Synopsis
Widely regarded as the father of modern Western philosophy, Descartes sought to look beyond established ideas and create a thought system based on reason. In this profound work he meditates on doubt, the human soul, God, truth and the nature of existence itself.
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Student review of Meditations by Katie Low, studying at Oxford University.
We can be certain about the nature of the world around us, the people in it, and above all our own bodies, can’t we? Surely the countless sensations and experiences that befall us every day of our lives create an impression on which we can depend? Not only does a mass of empirical evidence tend towards this conclusion, but we might think that there is nothing that contradicts the view that our external perceptions mirror reality. In the Meditations, Descartes does not seriously propose that we are mistaken about what we think we see and feel or, as in The Matrix, that a malevolent power controls us, deliberately feeding us false ideas that do not truly represent the real world. But in this sequence of linked discussions he introduces such possibilities as thought experiments that encourage us to reconsider our knowledge of the world and how we acquire it.
The work, moreover, is written not as a dry philosophical treatise, but rather a personal odyssey of intellectual investigation. The persona Descartes adopts in it is literally that of an armchair philosopher, who sits by the fire considering one fundamental question after another. He writes in the first person, purporting to describe his own reflections, hesitations and realisations: this approach helps readers follow his arguments, as well as subtly encouraging agreement with his conclusions.
In the course of the six Meditations Descartes moves from doubting the validity of all the beliefs he has acquired in the course of his life to a more constructive conclusion, but it is his original position of extreme scepticism that is most memorable. He begins by arguing that his senses may seem reliable, but as they have deceived him in the past there is no guarantee that they are not doing so now. Nor is there any infallible test to distinguish between sleeping and being awake, as he has had the same experiences in dreams and when conscious. Finally, it is impossible to prove that an evil demon is not constantly tricking him and distorting his view of the world. This is not at all likely – but the point is that these alternative scenarios cannot in theory be dismissed. Descartes cannot even take the existence of his own body for granted. The only thing, in fact, about which he can be certain is that whenever he entertains a thought of any kind, right or wrong, he exists as a thinking thing. As he famously expressed it in a different work, cogito ergo sum: I think, therefore I am.
Descartes has succeeded in confirming his own being, but he needs an independent justification for the reality of the material world and his perceptions of it. For him, this is supplied by God, whose own existence he now turns to proving. Two specific arguments are employed. He has in his mind in his mind an idea of God that must have come from somewhere (since, he notes, something cannot come from nothing), and the source of that idea must be as real as the idea itself – so God has to exist. Second, he argues that we conceive of God as a supremely perfect entity endowed with many individual qualities, one of which is existence. If he did not exist, he would not be perfect, and would not be God.
These proofs allow Descartes to be confident about more than just his own existence. He argues that God, being benevolent, would not make him believe that he has a physical body if this were not the case. And while his senses may have deceived him on occasion, this does not mean that he cannot make accurate judgements about physical things: he must use wisely the evidence of the senses God has given him. The states of dreaming and waking can, in addition, be distinguished: dreams lack logical consistency, and bizarre events occur in them.
This conclusion may well come as something of a disappointment when compared with the uncompromising sceptical manifesto that Descartes set out originally. Not only are readers unlikely to find the evocation of God as a solution to an epistemological impasse convincing, but the theoretical arguments for God’s existence themselves stand little chance of being accepted today.
However, it should be borne in mind that this appeal to orthodoxy may well have been in tended to counterbalance the views expressed in the earlier part of the work. Descartes was writing in France in 1640, when the influence of the Catholic Church, often hostile to scientific and philosophical enquiry, was all-pervasive. Under these conditions, to express even theoretical doubt about material existence and to reconsider basic assumptions about the world were courageous acts.
The religious overtones to Descartes’ work should not obscure the fact that his exploration of doubt and scepticism was at the time a radical departure, an innovatory way of doing philosophy. The Meditations have had a significant effect on subsequent thinkers. To read them today is still a genuinely challenging and thought-provoking experience.
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Product details
Format :
Paperback
ISBN: 9780141192963
Size : 111 x 181mm
Pages : 144
Published : 26 Aug 2010
Publisher : Penguin
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Meditations
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