, Descartes then holds the piece of wax in front of the fire. When he does this, he discovers that the properties of the piece of wax change. The wax becomes soft, warm, and it no longer emits a sound when it is struck with a finger. He is also aware that the same piece of wax remains as it was before it was heated, the physical properties of the wax are all that have changed .
Descartes considers what he can know about the piece of wax, and concludes that he can know only that it is extended, flexible, and changeable. He does not come to know this through the senses, and realizes that it is impossible that he comes to know the wax by means of the imagination: the wax can change into an infinite number of different shapes and he cannot run through all these shapes in his imagination. Instead, he concludes, he knows the wax by means of the intellect alone. His mental perception of it can either be imperfect and confused, as when he allowed herself to be led by his senses and imagination, or it can be clear and distinct, as it is when he applies only careful mental scrutiny to his perception of it.
Descarte then connects this wax example to a more real world implication of the ideas which he was able to discover. He describes the idea of people walking down the street in front of his window. He explains that when we see a person walking down the street, all we really see is the clothes that the person is wearing and infer that there is a person under those close making them move. A similar idea is needed to understand the wax. Much like how a person can change their clothes, the wax can change its properties. However, under these changed properties it is still the same piece of wax, just like it is the same person under the change of clothes. The important thing to remember about objects, Descarte argues, is that qualities of an object are contiguous, you sense them together. Furthermore, there must be an object behind these qualities to hold them together.
There are several people who disagree with Descarte on the viability of this theory of objects.

One such person is David Hume. He was a philosopher much like Descarte, and believed in a very different view of objects were perceived and how their organization should be viewed. He challenged the wax example that Descarte arrived at and in doing so created a new theory regarding the composition of objects. It came to be known as the bundle theory, in direct contrast to the substrate theory which Descarte had used to understand objects and their composition.

The bundle theory approaches the composition of objects in a new a different way. Bundle theory maintains that properties are bundled together in a collection without describing how they are tied together. For example, bundle theory regards an apple as red, four inches wide, and juicy but lacking an underlying substance. The apple is said to be a bundle of properties including redness, being four inches wide, and juiciness. It is not the apple that holds these properties together, it is in fact a collection of the properties that make the apple what it

is.
This is, of course, in direct contrast to the ideas communicated by Descarte in the wax example.

Descartes's ideas are known as the substrate theory. The theory explains the association of properties by asserting that the properties are found together because it is the substance that has those properties. In substance theory, a substance is the thing in which properties inhere. For example, redness and juiciness are found on top of the table because redness and juiciness are inherent in an apple, making the apple red and juicy. Substrate assumes that is the object that holds the properties together, not the properties that make the object. This is why the bundle theory does not stand up to Descartes's explanation of the wax

example.
There has long been debate as to the way in which objects should be perceived and viewed by the senses. Descartes and Hume come to very different conclusions as to how these objects should be viewed. Descarte believes that an object holds together the properties that it inherits, while Hume argues that it is the properties that make the object. Both men agree that all objects have properties that the senses must observe, and thus debate is raised as to how the senses should perceive them.