The Good Life and the Body

Elisabeth on Descartes' Three Rules of Living

Forfattere

  • Victor Lange studerende

Nøgleord:

Descartes, Elisabeth af Böhmen, etik, kroppen, det gode liv

Resumé

Brevkorrespondancen mellem Elisabeth og Descartes er velkendt for sin diskussion af ’sind-krop problemet’. Dog angår en betydelig del af korrespondancen spørgsmålet om, hvordan man bør leve, og hvad der kendetegner det gode liv. Descartes’ neo-stoiske (eller rationalistiske) synspunkt reflekteres tydeligt i de tre livsregler, han anbefaler Elisabeth at følge,især når hun står over for svære omstændigheder. Denne artikel viser, hvordan Elisabeths skepsis er funderet i en idé om kroppens etiske signifikans, hvor kroppen og visse kropslige tilstande er nødvendige for at leve godt. Udover at denne idé er af almen filosofisk interesse, så bidrager den også til den gamle filosofiske diskussion om, hvordan det gode liv opnås i praksis—i særdeleshed hvorvidt korrekt anvendelse af ens egen fornuft er tilstrækkeligt for at opnå et sådant, eller om eksterne faktorer (såsom kroppen eller ens politiske position) må inddrages. Nærværende artikel slutter med at foreslå, at Elisabeths bidrag kan anses som selvstændig filosofi, og at hun i sammenhæng hermed bør have status af filosof.

Referencer

Adam, Charles, and Paul Tannery (eds.). 1981–91. Oeuvres de Descartes. Paris: Vrin.

Alanen, Lili. 2004. “Descartes and Elisabeth: A Philosophical Dialogue?” Feminist Reflections on the History of Philosophy, edited by Lilli Alanen and Charlotte Witt, 193–218. Kluwer: Dortrecht.

Alexandrescu, Vlad. 2012. “What Someone May Have Whispered in Elisabeth’s Ear.” Oxford Studies on Early Modern Philosophy, vol. VI, edited by Daniel Garber and Donald Rutherford, 1–27. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Aristotle. 1999. Nicomachean Ethics, translation, introduction, notes, and glossary by Terence Irwin. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company Inc.

Broad, Jacqueline. 2004. Women Philosophers of the Seventeenth Century. Cambridge (UK): Cambridge University Press.

Bos, Erik-Jan. 2009. “Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and Descartes’ letters (1650–1665).” Historia Mathematica 37, 485–502. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hm.2009.11.004

Descartes, René. 1637 [2007]. Discourse on Method, translated by Pamela Kraus and Frank Hunt. Newburyport, MA: Focus Publishing/R. Pullins Company.

Epictetus. 1983. The Handbook [The Encheiridion], translated by Nicholas White. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.

Epicurus. 1989. The Extant Remains with Short Critical Apparatus, translated and annotated by Cyril Bailey. Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlag.

Hadot, Pierre. 2015. Philosophy as a Way of Life. Malden: Blackwell Publishing.

Hutton, Sarah. 2015. “ ‘Blue-eyed Philosophers Born on Wednesdays’: An Essay on Women and the History of Philosophy.” The Monist 98: 7–20.

Perler, Dominik. Forthcoming. “Is our happiness up to us? Elisabeth of Bohemia on the limits of internalism.” Elisabeth of Bohemia (1618–1680): A Philosopher in Historical Context, edited by Sabrina Ebbersmeyer and Sarah Hutton. Dortrecht: Springer.

Schneck, Ariane Cäcilie. 2019. “Elisabeth of Bohemia’s Neo-Peripatetic Account of the Emotions.” British Journal of the History of Philosophy 27 (4): 753–770.

Seneca. 1930. Ad Lucilium Epistulae Morales, translated by Richard M. Gummuere, vol. II, letters 74, 112–137. London: Heinemann (Loeb Classical Library).

Shapiro, Lisa. 1999. “Princess Elisabeth and Descartes: The Union of Soul and Body and the Practice of Philosophy.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 7, 503–20. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09608789908571042

Shapiro, Lisa (ed. and trans.). 2007. The Correspondence between Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and René Descartes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Tollefsen, Deborah. 1999. “Princess Elisabeth and the Problem of Mind–Body Interaction.” Hypatia 14 (3): 59–77. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1527-2001.1999.tb01052.x

Downloads

Publiceret

2021-10-28

Citation/Eksport

Lange, V. (2021). The Good Life and the Body: Elisabeth on Descartes’ Three Rules of Living. Tidsskrift for Medier, Erkendelse Og Formidling, 9(1), 23–43. Hentet fra https://tidsskrift.dk/mef-journal/article/view/118569