Knowledge about the World - Essay Example

Knowledge One of the most popular topics for philosophical explorations has always been the problem of objective knowledge and existence of human beings in the objective world (as well as existence of the objective world in general). Descartes was among those skeptics who questioned objectivity of knowledge and existence of the reality people are used to thinking they live in. However, even though Descartes’ arguments and skeptical assumptions seem to be reasonable, they lead the exploration into a vicious circle of indefensibility. Descartes method might be useful for discerning objective knowledge from the deceptive; however, it is not fully rational and objective as long as it is based on such vague grounds as intellectual intuition and doubt which are not objective enough to prove any existence. The very first skeptics appeared in the Ancient Greece and were representatives of the movement of Pyrrhonism (Neto 200). They asked many reasonable questions which, in general, casted doubt on the entire criteria of estimation of objective truth. Rene Descartes kept asking skeptical questions long after the ancient skeptical movement had retired, which restored skeptical movement within the Modern philosophy. Thus Descartes argued that people cannot have any knowledge concerning the external world because all their assumptions are based on the sensual perception, which is obviously very deceptive. Such Cartesian skepticism seems to lead to the unsolvable dilemma, as the question whether there is at least anything that we can actually know arises. Hence, Descartes assures us that indeed the only doubtless thing which exists is doubt, which is an aspect of human intelligence. Thus as long as we can cast doubt, we can think, which means that if we can think, we exist (McLaughlin & Owens 93). However, Descartes strived to form certain universal rules of method which would help people to discern objective knowledge and would eventually lead to construction of objective science, the one that would explore the world objectively. Such science would justify human existence. Application of the methodology requires a fundamental metaphysical operation which would be justification of the reliability of intellectual intuition, which is supposed to be the main tool of doubt. Descartes questioned not only the base of empirical facts, which was existence of the external world and consciousness, but the truth of intuitive acts at in general. According to Descartes, the intuitive act separates the doubtless knowledge from the one that is deceptive, as if knowledge can be questioned, it is not truth. Still, it is important to note that the assumption that objective things even exist and may be perceived using the universal methodology is based on the fact that God exists, which appears to be the main predicate in Descartes’ logical arguments. Hence, Descartes claims that people’s beliefs about what they perceive clearly are based on the assumption that God exists; as far as God cannot be deceptive, therefore the things that He produces cannot be deceptive too. This logical chain forms a circle of assumptions that can only be explained through each other. Thus in order to prove that God exists, people must be sure that their beliefs are truthful and vice versa (Weintraub 365). Moreover, none of these conclusions prove objective existence of human beings and don’t explain the fact why doubt is the only doubtless thing. Cartesian doubt couldn’t be really versatile, because Descartes at least used a language to explain his arguments; and as it was reasonably noted by Hilary Putnam, the existence of language as a semantic structure requires existence of the objects that language could refer to. These objects must be objective and available for people to perceive in order for them to tag the same objects with the same names. Thus Putnam’s claim that objects which people perceive are mind-dependent definitely makes sense (Steinhoff 231); this means that if a person can think of an object, one comes to a contact with the object, therefore the objects that a person knows and could give notions to indeed exist; otherwise, if there were no objects, there would be no way for people to say a word, or even to create a word. Moreover, Descartes managed to form certain methodological rules which consisted of very precise techniques, such as usage of the principle of contradiction, intuitive understanding, clarity, and distinctiveness as the criteria of knowledge. However, radical skeptics would argue that, apart from the argument concerning existence of language, in terms of objectivity of knowledge all these rules of method do not prove any actual existence and any objectivity at all. The claim “Cogito ergo sum” does not prove anything either, as the ability to doubt does not mean that there is a subject (res cogitans) of thinking. Human mind (if it indeed exists) may doubt whatever it wants; even doubt the fact of doubt. In fact, Descartes took into account such possible claims and doubted everything at once. He suggested that there is a possibility that everything in this world could be different from the way that people are used to perceive it; hence, two parallel lines might in fact converge and the only reason why we cannot see it is the existence of some cruel genius that hides the truth from us. Such a radical doubt in fact would not lead to any conclusions except for pure doubt itself, which has neither rational nor intuitive resolution. Moreover, it puts a person in risk to lock oneself into the vicious circle of solipsism, which so perfectly justifies itself in terms of logic that it seems like there is no way out from the solipsist beliefs. Although solipsism along with the vicious genius might be truth, still there are no objective evidences, except for logical intellectual assumptions, that would prove these theories. Thus as far as human mind (if to presuppose that it exists) is capable of building castles in the air, this assertion allows us to decline the assumptions about vicious genius and self-centered solipsist dimension. However, if we presuppose that Descartes’ method indeed works and we can apply doubt along with some intellectual intuition, it turns out that there are a lot of things that are absolute and doubtless. For instance, the example with the parallel lines proves the existence of fundamental truth which is doubtless for every rational human being. The fact that the fundamental truths like this are based on people’s definitions of the elements of axioms proves that language indeed justifies the existence of some objective things and knowledge. Thus if a person draws two parallel lines and calls the combination of lines “parallel”, this definition includes certain logical predicates which demonstrate that there are two lines placed in certain disposition to each other so that they do not converge. The assurance in the fact that such lines do not converge comes from the specific experience of drawing of two parallel lines. Hence, it would be possible to criticize the objectivity of this knowledge if there were no real experience that proved that the knowledge was doubtlessly objective. Furthermore, if all people agree that such things as parallel lines indeed exist, it means that there is some common experience of being familiar with the objects that makes people assume that they all are talking about the same thing, which are parallel lines. The argument seems doubtless as there are no doubts that would present any other objective evidences to decline the following assumptions: a) we know what parallel lines exist; b) when two lines are parallel they do not converge; c) we can draw parallel lines and make sure they do not converge (experience proof). However, the possibility to make such assumptions is based on the main predicates about the existence of objective world and human intelligence which is able to analyze objective things. Descartes’ methodological approach is definitely reasonable. People can perceive a lot of things and they can apply doubt to many of them; hence, some assumptions appear to be less likely truthful than those that resist the doubt examination. Those things that doubtlessly are truthful are considered to be parts of paradigms which define the doubtless knowledge that has already been explored and proved. Hence, this is the kind of knowledge we can perceive and consider it as truth. The subjective relative knowledge more looks like Schrödinger’s cat: we might believe it or not, trust its objectiveness or not, either way there is no measure that would be objective enough to estimate all the subjective beliefs and phantoms of sensual perception that people have. Furthermore, as long as all people are the creatures which process all the incoming information through sensual perception, there is no pure objective knowledge at all as it will always be evaluated by subjective intelligences. Cartesian skepticism questions a lot of fundamental things our understanding of knowledge stands on. However, as far as any skepticism might lead intellectual analysis to bunch of vicious circles like evil genius or solipsism, people should always bear in mind the fact that human intelligence, by its nature, is capable of creation of perfectly-justified theories concerning the reality, as it strives to explain it in any possible ways. Thus Descartes’ suggestion to examine knowledge by doubt is indeed very helpful in discerning of objective doubtless knowledge from the deceptive sensual one. Works Cited Neto, J.R.M. "Academic Skepticism in Early Modern Philosophy". Journal of the History of Ideas. 58(1997): 199-220. Weintraub, Ruth. "The Cartesian Circle and Two Forms of Scepticism". History of Philosophy Quarterly. 14(1997): 365-377. McLaughlin, Brian P. and Owens, David. "Self-Knowledge, Externalism, and Skepticism". Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes. 74(2000): 93-117. Steinhoff, Gordon. "Putnam on "Empirical Objects". Dialectica. 43(1989): 231-248. Read More