Importance Of Descartes First Meditations

There has always been a point in history of Western philosophy when the definition of knowledge had been redefined, debated upon, and rejected. However, many philosophers were more concerned with the essence of knowledge, that is, what does constitute as knowledge and how we can achieve it. In addition, many argue that there are certain knowledge is just not attainable and human mind wouldn’t be able to grasp on the capacity of the higher truths. Nevertheless, one still can question the knowledge they already possess and decided for themselves whether to believe it or not. In this essay I aim to demonstrate Descartes’ arguments for skepticism and genuine knowledge. In order to do so, I shall inform the reader about the very importance of skepticism, central concerns in the First Meditations, and eventually draw upon bona fide source of genuine knowledge. In particular, I discuss how I am certain in my knowing of writing this paper at this very moment based on my rationale and reasoning, without relying on senses to come to such conclusion.
From the beginning of Meditations, Descartes declares that what is certain that nothing is certain in this world. First, it is important to examine why he comes to …show more content…
Such radical process has a purpose of inquiring and questioning our knowledge by looking at its foundation. If foundation proves to be doubtful, everything else collapses; thus leaving one to own device to decide what knowledge is genuine by using reason. Furthermore, Descartes strives to utilize skepticism as the mean to an end, that is, the doubting all our beliefs for the purpose of acquiring genuine knowledge. However, Descartes himself admits that it might be impossible to know all the truths, but at least the skepticism would help him to eject the false beliefs, replacing them with justified and certain