The Crucible Of Methodic Doubt
...to as the father of modern philosophy, was very pessimistic in his ponderings. He doubted all until he was only left with cogito, ergo sum or I think, therefore I am. Why did Descartes bother with all of his cynical ruminations? Why would he doubt all that he had learned in his lifetime? Why not just take what the world gives you, that which you see with your own two eyes? I will offer some answers to these questions while talking about the appropriately named Crucible of Method Doubt.
It seems to me that many a philosopher was also deeply entrenched in studies of other, more well-defined disciplines. It also seems that when they had learned all there was to learn, they ventured out to where no one had gone, simply thinking about thinking. Descartes sought out to rebuild his knowledge base from something or things, which he knew he could be absolutely certain about. The beginning of his doubting sprouted from trying to determine just how much we really know or how much we can be absolutely certain of. These reflections, published around 1633, start out with the first and second meditation, which, I believe, blend to become the first stage of The Crucible of Methodic Doubt, where Descartes begins to have a sense of doubt of his knowledge and perceptions.
Stage 1 of the crucible eliminates all of our perceptions of life and learning experiences taken in by touch, taste, feel, sight, and hearing. Descartes offers the possibility that one cannot readily discern between real perceptions or a set of false ones. For example, most people have seen the puddles or even lakes of water on the long, flat stretch of asphalt on a blisteringly hot day. Our eyes perceive the virtual water to be right in front of us. Our optic nerve carries the transduced signal to the back of the brain where the visual cortex is located, and our brain interprets it to be water,...
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