Rules for the Direction of the Mind by René Descartes. Short summary

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According to the French philosopher, the goal of scientific cognition should be to choose the right direction of mental activity, which will allow to draw only reliable information.

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The author believes that the goal of scientific cognition should be to choose the right direction of mental work that will allow one to draw only truthful information. According to Descartes, the thinking inherent in a scholarly person makes it possible to understand the essence of the subject from the simplest side, while the mundane, on the contrary, only makes it more difficult to understand.

The French philosopher believed that one should only investigate objects that the mind can comprehend. After all, the aim of all research is to obtain simple truth. Complex knowledge, mixing the concepts of «falsehood» and «truth,» only distances one from achieving the scientific goal.

In the study of a subject, one should not look for what other people think or make subjective assumptions, but for what can be scrutinized by superficial examination. There is no other way to attain knowledge. Descartes admits to relying on the opinions of predecessors, but speaks of the need to be able to distinguish them from knowledge.