René Descartes's Existence

While the process that led to his first absolute certainty regarding his existence was impressive, the fact that he proposed his existence as the key to God’s existence demolished the credibility of his argument (Discourse on Method and Meditations on First Philosophy, p.70). For Descartes to exist, he believed that thoughts must come as a precondition. We understand that thoughts could only be able to process through a living organism. Before and right after the point at which his existence was proven as an absolute certainty, he had not confirmed that other living being could be capable of the same ability, thus if Descartes died then his thoughts would also being lost, his existence would be unproven and the very basis for the existence of God would be gone. The second problem with his argument lied within the cause and effect argument, in which there must exists a God whose presence encompassed everything.

His philosophy had a massive impact on further development of European philosophy. Kant, an outstanding Dutch philosopher, in all seriousness perceived many of Hume’s conclusions. For instance, that whole material of knowledge we get from experience and that empirical methods of human understanding are not able to provide its objectivity and necessity, and by this, to substantiate the potential of theoretical sciences and philosophy. Auguste Comte’s ideas about some science’ buildings which linked just with the description of phenomena but not with its explanation, and row of another positivist conclusions were based on Hume’s skepticism. On the other hand, further development of knowledge and philosophy confirmed Hume’s anxiety concerning any philosophical conclusions.

If so, to whom should we ascribe existence to? It would seem that ascribing existence to the computer engineer is seemingly logical but wrong, since he did not put thought into creating the computer code. However, it would be ridiculous to ascribe existence to the computer since we understand the computer to be a non-thinking thing. In this case, Descartes has to be forced to conclude that the cogito: I think, therefore I am, does not apply in this case, but he is also mistaken. The case applies aptly.

Tolstoy argues, rational knowledge cannot provide a clear answer to what is the meaning of life, because it explains that life is just a random of collections of cells forming and than passing. The randomness and purposelessness is what frightens Tolstoy, because he questions what is the point of living if he was not even specially formed for a special function. His argument is rooted in the idea that rational knowledge diminishes the sacredness of life by eliminating purpose. From his observations, he concludes life is sacred when viewed through the lens of religious faith; religious faith argues our purpose:a) is given by an omni-benevolent being, b) makes life meaningful, and c) contributes to something more than ourselves (Tolstoy 674). Tolstoy is not necessarily religious, but he

“What else can matter to us, other than how our lives feel from the inside?" (Nozick) This question was asked by Robert Nozick in response to an Experience Machine that would give a person any experience that they desired. Once plugged into this Experience Machine you cannot turn back to reality, you would not be able to know if you were in a type of a never ending vivid dream. This scenario has led to the debate over what the correct choice would be if you had the choice to plug into the machine. Nozick claimed that people should not plug into the Experience Machine.

From one perspective, our experience of ourselves is the most certain thing as Descartes himself would concur. Nonetheless, on the off chance that we can't define an unmistakable argument to go past this perspective, we are left with what is called solipsism, or the thought that we can just really have knowledge about our own mental states. Descartes himself attempted to base his knowledge of the outside world on the Cogito – his assurance he could call his own existence – and the way that more dependable knowledge is by all accounts clear and distinct. Notwithstanding, as we found in our dialog of the Meditations, both the thought of clear and distinct thoughts and the cogito itself were hazardous. As specified prior, Descartes was a scholar who wanted to think in solitude.

The fact that synthetic a priori knowledge is known by us suggests that important truths can be known by the pure reason. However, rationalist metaphysics was not followed by the author Immanuel Kant in asserting that pure reason has the influence to take hold of the mysteries of the world. Instead, the author suggests that whatever we perceives in mind shapes the reality. As per author the mind do not inactively receive information provided by the senses. Instead, it actively shapes and makes sense of that information.

Father Flynn gets very defensive and works very hard to defend his case to Sister James, which seems like he is trying to get more people on his side. This is almost too much effort to just keep his reputation and prove his innocence. He also leaves the parish when Sister Aloysius claims to have contacted his old parish. Sister Aloysius never truly did this, however Father Flynn still left. The fact that he left when she brought up his old

He does so, however, with the intent of learning what is true, so he can separate real knowledge from falsehoods. Descartes writes that his first objective is to find one certain, indubitable belief, that he could further use to build all his prospective knowledge. The First Meditation alone already distinguished Descartes as an important advocate for the theory of knowledge of foundationalism, and as a remarkable adherent of scepticism as a method. Descartes, in the First Meditation, outlined various arguments through which he tries to call all his previous beliefs into doubt. In the first paragraphs of this meditation, he writes how he was suddenly

In the 21st-century, however, Descartes was mostly known for his saying, “Cogito, ergo sum.” “Cogito, ergo sum,” or, “I think, therefore I am,” was the universal truth that Descartes came up with in his most famous work, Discourse on the Method, to prove the concept of pro-foundational skepticism. Pro-foundational skepticism was the belief that one must never believe anything unless they know it to be true. Descartes stated that the only thing anyone could ever know to be true is that they existed, because they were thinking about philosophy in the first