Can Doubt lead to understanding?
Descartes opens his Meditations indicating his desire to have only true beliefs. One way to accomplish this is to doubt everything he has learned that might be subject to error. He does not intend to doubt the truth of every specific idea that comes into is head, but, instead to undermine the foundation of his views. To determine if our beliefs are justified, we have to be able to trace them back to a statement, belief, or proposition that cannot be doubted. Descartes saw that Mathematics held the only true and believable facts. If achieved, such a proposition could place the firm foundation on which all subsequent beliefs could be grounded; it would guarantee that all subsequent claims based on it would be true. In his writings, he ultimately hopes to achieve absolute certainty about the nature of everything including God, the physical world, and himself. It is only with clear and distinct knowledge of such things that he can then begin to understand his true reality. In order to acquire absolute certainty, Descartes must first lay a complete foundation on which to build up his knowledge. The technique he uses to lay this base is doubt. If any belief c
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Evil Genius, Descartes Mathematics, Descartes Meditations, Sample PL, absolute certainty, essential property, believe religion, physical world, doubted descartes, statement belief,
Approximate Word count = 1062
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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