We see many philosophers base their beliefs on something specific however Descartes philosophy comes from extreme scepticism also known as nihilism. He begins his philosophy by having disbelief in the true existence of anything at all. Descartes main aim was to attain certainty. He had a desire to be certain about the things that truly exist and those that do not. He believed that once he could be truly certain of one thing that he could re-build the world from there for the better. He begins his attempt at this by using methodic doubt. This is the process whereby Descartes eliminates anything from which he has the slightest doubt. He doubted the senses because they can often deceive us in the form that things may appear in one way but consequently …show more content…
He therefore could build upon the cogito to eventually build the world that is of true existence. The idea that Descartes exists as a thinking being ensures that he will be unable to doubt his thoughts and consequently believe that his philosophy is correct. Be that as it may, the cogito certainly has its weaknesses. An objection that would be considered one of the weakest points in the cogito is that it is limited to the ‘I’. The only thing that Descartes view on this reveals is that of his own mind. This subsequently means that Descartes could not discover anything outside himself. He could understand things outside himself and believed that to know what ‘I’ means, he also must know the meaning of ‘you’ and ‘they’. However he could not assure that another exists because he is only able to be certain of ‘I think’. Another weakness is the idea that Descartes only knows of his existence through his thinking. Everything is in the present tense meaning he is unable to make any predictions or thoughts on the past or the future. He makes thought the only characteristic in true existence which some see as a very broad assumption. Some philosophers rejected the necessity of thought to prove existence as they believed that when they turned the sentence ‘I think therefore I am’ to the reverse ‘I do not think therefore I am not’ they believed this to be untrue. An example of a rock was used to show that the rock may not be thinking however can still be in
Descartes, in his Meditations on First Philosophy, used a method of doubt; he doubted everything in order to find something conclusive, which he thought, would be certain knowledge. He found that he could doubt everything, expect that he was thinking, as doubting is a type of thinking. Since thinking requires a thinker, he knew he must exist. According to Descartes if you are able to doubt your existence, then it must mean that you exist, hence his famous statement cogito ergo sum which is translated into ‘I think, therefore I am.’ Descartes said he was able to doubt the existence of his body and all physical things, but he could not doubt that his mind exists.
Explain Descartes’ method of doubt. What is Descartes purpose in exercising this method? Descartes begins Meditation I by stating that in order for him to establish anything in the sciences that was constant, he would have to start from the foundations of all knowledge. By claiming this, he is adopting skepticism which is not him rejecting his beliefs, but doubting them.
This essay will now begin the task of laying out the objection to Descartes’
An early example of enlightenment René Descartes was a philosopher who lived in the 17th century. His writings were mainly about mathematics, philosophy and physics. His treatise Discourse on the method was published in 1637. The Discourse on the method is a philosophical treatise about the scientific method and correct reasoning.
The next step that Descartes uses in the second meditation is the existence of this Godly figure. He questions his own beliefs with that of the God, and argues that a mind should be capable of thinking for them to be of existence, “Is there not some God, or some other being by whatever name we call it, which puts these reflections into my mind? That is not necessary, for is it not possible that I am capable of producing them myself?” He then puts forward that for one to be deceived by this “evil demon” as he describes it, they have to exist to be deceived.
Notre Dame ID: 902008117 In René Descartes ' Mediations on First Philosophy, Descartes abandons all previous notions or things that he holds to be true and attempts to reason through his beliefs to find the things that he can truly know without a doubt. In his first two meditations Descartes comes to the conclusion that all that he can truly know is that he exists, and that he is a thinking being. In his third meditation, Descartes concludes that he came to know his existence, and the fact that he is a thinking being, from his clear and distinct perception of these two facts. Descartes then argues that if his clear and distinct perception would turn out to be false, then his clear and distinct perception that he was a thinking being would not have been enough to make him certain of it (Blanchette).
We know clear and distinct perceptions independently by God, and his existence provides us with a certainty we might not possess otherwise. However, another possible strategy would be to change Gods role in Descartes philosophy. Instead of seeing God as the validation of clear and distinct perceptions, rather see him as a safeguard against doubt. This strategy, however, is a problem since it re-constructs the Meditations – Philosophical work of Descartes –.This is because it would not be God, who is the ultimate foundation of knowledge, but the clear and distinct
He was trying to find a base of knowledge so reliable that the strongest of skepticisms cannot destroy it. Descartes bring up situations or scenarios of how we can be deceived from our own senses. For example, Descartes states that, “Whatever I have up till now accepted as most true I have acquired either from senses or through the sense. But from time to time I have found that the senses deceive, and it is prudent never to trust completely those who have deceived us even once” (page 12).
Rene Descartes was one the famous French philosopher of his era, he was also known as the father of modern philosophy. In addition, his ideas or theories are also considered to change the age of science during that era. The ideas or the phenomena’s he has presented in his writing are still considered as the stepping stone for the modern science. First of all, one of the basic ideas which Rene Descartes has presented was the idea of skepticism. According to him, through the phenomena of the skepticism, any truth can be verified by the theory of it.
One of Descartes’ many critiques was that of fellow philosopher John Locke. Using Locke I will argue that many of Descartes claims in his meditations on innate knowledge and reality show problematic. I do not totally agree with his proposition that only the mind can produce certain knowledge and that our senses are always under the attack of the devil that deceives us. I do however agree with Locke’s argument which opposes Descartes concerning doubt in the first meditation. During Descartes first meditation the focus was placed on doubt and how knowledge is innate in each of us.
In this paper, I will deliver a reconstruction of Descartes’ Cogito Argument and my reasoning to validate it as indubitable. I will do so by justifying my interpretations through valid arguments and claim, by showcasing examples with reasoning. Rene Descartes is a French Philosopher of the 17th century, who formulated the philosophical Cogito argument by the name of ‘cogito ergo sum,’ also known as “I think, therefore, I am.” Rene was a skeptic philosopher amongst many scholastic philosophers of his time. To interpret his cogito argument as indubitable and whether it could serve as a foundational belief, he took a skeptical approach towards the relations between thoughts and existence.
The first thing he does is doubted what the senses give us. However, Descartes pushes his doubting one step further by doubting whether we are actually awake. In the dream argument Descartes is saying that he often experiences the sensations of dreaming while he is awake. From reflecting on this he comes to the conclusion that if he can falsely perceive himself to be awake while he is dreaming then he can falsely believe he is dreaming while he is awake. So, he can never actually know when he is awake or dreaming (Windt).
For how he can be certain that 2+2= 4 and not 5, how can he know for sure that he is not being deceived into believing the answer to be 5 due to a demon. But even if an evil demon did indeed exist, in order to be misled, Descartes himself must exist. As there must be an “I”, that can be deceived. Conclusively, upon Descartes’ interpretations we can come to decipher that in order for someone to exist they must indeed be able to think, to exist as a thinking thing.
For an example, rather than believing that a person is bad, someone can believe that a person is trusted. Descartes did not truly believe that the information that we receive through our senses is exactly correct. We know that some of our experiences are incorrect only because we are able to know some of them are correct, and for that we have to depend on other. Descartes uses the method of doubt to find true knowledge, but Hume for instance, had different methods what he thought about about how to find true knowledge which Descartes disagreed on. Rene Descartes, believes doubting everything is absolutely way to find true knowledge.
For example, a rock can exist all by itself. This indicates that Descartes proposed that God if he wanted could create a world of beings that could exist all by itself. Therefore what he means to say is that if the mind and body are really distinct, they could exist all by themselves without being dependant on each other. Although he has changed a bit in his stance from his books like Discourse and Meditations which has versions like the First, the Second, the Sixth and so on, he was still critiqued by two of his successors, Nicolas Malebranche and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. Malebranche developed an internal critique of Descartes theory of the mind.