Descartes aims to eliminate anything that can be questioned in order to establish a solid basis for his beliefs. By employing skepticism, Descartes seeks to identify a foundation that is unquestionably true, upon which he can construct his convictions. He hopes that this approach will be accepted not only by the prevalent school of thought known as “Scepticism,” but also by those who mistakenly adhere to Aristotelian physics. Utilizing their own reasoning, Descartes intends to convince skeptics to abandon their erroneous beliefs.
Descartes employs the Meditations as a means to demonstrate the process of meditation and its role in reaching a rational understanding of reality. By presenting a fictional meditator, Descartes offers readers a relatable narrative through which they can follow a logical thought process. Through this method, Descartes aims to guide readers in using skepticism effectively to arrive at comprehensive logical conclusions.
In Meditations 1, Descartes challenges the reliability of knowledge gained through sensory experience. He argues that even our thoughts can be deceptive. Descartes uses the dreaming argument to undermine the foundational basis of beliefs obtained through sensory perception. Throughout the Meditations, he systematically dismantles the grounds for relying on sensory experience to form beliefs.
The meditator within Descartes’ work successfully defends his skeptical argument and persuades individuals to abandon their Aristotelian beliefs by demonstrating their tendency to mislead and provoke doubt. Meditations 1 focuses on the core principles of the meditator’s beliefs. Since any belief’s foundation is open to doubt, all structures built atop that foundation cannot be considered true. As Aristotelian physics is founded on sensory perception, the meditator aims to demonstrate that the senses themselves can be questioned, thus enticing individuals to reconsider their beliefs.
The meditator argues that his most true beliefs are derived from sensory experience, including sight, touch, and smell. However, he recognizes that his senses have deceived him in cases where perception is not obvious. For instance, in the desert, people often mistake heat wave-induced mirages for actual water in the distance. This leads the meditator to question whether even things perceived clearly, like feeling the warmth of a fire next to him, can be doubted.
The meditator reflects on how often they have dreamed of themselves dressed by a warm fire at home, only to realize they were actually undressed and asleep in bed. This realization leads to the understanding that vivid and distinct dreams are possible, blurring the lines between being awake and asleep. Consequently, perceptions during sleep can be false, just as we sometimes mistake dream objects for reality. If there is no essential difference between illusory dream experiences and true waking experiences, then it is plausible that we are constantly dreaming. As a result, none of our beliefs based on sensory experience can be considered unquestionable. Therefore, it can be concluded that all our sensory-based beliefs may potentially be nothing more than illusions.
The purpose of this passage is to argue that our beliefs can be questioned and should be abandoned. However, let us imagine for a moment that we are dreaming. Doesn’t it seem like the things we perceive in dreams must come from somewhere? The ideas we imagine must truly exist because we cannot think of things that we have never experienced. The logic is simple: something cannot come from nothing. This principle also applies to thoughts; no idea comes into existence without a cause, even adaptations are combinations of things we have sensed.
Even if something appears unfamiliar, it is still composed of colors and geometric shapes that we have experienced through our senses. Therefore, there must be a reality from which these ideas originate. Descartes’ meditator can conclude that simple ideas like color, arithmetic, and physics are unquestionable, as their existence is not dependent on being awake or asleep. Whether we are conscious or not, the laws governing these concepts apply consistently. For example, two plus three will always equal five, and red will never be blue.
However, how can we determine if our experience is truly real or merely a dream? Even though we acknowledge that there is a reality beyond our consciousness, we still lack conclusive evidence to distinguish between illusory and genuine experiences. This premise, which states that there are no definitive signs to differentiate wakefulness from sleep, has been repeatedly debated in response to Descartes’ dreaming argument (Richmond Journal of Philosophy 8 (Winter 2004)).
John Locke, in his Essay concerning Human Understanding, disagrees with the idea that he might be dreaming. He argues that what sets dreams apart from waking experiences is the presence of pleasure and pain, which are felt when awake but not in dreams. In his essay, Locke illustrates this point through the example of acute pain: “I believe he [someone like Descartes] will allow a very manifest difference between dreaming of being in the Fire, and being actually in it.”
In essence, the author proposes that Descartes would have a different perception of being in a fire while dreaming compared to actually being in a fire while awake. It is notable that the example provided by Locke pertains to physical pain rather than the mental torment experienced in nightmares such as anxiety or fear. Locke asserts that the genuine physical sensation of pain is not something we could have encountered while asleep and dreaming. This serves to illustrate that there are authentic experiences that are beyond doubt.
Contrary to the assertion that feeling physical pain while dreaming is impossible, I have personally experienced dreams in which I endured intense physical pain. Nevertheless, if Locke had acknowledged that dreaming excludes the initial experience of pain, his argument would have been more precise. This is due to the fact that everything I feel during my dreams has already been encountered in my waking life.
The physical sensations in my dreams are not new experiences, but rather ones that I have already felt while awake. Consequently, it is possible to dream of experiencing intense pain like being stabbed if we have previously encountered it in our waking life. To distinguish between the two, we can consider the initial encounter with acute pain as the experience while awake. However, Descartes could dispute this argument by asserting that relating sensory experiences to dreams does not establish a clear distinction between them.
Descartes argues that the absence of experiencing certain events does not disprove the possibility of experiencing them. Embracing skepticism to the extent Descartes does allows for the notion that our past collective life experiences may simply be our initial dream. In addition, it raises the question of whether our current experience of pain is genuine or merely a dream, and whether the chaotic world lacking coherence is actually reality. Descartes responds to this by suggesting that a potential dream has the ability to imitate any present experience, regardless of its nature.
Dreams have the ability to take on various forms and replicate any scenario, feeling, or thought. However, if we are currently in a dream state with no actual experiences, where do these thoughts come from? It is evident that we must have had some interaction with an external reality in order to develop our understanding of arithmetic and colors, which present themselves consistently regardless of our conscious state. Unless, of course, these ideas are derived from God.
According to Descartes, although something cannot come from nothing, God, our omnipotent father, is capable of creating all of our experiences as dreams purely through his will. Our understanding of God implies boundless potential, doesn’t it? Descartes suggests that God’s limitless potential could make him an all-powerful deceiver, while our ability to be deceived is also boundless compared to his power. With this concept in mind, Descartes’ meditator successfully defends against all challengers to his skeptical argument.
Descartes posits that God’s ability to deceive is so great that any experience or belief could be rendered false. He employs this concept to challenge the validity of Aristotelian physics, thereby undermining its fundamental principles. According to Descartes, knowledge derived from sensory perception lacks certainty and cannot serve as a foundation for belief. Personally, I find Descartes’ argument in the First Meditation to be an incredibly persuasive defense of skepticism.
While Descartes’ attempt to appeal to skeptics and disprove their logic with absolute truths may not resonate with them, he does use skepticism effectively in the First Meditation to break down all beliefs gained through the senses. One example of this is his illustration of the dreaming argument.
Works Cited: Hill, James. “Descartes’ Dreaming Argument And Why We Might Be Sceptical Of It.” Richmond Journal of Philosophy 8 (Winter 2004), http://www.richmond-philosophy.net/rjp/back_issues/rjp8_hill.pdf.
