Laëtitia Simonetta
Abstract
In La Recherche de la vérité, Malebranche succeeds Descartes in entitling the affections of pleasure and pain to a practical role. However, he also speaks of instinct as “knowledge” and “proof”. This vocabulary is all the more surprising as it keeps opposing knowledge, based on ideas, to feeling, which only consists of obscure perceptions. It will thus be about examining the cognitive range that affectivity receives in this philosophy yet known for its rationalism and its intellectualism.