He decided that he would assume that each of his opinions had at least "some reason for doubt". He believed that all he had acquired as perception he acquired through his senses, and he was sure through his meditations that these were unreliable.
His premise was that the senses rob people of their judgments. Descartes described the sky, the clouds, the earth itself as subject to perception of the senses. He was sure that each of us saw these objects differently so how could our senses be reliable. Descartes was skeptical of the senses as reliable, and in the Second Meditation he continued this methodology to prove that doubt could actually prove that the nature of the mind was easier to understand than the body. Common wisdom to the contrary, Descartes wanted to prove that a sense of knowledge would lead one to understand that a hand or leg is a thing but not the entire you. For instance if someone had their leg amputated and the limb lied 20 feet away on an operating table, was that limb the person or just a perception of who they were. If body parts were only a thing then who is the "I" that all of us strive to know and understand. Descartes concluded that the method of doubt employed here allowed him to understand himself. All that the imagination allowed him to perceive about the body did not help him understand himself. His best example of the senses ability to deceive is that one feels the heat in a room and the smells of the air exist, but if one is asleep does that make them all false because one is not mindful of them. He believed that whether these senses and their attending perceptions were true or false was irrelevant to understanding one's self.
His conclusion through his method of doubt is that even the body is not easily perceived by the senses of touch, smell or sight. Each of these senses is subject to an individual's perception therefore very unreliable.
DesCartes--- The concept of hylomorphism; the idea that the only way to understand the form of something is through understanding its matter, is a concept that Rene Decartes completely rejects. He adamently believes in the separation of the body from the soul, or rather declaring in a more conv...
Rene Descartes was born in La Haye, Touraine (France) in March of fifteen ninety-six. During the course of his life, he made many significant contributions to the progress of science, because of these achievements, he is known as the father of modern philosophy. He was a distinguished physicist, phy...
What Does It All Mean? Question #1: Is it a meaningful possibility that the inside of your mind is the only thing that exists -- or that even if there is a world outside your mind, it is totally unlike what you believe it to be? Descartes" Answer: Decartes would entertain the possibility ...
Descartes is famed by is familiar notion, "I think therefore I am (Cogito, ergo sum.)." It is a conclusion he has reached in his second meditation after much deliberation on the existence of anything certain. After he discovers his ability to doubt and to understand, he is able to substantiate his n...
The organization I have worked for this semester is Lutheran Family Services, in particular, refugee services. This organization relocates refugees, the ones I worked with are from Sudan, Africa. A 20 year civil war has been raging in Sudan leaving families displaced and relocated. The war i...
The Sight of Science It is a truth universally acknowledged that he whose mind is ahead of his time and above that of his peers may not be understood by his fellow people and be subject to critisizm and persecution. Galilei Galileo, Francis Bacon, and Rene Descartes were am ong the first to b...
1) Descartes" argument "Cogito Ergo Sum" I am, I exist is a complex one, in alot of ways, he makes a convincing argument for the existence of the self, and for the process of the thinking being, the essence of the self. He tries to convince both the readers, as well as himself, of his theory we must reject all our present ideas and beliefs and start from nothing. Descartes is a rational thinker and he rationalizes through his studies that nothing in the world is known. He believes that the only thing that has any certainty at this point is his own existence as thinking being, Descartes" met...
"Method of Radical Doubt" Descartes said " I realized that once in my life I had to raze everything to the ground and begin again from the original foundations, if I wanted to establish anything firm and lasting in the sciences." Descartes described this meaning, if he wanted to know the truth about anything and have a firm foundation in his beliefs, he would have to start from the ground up and examine every detail. Doing this, would he then only be able to believe something to be true. The purpose of his examining methodology was to be able to have a solid foundation and to understand w...
1. a. Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes masterpiece conveys his will to erase all the previous beliefs and principles that was instilled in him during his childhood and start on a clean slate. His aim was the rebuilding of knowledge from the basics. The only way he was to accomplish this goal was by a plan called doubt. ...
