According to Descartes' The Passions of the Soul, what makes it possible for humans to control and master their desires? Are our passions...

René Descartes composed The Passions of the Soulin 1645-1646 and published it in 1650, at the end of his life. Unlike his earlier work, which focused on cognition, this treatise attempts to explain human emotions. The first step in understanding how Descartes thought about passions is understanding how the term was used in his period. In the twenty-first century, we tend to think of passions or emotions as something internal. From antiquity through the early...

René Descartes composed The Passions of the Soul in 1645-1646 and published it in 1650, at the end of his life. Unlike his earlier work, which focused on cognition, this treatise attempts to explain human emotions. The first step in understanding how Descartes thought about passions is understanding how the term was used in his period. In the twenty-first century, we tend to think of passions or emotions as something internal. From antiquity through the early modern period, passions were internal effects of external factors; the term "passion" is etymologically related to the word "passive". Passions are something you suffer or experience rather than something you generate ex nihilo.

For Descartes, as for Plato, the passions were seated not in the rational mind, but in the body. Perceptions and physical experiences affect the "animal spirits" of the body; emotions are our mind's response to these physical phenomena. However, emotions, like sensations, do not need to be acted upon by unthinking reflex. Instead, the soul can rationally consider how to respond to them. Thus we might perceive pain when we try to lift a heavy weight, but we can respond by either giving up or pursuing a program of strength training.

Although our passions are not under our control, how we respond to them is something about which we can make a rational decision. As we reflect upon our passions we can direct them into positive rather than negative channels. For example, if we are jealous of someone else's success, we can either react by trying to harm that person or by trying to improve ourselves so we become equally successful. The former is a negative use of jealousy and the latter a positive use of jealousy.