The Breakdown of Cartesian Metaphysics

A reissue of the Humanities Press Edition of 1987.

Combines historical research and philosophical analysis to cast light on why and how Cartesianism failed as a complete metaphysical system. Far more radical in its conclusions than his 1966 study The Downfall of Cartesianism (a slightly revised version of which forms the main body of the current work), Watson argues that Descartes’s ontology is incoherent and vacuous, his epistemology deceptive, and his theology unorthodox—indeed, that “Descartes knows nothing”.

Reviews:

“Original and stimulating. . . . The four new chapters deserve close attention. . . . Readers will await further studies by Richard A. Watson all the more impatiently.”
    —Jean-Luc Marion, Archives de Philosophie

“Downfall is required reading for anyone doing early modern philosophy, and its reappearance is welcome and long overdue.”
    —Steven Nadler, International Studies in Philosophy