Descartes’ Gebrauch des Wortes »Idee«

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Zurück zum Heft: Archiv für Begriffsgeschichte. Band 48
DOI: 10.28937/9783787336760_5

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Abstract
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According to a commonplace, the modern use of the word »idea« traces back to Descartes through Locke. Descartes would have consciously given the word anew sense by using it to refer to contents of the human mind whereas medieval tradition reserved it to refer to archetypes in the divine intellect. – The commonplace is wrong. It wasn’t Descartes’ intention to give the word »idea« a new meaning. He rather intended a new theory of the human mind. To Descartes the word »idea« with the traditional meaning seemed attractive for this elaboration nas it unmistakably represents contents which do not derive from things already presumed.