Epistemological Truth Exposed In Christopher Nolan's Inception

Christopher Nolan’s imaginative and visually stunning thriller Inception is one of the most ingenious movies I have ever seen. The plot, editing and actors are all spectacular. I have seen the movie several times, yet each time I watch the movie I pick up on something new I had previously missed. However, I never knew that there were philosophical references in the movie until this assignment was given. I have learned that these references specifically come from epistemological problems, primarily those first raised by René Descartes. The films fundamental epistemological question is with out a doubt whether one knows when they are dreaming. This question is known as the Dream Argument and was first posed by René Descartes in his book called Meditations on First Philosophy. …show more content…
However, the film’s protagonists have real world objects called “totems”, which have weights or other properties known only to their owners. They use them so that they can distinguish whether they are in a dream. Only in the real world will a totem fall the way it is supposed to fall. Therefore when the totem is thrown, spun, or held, its owner can tell if they are in a dream-state or in reality. When Cobb walks into his house at the end of the film, he spins his totem, a spinning top, and then proceeds to walk outside to greet his children. A sign that he is in a dream would be that the top continued spinning forever. We are left seeing the totem spinning on the table, and then the film cuts to the credits. We are not sure if the totem spins forever, or falls. As I have learned, even if the spinning top had toppled over at the end of the film, it would still be impossible to tell whether Cobb was dreaming. This is because the original state where he created his totem and defined its behavior might itself have been within a dream. Understanding this makes the ending of the film and its entirety even more mind blowing to