Knowledge Vs. Belief The Difference Between Knowing And Believing

User Generated

juhpuhq

Writing

Description


My topic would be: What's the difference between knowing something and just believing it? ( Knowledge vs. belief)

For this assignment I want you to compose a detailed outline in preparation for a full paper. You will not have to write this paper. As such, the emphasis is on the “detailed” of “detailed outline”. I want to see you include in the outline every point, idea, argument, and observation you would plan on including in the paper. This assignment, in short, is to do all the intellectual work behind the writing of the paper.

The attached documents are the instructions of this paper and some resources.

Unformatted Attachment Preview

First Writing Assignment For this assignment I want you to compose a detailed outline in preparation for a full paper. You will not have to write this paper. As such, the emphasis is on the “detailed” of “detailed outline”. I want to see you include in the outline every point, idea, argument, and observation you would plan on including in the paper. This assignment, in short, is to do all the intellectual work behind the writing of the paper. Length is a subjective matter for this assignment, but I don’t imagine that you can do an adequate job in under two pages. You’re going to have to identify (even if you don’t fully explain) the ideas you plan on including, and it should be clear to me what are the claims you plan to make in the paper and how you will defend them. Remember again that philosophical writing is and should be denser then much other academic writing. I’m not going to be too formal about my evaluation here, I just want to see you making an authentic effort to get into the exploration of your chosen topic. Grading for this assignment will concern almost entirely the conceptual depth and density with which you compose your outline. A thesis with a couple throw-away defenses will not cut it. If you follow the attached procedure, you should find yourself with more than enough to build a detailed, complex discussion of your topic. Clarity and organization will also factor into your grade for this assignment, so even though this is only an outline, it may still be a good idea to do some revisions! Pick a narrow topic, but don’t limit it by contextualizing it to just your experience or into some restricted conditions. Approach whatever issue you pick as if it was part of a discussion that would not be limited to a specific cultural or other circumstantial background. Finally, as I have tried to articulate in class, I want you to really dive into whatever question or issue you want to explore – don’t just poke at the issue from afar, speaking to what others have or would say on the issue. Try to get inside the question; imagine it from the vantage point of someone who has to make a decision on how to answer that question and what things you think they should be considering. I think the philosophers we’ve already read may give you a good idea of what this kind of engagement looks like, but if you are having any further trouble with picking out a topic or in figuring out how I want you to approach it, please contact me so we can talk about it. Consider me available for assistance throughout the week up to the day the assignment is due. The attached summary of my lecture may also be of assistance. Please take a look: These steps do not necessarily need to follow rigidly in the order they are presented in, but they are all covering facets of the overall process that are good to keep in mind. #1: Picking a topic There are 2 general categories of motivations philosophers have in picking topics to discuss: - Sometimes a philosopher already has an answer to some question that we wonder about and so they start with the knowledge of where they want to go (their conclusion) and the process becomes a matter of giving a defense of this answer/position. Maybe you already have an opinion on some matter that you would like to work with to see what can be said for it. - Other times (many times!), a philosopher just starts with a question they are curious about and wants to explore more. In this case they may not have an immediate answer, or even a starting guess, and the process becomes exploring the question and what things will be considerations we will have to weigh. Perhaps you are in this boat where you’ve wondered about something but are not yet confident or comfortable claiming that a particular answer to that question is the right one. This is totally ok! You don’t have to have all the answers before you start out on the journey of writing a philosophy paper. Whatever your motivation is, you want the paper to end up engaging with a matter of some substance and significance. You don’t want a paper that ends up defending an uncontroversial answer to a question that no one finds perplexing. Don’t be afraid to try to tackle something you are not 100% confident about. The philosophical process is an ongoing one where we sort out the various considerations together, rather than accepting answers based on the authority of the author. Also be looking for potential opponents. This will be easy if you are approaching things from the first direction mentioned above, but even if you are starting with the second, you should end up making a claim by the end of the process and being aware of the other possible answers out there that will be in disagreement is good. If you can find a strong opponent to your conclusion, that is a good sign you have a substantial topic. In balance with all of this is making sure that you are able to accomplish (more or less) what you set out to defend. If your topic is too broad it will be impossible to give a satisfactory defense of what you are trying to claim. Too narrow, and you run the risk of it being insubstantial. This is a hard balancing act that mostly requires experience to judge, but a sensitivity to this possibility even for new students of philosophy is a good thing in my opinion. #2: Identifying a thesis Your thesis is your conclusion that you will be spending the paper trying to defend. Every philosophy paper needs a claim like this. Even if you are starting out just exploring a question, by the end of things you need to adopt some position on that question and make whatever case you can. Again, don’t feel like you have to be dogmatic about your opinion before you can set about defending it. You can even say as much in your paper! You can say something like, “I’m not completely confident this is the right answer because of x, y, z (reasons that may be in tension with your conclusion), but reasons a, b, c (or however many you have) seem to make a good case for my conclusion”. Such modesty is totally appropriate when the situation calls for it (i.e. there must be some reasons x, y, z available!), but also don’t make the mistake of being overly modest when you have in fact presented strong support for your conclusion! Finally, I want to emphasize that while defining a thesis may happen at the start of this process it also may not. In either case, most theses will get modified and adjusted as you go about the work of putting together the paper. You may find that the arguments you come up with are able to justify a stronger thesis then what you originally had in mind, or you may find it is too hard to defend your original thesis and you’ll have to weaken it. Be open to this possibility as you go to work. Two variables are particularly important when defining a thesis: - - Scope: this is similar to the suggestions I’ve been making regarding the journals. Don’t make your topic to broad – find a manageable topic that you’ll be able to give a good treatment to in the space you have available. Since you are only doing an outline, you may feel you can be more ambitious, but just keep in mind that the bigger the topic, the more you’ll have to say to support any conclusions you draw about it. o Example: ▪ We never know anything (too broad) ▪ The subjectivity of perception undermines our claims to know things on the basis of our experience (much more manageable) Strength: this is parallel to scope in that the stronger the thesis, the more defense is required in support. Let’s look at a couple of examples to explain: ▪ The subjectivity of perception undermines our claims to know things on the basis of our experience • (this is still a strong claim since it rules out a number of ways we may try to justify knowledge based on experience, AND because inferring from our experience is a commonly accepted basis for knowledge) ▪ The subjectivity of perception threatens to undermine our claims to know things on the basis of our experience • This is weaker since “threatens” does not yet assert that the threat is successful. All that would be required for this thesis is to provide reasonable support to the existence of a concern that is in tension with our claims to knowledge based on experience. o In this example, the first is stronger not only because if true it rules out more opponents, but also because it controversially denies something we usually take to be uncontroversial. The more controversial the claim, the stronger it is and the more defense it requires o Strength also concerns the force in which a claim is asserted: ▪ Example: • We possibly don’t know • We plausibly don’t know • We don’t know • We certainly don’t know • We necessarily can’t know ▪ These proceed in increasing strength o Watch strength because it is tempting to assert our claims more forcefully in order to express confidence, but confidence doesn’t always come with enough supporting reasons to justify it! Philosophers are never (ideally) convinced of something only on the basis of the conviction of the one arguing – conviction is not a substitute for giving good reasons in support. Finally, when deciding on a thesis, it can be useful to get straight on the following two things: - What is the precise question my thesis is supposed to be an answer to? What are my motivations behind defending this thesis and not another? These should help you get starting identifying what kinds of reasons and considerations you want to be bringing up in the course of the paper and what stuff is actually off track. It also helps make sure you are defending only what you need/want to, without leaving out anything OR adding claims you really might not need to in order to get your point across. #3: the first pass The next step is to make a (revisable) list of the points, observations, arguments etc that first strike you as you approach the question, topic, or position that is your chosen subject. Most of the papers I’ve gotten in the past from students only make it this far. And while this is a crucial step in the process of writing a paper, it is not the end of the road. If you are starting with a question: listing the various significant considerations related to answering the question should give you an idea of what answer you want to pick up and run with. After this step might be a good time to go back to #2 and work out defining a thesis. If you are starting with an answer: First look to why you are at this point convinced of your position. What has maybe been in the “back of your head” when you’ve formed this opinion in the past. Once you’ve got down what has led you to this position up to this point, spend time seeing if you can’t brainstorm some new reasons for the position that you may not have considered before but which provide additional support. #4: the second pass: filling gaps This stage is for looking over your list of considerations and seeing if anything needs to be added in order to just make your story sensible. Perhaps you make a leap in logic that could be filled in so that your reader can follow what’s going on. It is easy to make assumptions as far as how your audience will understand what you are trying to say, and this stage is just to take a step back to see how much you may be taking for granted and fixing that. #5: the third pass: validity/sufficiency This time going through your list you should be looking for ways in which a reader could agree to all your points while still disagreeing with your thesis. See if what you’ve said is really enough to convince anyone who doesn’t take issue with your arguments. Example: - Today is a Monday, so you should give me $5. o Someone can agree with the truth of the premise (that today is Monday) without agreeing that the conclusion (you should give me $5) follows from this point. A less silly example: - We need an America with strong values, and I haven’t ever broken the law (unlike my opponent who has held 3 parking violations in his life), so you should vote for me. o Again, the premises may be true, and they may even provide SOME support for the conclusion, but maybe not ENOUGH support – like I hope is clear in this case! If you find that someone could take a (sensible) stance that agrees with you on your premises but not your conclusion, then see if you can’t fix this by providing more support or including more premises that forge a tighter link between your conclusion and the premises. Sometimes the answer is to weaken the conclusion too! #6: the fourth pass: soundness Here you should now look for ways the truth of your points could be called into question. Perhaps there is some controversy over your claims in support of your conclusion. Get clear on how such objections might go and find ways to address them (or avoid them by adjusting the claims in your argument). Sincerely going through this step will probably help you find much more to say in your paper if you were originally worried you might not have enough to say. Remember charity! (try to make your opponents look as strong as possible so that you give them a fair presentation and so that when you argue against them you are accomplishing more) #7: the fifth pass: perspective Now step REALLY back and look for ways in which your topic may be approached in alternative ways. Compare and contrast, but first just do this for yourself (don’t necessarily include it in the paper) as a way of exploring the ideas related to the issue. The similarities and differences between your perspective and others may possibly not contribute to the discussion of what answers we have the best reasons for. If such similarities/differences DO contribute, then they may be a good addition, but don’t just put them in automatically (this is the biggest source of “space filling” which I will not appreciate so much - remember how I talked about how I want you to get “into” the issue of giving an answer and not just talking about different ways people COULD answer). This step can take the longest and demand the most imagination on your part (in addition to holding a lot of things up in the air at the same time), but many times it is where things are the most dynamic in terms of getting straight on your own view and the best way to go about defending it. (if you didn’t start with a thesis, but instead with a question, you should probably do this step alongside step #3) #8: Organization Another CRUCIAL step. This is where you decide what order to place your content in. Many things can inform this including: - - Argumentative structure: generally keep claims and the arguments they support together o This is probably already obvious. If you have a chain of reasoning, don’t split it up with other points that are not relevant to that chain. Uncontroversial -> controversial o Start with the more uncontroversial and move to the controversial Simple -> complex Common -> uncommon Direct -> indirect connection to the “source” material (this being wherever the discussion begins) o Along with this is: significant -> less significant to your core position o The idea here is to start with the stuff that matters more to your discussion and leave the curiosities toward the end. If there’s one point or set of points that you think are the most important reasons for your conclusion, don’t save them all for the very end unless this contradicts all the other variables listed here In general, you also want to be clear in alerting your reader to 1) where you’re going and 2) how you are planning to get there. Philosophical papers should not be like leading us blinding through a bunch of points to a surprise answer. This virtue of philosophical writing becomes more important at the draft stage of paper composition (as opposed to the outline stage), but it is still good to mention now. A final note on Audience Identifying an audience is important when defining a thesis, but most of the time it won’t be necessary to imagine any substantial philosophical views on their part. For example, Jackson may be imagining certain philosophical beliefs of his readers in his paper on Mary (this is why he puts in the 3 clarifications in order to head off possible objections) since he is arguing against a certain common view (physicalism). But his paper is a very focused addition to an ongoing conversation. Your papers will probably not have so specific a purpose, so don’t worry too much about such things. My advice if you are going to imagine an audience is to imagine someone who is open, curious, but critical (in a non-antagonistic sort of way). They will listen to whatever you want to say, but they won’t just accept your arguments rolling over, unless you really do provide good reasons in defense of your position. I, for some reason, always imagine Morgan Freeman, but go for whatever works for you. Think of an audience that will be a part of that whole co-operative truth seeking thing with you. Hope this helps!!!! FIRST MEDITATION 17 of those things that may be called into doubt It is some years now since I realized how many false opinions I had accepted as true from childhood onwards,* and that, whatever I had since built on such shaky foundations, could only be highly doubtful. Hence I saw that at some stage in my life the whole structure would have to be utterly demolished, and that I should have to begin again from the bottom up if I wished to construct something lasting and unshakeable in the sciences. But this seemed to be a massive task, and so I postponed it until I had reached the age when one is as fit as one will ever be to master the various disciplines. Hence I have delayed so long that now I should be at fault if I used up in deliberating the time that is left for acting. The moment has come, and so today I have discharged my mind from all its cares, and have carved out a space of untroubled leisure. I have withdrawn into seclusion and shall at last be able to devote myself seriously and without encumbrance to the task of destroying all my former opinions. To this end, however, it will not be necessary to prove them all false—a thing I should perhaps never be able to achieve. But since reason already persuades me that I should no less scrupulously withhold my assent from what is not fully certain and indubitable than from what is blatantly false, then, in order to reject them all, it will be sufficient to find some reason for doubting each one. Nor shall I therefore have to go through them each individually, which would be an endless task: but since, once the foundations are undermined, the building will collapse of its own accord, I shall straight away attack the very principles that form the basis of all my former beliefs. Certainly, up to now whatever I have accepted as fully true I have learned either from or by means of the senses: but I have discovered that they sometimes deceive us, and prudence dictates that we should never fully trust those who have deceived us even once. But perhaps, although they sometimes deceive us about things that are little, or rather a long way away, there are plenty of other things of which there is clearly no doubt, although it was from the senses that we learned them: for instance, that I am now here, sitting by the fire, wrapped in a warm winter gown, handling this paper, 18 14 19 20 First Meditation and suchlike. Indeed, that these hands themselves, and this whole body are mine—what reason could there be for doubting this? Unless perhaps I were to compare myself to one of those madmen, whose little brains have been so befuddled by a pestilential vapour arising from the black bile,* that they swear blind that they are kings, though they are beggars, or that they are clad in purple, when they are naked, or that their head is made of clay, or that their whole body is a jug, or made entirely of glass. But they are lunatics, and I should seem no less of a madman myself if I should follow their example in any way. This is all very well, to be sure. But am I not a human being, and therefore in the habit of sleeping at night, when in my dreams I have all the same experiences as these madmen do when they are awake— or sometimes even stranger ones? How often my sleep at night has convinced me of all these familiar things—that I was here, wrapped in my gown, sitting by the fire—when in fact I was lying naked under the bedclothes.—All the same, I am now perceiving this paper with eyes that are certainly awake; the head I am nodding is not drowsy; I stretch out my hand and feel it knowingly and deliberately; a sleeper would not have these experiences so distinctly.—But have I then forgotten those other occasions on which I have been deceived by similar thoughts in my dreams? When I think this over more carefully I see so clearly that waking can never be distinguished from sleep by any conclusive indications that I am stupefied; and this very stupor comes close to persuading me that I am asleep after all. Let us then suppose* that we are dreaming, and that these particular things (that we have our eyes open, are moving our head, stretching out our hands) are not true; and that perhaps we do not even have hands or the rest of a body like what we see. It must nonetheless be admitted that the things we see in sleep are, so to speak, painted images, which could not be formed except on the basis of a resemblance with real things; and that for this reason these general things at least (such as eyes, head, hands, and the rest of the body) are not imaginary things, but real and existing. For the fact is that when painters desire to represent sirens and little satyrs with utterly unfamiliar shapes, they cannot devise altogether new natures for them, but simply combine parts from different animals; or if perhaps they do think up something so new that nothing at all like it has ever been seen, which is thus altogether fictitious and false, it is certain that at First Meditation 15 least the colours which they combine to form images must be real. By the same token, even though these general things—eyes, head, hands, and so forth—might be imaginary, it must necessarily be admitted that at least some other still more simple and universal realities must exist, from which (as the painter’s image is produced from real colours) all these images of things—be they true or false—that occur in our thoughts are produced. In this category it seems we should include bodily nature in general, and its extension; likewise the shape of extended things and their quantity (magnitude and number); likewise the place in which they exist, the time during which they exist, and suchlike. From all this, perhaps, we may safely conclude that physics, astronomy, medicine, and all the other disciplines which involve the study of composite things are indeed doubtful; but that arithmetic, geometry, and other disciplines of the same kind, which deal only with the very simplest and most general things, and care little whether they exist in nature or not, contain something certain and indubitable. For whether I am waking or sleeping, two plus three equals five, and a square has no more than four sides; nor does it seem possible that such obvious truths could be affected by any suspicion that they are false. However, there is a certain opinion long fixed in my mind, that there is a God who is all-powerful, and by whom I was created such as I am now. Now how do I know that he has not brought it about that there is no earth at all, no heavens, no extended things, no shape, no magnitude, no place—and yet that all these things appear to me to exist just as they do now?* Or even—just as I judge now and again that other people are mistaken about things they believe they know with the greatest certitude—that I too should be similarly deceived whenever I add two and three, or count the sides of a square, or make a judgement about something even simpler, if anything simpler can be imagined? But perhaps God has not willed that I should be so cheated, for he is said to be supremely good.—But if it were incompatible with his goodness to have created me such that I am perpetually deceived, it would seem equally inconsistent with that quality to permit me to be sometimes deceived. Nonetheless, I cannot doubt that he does permit it. Perhaps, indeed, there might be some people who would prefer to deny the existence of any God so powerful, rather than believing that all other things are uncertain. But let us not quarrel with them, and 21 16 22 23 First Meditation let us grant that all this we have said of God is only a fiction; and let them suppose that it is by fate or chance or a continuous sequence of things that I have come to be what I am. Since, though, to be deceived and to err appear to be some kind of imperfection, the less powerful the source they invoke to explain my being, the more probable it will be that I am so imperfect that I am perpetually deceived. To all these arguments, indeed, I have no answer, but at length I am forced to admit that there is nothing of all those things I once thought true, of which it is not legitimate to doubt—and not out of any thoughtlessness or irresponsibility, but for sound and wellweighed reasons; and therefore that, from these things as well, no less than from what is blatantly false, I must now carefully withhold my assent if I wish to discover any thing that is certain.* But it is not enough to have realized all this, I must take care to remember it: for my accustomed opinions continually creep back into my mind, and take possession of my belief, which has, so to speak, been enslaved to them by long experience and familiarity, for the most part against my will. Nor shall I ever break the habit of assenting to them and relying on them, as long as I go on supposing them to be such as they are in truth, that is to say, doubtful indeed in some respect, as has been shown just now, and yet nonetheless highly probable, so that it is much more rational to believe than to deny them. Hence, it seems to me, I shall not be acting unwisely if, willing myself to believe the contrary, I deceive myself, and make believe, for some considerable time, that they are altogether false and imaginary, until, once the prior judgements on each side have been evenly balanced in the scales, no evil custom can any longer twist my judgement away from the correct perception of things. For I know for sure that no danger or error will ensue as a result of this, and that there is no risk that I shall be giving too free a rein to my distrustfulness, since my concern at the moment is not with action but only with the attainment of knowledge.* I will therefore suppose that, not God, who is perfectly good and the source of truth, but some evil spirit, supremely powerful and cunning, has devoted all his efforts to deceiving me.* I will think that the sky, the air, the earth, colours, shapes, sounds, and all external things are no different from the illusions of our dreams, and that they are traps he has laid for my credulity; I will consider myself as having no hands, no eyes, no flesh, no blood, and no senses, but yet as falsely Second Meditation 17 believing that I have all these;* I will obstinately cling to these thoughts, and in this way, if indeed it is not in my power to discover any truth,* yet certainly to the best of my ability and determination I will take care not to give my assent to anything false, or to allow this deceiver, however powerful and cunning he may be, to impose upon me in any way. But to carry out this plan requires great effort, and there is a kind of indolence that drags me back to my customary way of life. Just as a prisoner, who was perhaps enjoying an imaginary freedom in his dreams, when he then begins to suspect that he is asleep is afraid of being woken up, and lets himself sink back into his soothing illusions; so I of my own accord slip back into my former opinions, and am scared to awake, for fear that tranquil sleep will give way to laborious hours of waking, which from now on I shall have to spend not in any kind of light, but in the unrelenting darkness of the difficulties just stirred up. SECOND MEDITATION of the nature of the human mind; that it is more easily known than the body Yesterday’s meditation has plunged me into so many doubts that I still cannot put them out of my mind, nor, on the other hand, can I see any way to resolve them; but, as if I had suddenly slipped into a deep whirlpool, I am in such difficulties that I can neither touch bottom with my foot nor swim back to the surface. Yet I will struggle on, and I will try the same path again as the one I set out on yesterday, that is to say, eliminating everything in which there is the smallest element of doubt, exactly as if I had found it to be false through and through; and I shall pursue my way until I discover something certain; or, failing that, discover that it is certain only that nothing is certain. Archimedes* claimed, that if only he had a point that was firm and immovable, he would move the whole earth; and great things are likewise to be hoped, if I can find just one little thing that is certain and unshakeable. I therefore suppose that all I see is false; I believe that none of those things represented by my deceitful memory has ever existed; in fact I have no senses at all; body, shape, extension in space, motion, 24 18 25 Second Meditation and place itself are all illusions. What truth then is left? Perhaps this alone, that nothing is certain. But how do I know that there is not something different from all those things I have just listed, about which there is not the slightest room for doubt? Is there not, after all, some God, or whatever he should be called, that puts these thoughts into my mind? But why should I think that, when perhaps I myself could be the source of these thoughts? But am I at least not something, after all? But I have already denied that I have any senses or any body. Now I am at a loss, because what follows from this? Am I so bound up with my body and senses that I cannot exist without them? But I convinced myself that there was nothing at all in the world, no sky, no earth, no minds, no bodies. Did I therefore not also convince myself that I did not exist either? No: certainly I did exist, if I convinced myself of something.—But there is some deceiver or other, supremely powerful and cunning, who is deliberately deceiving me all the time.— Beyond doubt then, I also exist, if he is deceiving me; and he can deceive me all he likes, but he will never bring it about that I should be nothing as long as I think I am something. So that, having weighed all these considerations sufficiently and more than sufficiently, I can finally decide* that this proposition, ‘I am, I exist’, whenever it is uttered by me, or conceived in the mind, is necessarily true. But indeed I do not yet sufficiently understand what in fact this ‘I’ is that now necessarily exists;* so that from now on I must take care in case I should happen imprudently to take something else to be me that is not me, and thus go astray in the very knowledge [cognitione] that I claim to be the most certain and evident of all. Hence I shall now meditate afresh on what I once believed myself to be, before I fell into this train of thought. From this I shall then subtract whatever it has been possible to cast doubt on, even in the slightest degree, by the reasons put forward above, so that in the end there shall remain exactly and only that which is certain and unshakeable. So what in fact did I think I was before all this? A human being, of course. But what is a human being? Shall I say, ‘a rational animal’?* No, for then I should have to examine what exactly an animal is, and what ‘rational’ is, and hence, starting with one question, I should stumble into more and more difficult ones. Nor do I now have so much leisure that I can afford to fritter it away on subtleties of this kind. But here I shall rather direct my attention to the thoughts that Second Meditation 19 spontaneously and by nature’s prompting came to my mind beforehand, whenever I considered what I was. The first was that I have a face, hands, arms, and this whole mechanism of limbs, such as we see even in corpses; this I referred to as the body. Next, that I took nourishment, moved, perceived with my senses, and thought: these actions indeed I attributed to the soul.* What this soul was, however, either I never considered, or I imagined it as something very rarefied and subtle, like a wind, or fire, or thin air, infused into my coarser parts. But about the body itself, on the other hand, I had no doubts, but I thought I distinctly knew its nature, which, if I had attempted to describe how I conceived it in my mind, I would have explained as follows: by body I mean everything that is capable of being bounded by some shape, of existing in a definite place, of filling a space in such a way as to exclude the presence of any other body within it; of being perceived by touch, sight, hearing, taste, or smell, and also of being moved in various ways, not indeed by itself, but by some other thing by which it is touched; for to have the power of moving itself, and also of perceiving by the senses or thinking, I judged could in no way belong to the nature of body; rather, I was puzzled by the fact that such capacities were found in certain bodies. But what about now, when I am supposing that some deceiver, who is supremely powerful and, if I may venture to say so, evil, has been exerting all his efforts to delude me in every way? Can I affirm that I possess the slightest thing of all those that I have just said belong to the nature of body? I consider, I think, I go over it all in my mind: nothing comes up. It would be a waste of effort to go through the list again. But what about the attributes I used to ascribe to the soul? What about taking nourishment or moving? But since I now have no body, these also are nothing but illusions. What about senseperception? But certainly this does not take place without a body, and I have seemed to perceive very many things when asleep that I later realized I had not perceived. What about thinking? Here I do find something: it is thought; this alone cannot be stripped from me. I am, I exist, this is certain. But for how long? Certainly only for as long as I am thinking; for perhaps if I were to cease from all thinking it might also come to pass that I might immediately cease altogether to exist. I am now admitting nothing except what is necessarily true: I am therefore, speaking precisely, only a thinking thing, that is, a mind, or a soul, or an intellect, or a reason—words the meaning of 26 27 20 28 Second Meditation which was previously unknown to me. I am therefore a true thing, and one that truly exists; but what kind of thing? I have said it already: one that thinks. What comes next? I will imagine: I am not that framework of limbs that is called a human body; I am not some thin air infused into these limbs, or a wind, or a fire, or a vapour, or a breath, or whatever I can picture myself as: for I have supposed that these things do not exist. But even if I keep to this supposition, nonetheless I am still something.*—But all the same, it is perhaps still the case that these very things I am supposing to be nothing, are nevertheless not distinct from this ‘me’ that I know* [novi].—Perhaps: I don’t know. But this is not the point at issue at present. I can pass judgement only on those things that are known to me. I know [novi] that I exist; I am trying to find out what this ‘I’ is, whom I know [novi]. It is absolutely certain that this knowledge [notitia], in the precise sense in question here, does not depend on things of which I do not yet know [novi] whether they exist; and therefore it depends on none of those things I picture in my imagination. This very word ‘imagination’ shows where I am going wrong. For I should certainly be ‘imagining things’ if I imagined myself to be anything, since imagining is nothing other than contemplating the shape or image of a bodily thing. Now, however, I know [scio] for certain that I exist; and that, at the same time, it could be the case that all these images, and in general everything that pertains to the nature of body, are nothing but illusions. Now this is clear to me, it would seem as foolish of me to say: ‘I shall use my imagination, in order to recognize more clearly what I am’, as it would be to say: ‘Now I am awake, and I see something true; but because I cannot yet see it clearly enough, I shall do my best to get back to sleep again so that my dreams can show it to me more truly and more clearly.’ And so I realize [cognosco] that nothing that I can grasp by means of the imagination has to do with this knowledge [notitiam] I have of myself, and that I need to withdraw my mind from such things as thoroughly as possible, if it is to perceive its own nature as distinctly as possible. But what therefore am I? A thinking thing. What is that? I mean a thing that doubts, that understands, that affirms, that denies, that wishes to do this and does not wish to do that, and also that imagines and perceives by the senses. Second Meditation 21 Well, indeed, there is quite a lot there, if all these things really do belong to me. But why should they not belong to me? Is it not me who currently doubts virtually everything, who nonetheless understands something, who affirms this alone to be true, and denies the rest, who wishes to know more, and wishes not to be deceived, who imagines many things, even against his will, and is aware of many things that appear to come via the senses? Is there any of these things that is not equally true as the fact that I exist—even if I am always asleep, and even if my creator is deceiving me to the best of his ability? Is there any of them that can be distinguished from my thinking? Is there any that can be said to be separate from me? For that it is I that am doubting, understanding, wishing, is so obvious that nothing further is needed in order to explain it more clearly. But indeed it is also this same I that is imagining; for although it might be the case, as I have been supposing, that none of these imagined things is true, yet the actual power of imagining certainly does exist, and is part of my thinking. And finally it is the same I that perceives by means of the senses, or who is aware of corporeal things as if by means of the senses: for example, I am seeing a light, hearing a noise, feeling heat.— But these things are false, since I am asleep!—But certainly I seem to be seeing, hearing, getting hot. This cannot be false. This is what is properly meant by speaking of myself as having sensations; and, understood in this precise sense, it is nothing other than thinking. From all of this, I am indeed beginning to know [nosse] rather better what I in fact am. But it still seems (and I cannot help thinking this) that the bodily things of which the images are formed in our thought, and which the senses themselves investigate, are much more distinctly recognized than that part of myself, whatever it is, that cannot be represented by the imagination. Although, indeed, it is strange that things that I realize are doubtful, unknown, unrelated to me should be more distinctly grasped by me than what is true and what is known—more distinctly grasped even than myself. But I see what is happening. My mind enjoys wandering off the track, and will not yet allow itself to be confined within the boundaries of truth. Very well, then: let us, once again, slacken its reins as far as possible— then, before too long, a tug on them at the right moment will bring it more easily back to obedience.* Let us consider those things which are commonly thought to be more distinctly grasped than anything else: I mean the bodies we 29 30 22 31 Second Meditation touch and see; but not bodies in general, for these general perceptions are usually considerably more confused, but one body in particular. Let us, for example, take this wax: it has only just been removed from the honeycomb; it has not yet lost all the flavour of its honey; it retains some of the scent of the flowers among which it was gathered; its colour, shape, and size are clearly visible; it is hard, cold, easy to touch, and if you tap it with your knuckle, it makes a sound. In short, it has all the properties that seem to be required for a given body to be known as distinctly as possible. But wait—while I am speaking, it is brought close to the fire. The remains of its flavour evaporate; the smell fades; the colour is changed, the shape is taken away, it grows in size, becomes liquid, becomes warm, it can hardly be touched, and now, if you strike it, it will give off no sound. Does the same wax still remain? We must admit it does remain: no one would say or think it does not. So what was there in it that was so distinctly grasped? Certainly, none of those qualities I apprehended by the senses: for whatever came under taste, or smell, or sight, or touch, or hearing, has now changed: but the wax remains. Perhaps the truth of the matter was what I now think it is: namely, that the wax itself was not in fact this sweetness of the honey, or the fragrance of the flowers, or the whiteness, shape, or sonority, but the body which not long ago appeared to me as perceptible in these modes,* but now appears in others. But what exactly is this that I am imagining in this way? Let us consider the matter, and, thinking away those things that do not belong to the wax, let us see what remains. Something extended, flexible, mutable: certainly, that is all. But in what do this flexibility and mutability consist? Is it in the fact that I can imagine this wax being changed in shape, from a circle to a square, and from a square into a triangle? That cannot be right: for I understand that it is capable of innumerable changes of this sort, yet I cannot keep track of all these by using my imagination. Therefore my understanding of these properties is not achieved by using the faculty of imagination. What about ‘extended’? Surely I know something about the nature of its extension. For it is greater when the wax is melting, greater still when it is boiling, and greater still when the heat is further increased. And I would not be correctly judging what the wax is if I failed to see that it is capable of receiving more varieties, as regards extension, than I have ever grasped in my imagination. So I am left with no alternative, but to accept that I am Second Meditation 23 not at all imagining what this wax is, I am perceiving it with my mind alone: I say ‘this wax’ in particular, for the point is even clearer about wax in general. So then, what is this wax, which is only perceived by the mind? Certainly it is the same wax I see, touch, and imagine, and in short it is the same wax I judged it to be from the beginning. But yet—and this is important—the perception of it is not sight, touch, or imagination, and never was, although it seemed to be so at first: it is an inspection by the mind alone, which can be either imperfect and confused, as it was before in this case, or clear and distinct, as it now is, depending on the greater or lesser degree of attention I pay to what it consists of. But in the meantime I am amazed by the proneness of my mind to error. For although I am considering all this in myself silently and without speech, yet I am still ensnared by words themselves, and all but deceived by the very ways in which we usually put things. For we say that we ‘see’ the wax itself, if it is present, not that we judge it to be there on the basis of its colour or shape. From this I would have immediately concluded that I therefore knew the wax by the sight of my eyes, not by the inspection of the mind alone—if I had not happened to glance out of the window at people walking along the street. Using the customary expression, I say that I ‘see’ them, just as I ‘see’ the wax. But what do I actually see other than hats and coats, which could be covering automata?* But I judge that they are people. And therefore what I thought I saw with my eyes, I in fact grasp only by the faculty of judging that is in my mind. But one who desires to know more than the common herd might be ashamed to have gone to the speech of the common herd to find a reason for doubting. Let us then go on where we left off by considering whether I perceived more perfectly and more evidently what the wax was, when I first encountered it, and believed that I knew [cognoscere] it by these external senses, or at least by what they call the ‘common sense’,* that is, the imaginative power; or whether I perceive it better now, after I have more carefully investigated both what it is and how it is known [cognoscatur]. Certainly it would be foolish to doubt that I have a much better grasp of it now. For what, if anything, was distinct in my original perception? What was there, if anything, that seemed to go beyond the perception of the lowest animals?* But on the other hand, when I distinguish the wax from its external forms, and, as if I had stripped off its garments, consider it in all its 32 24 33 34 Second Meditation nakedness, then, indeed, although there may still be error in my judgements, I cannot perceive it in this way except by the human mind. But what, then, shall I say about this mind, or about myself? For I do not yet accept that there is anything in me but a mind. What, I say, am I who seem to perceive this wax so distinctly? Do I not know [cognosco] myself not only much more truly, much more certainly, but also much more distinctly and evidently than the wax? For, if I judge that the wax exists, for the reason that I see it, it is certainly much more evident that I myself also exist, from the very fact that I am seeing it. For it could be the case that what I am seeing is not really wax; it could be the case that I do not even have eyes with which to see anything; but it certainly cannot be the case, when I see something, or when I think I am seeing something (the difference is irrelevant for the moment), that I myself who think should not be something. By the same token, if I judge that the wax exists, for the reason that I am touching it, the same consequence follows: namely, that I exist. If I judge it exists, for the reason I am imagining it, or for any other reason, again, the same certainly applies. But what I have realized in the case of the wax, I can apply to anything that exists outside myself. Moreover, if the perception of the wax appeared more distinct after it became known to me from many sources, and not from sight or touch alone, how much more distinctly—it must be admitted—I now know [cognosci] myself. For there are no reasons that can enhance the perception either of the wax or of any other body at all that do not at the same time prove better to me the nature of my own mind. But there are so many things besides in the mind itself that can serve to make the knowledge [notitia] of it more distinct, that there seems scarcely any point in listing all the perceptions that flow into it from the body. But I see now that, without realizing it, I have ended up back where I wanted to be. For since I have now learned that bodies themselves are perceived not, strictly speaking, by the senses or by the imaginative faculty, but by the intellect alone, and that they are not perceived because they are touched or seen, but only because they are understood, I clearly realize [cognosco] that nothing can be perceived by me more easily or more clearly than my own mind. But since a long-held opinion is a habit that cannot so readily be laid aside, I intend to stop here for a while, in order to fix this newly acquired knowledge more deeply in my memory by long meditation. THIRD MEDITATION of god, that he exists I shall now close my eyes, I shall block up my ears, I shall divert all my senses, and I shall even delete all bodily images from my thought or, since this is virtually impossible to achieve, at least count them as empty and worthless; and I shall try, by conversing only with myself and looking deep within myself, to make myself gradually better known and more familiar to myself. I am a thinking thing, that is, one that doubts, affirms, denies, understands a few things, is ignorant of many others, wills this and not that, and also imagines and perceives by the senses; for as I have already remarked, although the things I perceive or imagine outside myself do not perhaps exist, yet I am certain that the modes of thinking that I call sensations and imaginations, considered purely and simply as modes of thinking, do exist inside me. And this, short as it is, is a complete list of what I truly know [scio], or at least of what, up to now, I have realized that I know. Now I shall examine more carefully whether perhaps there are any further items of knowledge in my possession to which I have not yet paid attention. I am certain that I am a thinking thing. But do I not therefore also know what is required in order for me to be certain of something? For in this first act of knowledge [cognitione] there is nothing other than a clear and distinct perception of what I affirm to be the case; and this certainly would be insufficient to make me certain of the truth of the matter, if it could ever come to pass that something I perceived so clearly and distinctly was false. And therefore I seem already to be able to lay down, as a general rule, that everything I very clearly and distinctly perceive is true. And yet there are many things that I once accepted as completely certain and obvious, that I have since realized were doubtful. What kind of things were these? The earth, the sky, the stars, and everything else I became aware of through the senses. But what did I clearly perceive here? Certainly, that the ideas or thoughts of such things were present to my mind. And even now I do not deny that these ideas exist in me. But there was something else that I was affirming, and that, because I was used to believing it, I thought 35 26 36 37 Third Meditation I perceived clearly, although in fact I was not really perceiving it; namely, that there were certain things existing outside me from which these ideas derived and that the ideas perfectly resembled. This was my mistake; or at least, if I was after all right in thinking this, the rightness was not due to my perception. But when in arithmetic or geometry I considered something very simple and easy—for instance, two plus three equals five—surely I intuited this kind of thing at least clearly enough to declare it true? In fact, when I later judged that such things should be doubted, this was only because the thought had come to me, that perhaps some God might have endowed me with such a nature that I could be deceived even about those things that appeared supremely obvious. But whenever this preconceived opinion of God’s supreme power occurs to me, I cannot help admitting, that, if indeed he wishes to, he can easily bring it about that I should be mistaken, even about matters that I think I intuit with the eye of the mind as evidently as possible. On the other hand, whenever I turn my attention to the things themselves that I think I perceive very clearly, I am so thoroughly convinced by them, that I cannot help exclaiming: ‘Let whoever can, deceive me as much as he likes: still he can never bring it about that I am nothing, as long as I think I am something; or that one day it will be true that I have never existed, when it is true now that I exist; or that perhaps two plus three added together are more or less than five; or that other such things should be true in which I recognize an obvious contradiction.’ And certainly, since I have no grounds for thinking that any deceitful God exists—in fact, I do not yet sufficiently know whether there is any God at all—then a reason for doubting that depends wholly on the belief in a deceitful God is very slight, and, so to speak, metaphysical. In order to remove it, then, at the first opportunity, I must examine whether there is a God, and, if there is, whether he can be a deceiver; since, as long as I remain ignorant of this matter, I seem unable ever to be certain of any other at all.* But now it seems that, to proceed in an orderly fashion, I should first divide up all my thoughts into definite categories, and examine to which of these truth and falsity can properly be said to pertain. Some of these thoughts are apparently images of things,* and to these alone the name ‘idea’ is properly applied: for instance, when I think of a human being, or a chimera, or the heavens, or an angel, Third Meditation 27 or God. But others have certain other forms as well; thus, when I will, or fear, or affirm, or deny, I am always in fact apprehending some thing as the subject of this thought,* but I am including something further within the thought than the mere likeness of the thing; and of thoughts of this kind some are called volitions, or affects, whereas others are called judgements. Now, as far as ideas are concerned, if they are considered purely in themselves, and if I do not connect them with anything outside themselves, they cannot, strictly speaking, be false; for whether I am imagining a goat or a chimera, it is no less true that I am imagining one than that I am imagining the other. Again, there is no fear of falsehood in the will itself, or in the affects: for although I can desire something wicked, and even something that does not exist at all, this does not mean that it is not true that I desire it. This leaves only judgements: in these alone I must take care not to be deceived. The most glaring and widespread error that can be found in them consists in my judging that the ideas that are in me are similar to or in accordance with some things existing outside me. For certainly, if I conceived the ideas themselves purely and simply as modifications of my thinking, and did not connect them with anything else, they could scarcely give me any occasion to err. Of these ideas, some seem to me to be innate, others adventitious,* others produced by myself. For understanding what a thing is, what truth is, what thought is, is something I seem to possess purely in virtue of my nature itself. But if I am now hearing a noise, seeing the sun, feeling the heat of a fire,* up to now I have judged that such sensations derive from things existing outside myself. Finally, sirens, hippogriffs, and suchlike creatures are inventions of my own imagination. But perhaps I can think that all my ideas are adventitious, or all innate, or all produced by me: for I have not yet clearly discovered their true source. About those ideas that I consider as proceeding from things existing outside myself, the key question to ask here is: What reason do I have for thinking the ideas are like the things? Well, certainly, nature itself seems to teach me to think so. Besides, experience shows me that they do not depend on my own will, and therefore do not depend on myself. For they often intrude upon me against my will. Now, for instance, I am feeling heat, whether I want to or not, and this is why I think that this sensation, or idea, of heat is coming to me 38 28 39 Third Meditation from a thing distinct from myself, in this case from the heat of the fire by which I am sitting. And by far the most obvious judgement to make is that what the thing is transmitting to me is its own likeness rather than anything else. But I shall now see whether these reasons are sufficiently solid. When I say here that ‘I am taught by nature’ to think so, I mean only that I am prompted to believe this by some spontaneous inclination, not that it is shown to me to be true by some natural light.* The two things are very different: for whatever is shown to me by the natural light (for instance, that, from the fact that I am doubting, it follows that I exist, and suchlike) can in no way be doubtful, because there can be no other faculty that I could trust as much as this light, and that could teach me that such things are not, after all, true. But when it comes to natural inclinations, I have before now often judged in the past that I have been led by these in the wrong direction, when it was a matter of choosing the good,* nor do I see why I should trust them more in any other domain. Then again, although these ideas do not depend on my own will, it does not necessarily follow that they derive from things existing outside me. For just as those inclinations of which I was speaking a moment ago, although they are inside me, seem, however, to be distinct from my will, so perhaps there is some other faculty within me, as yet insufficiently known to me, that produces such ideas—just as up to now it has always seemed to me that they form themselves in me while I am asleep without any assistance from external things.* And finally, even if they did derive from things distinct from myself, it does not follow that they have to be like those things. Indeed, in many of them I seem to have discovered major discrepancies between the idea and the object. For instance, I find within me two different ideas of the sun. One appears to be derived from the senses, and it would absolutely have to be placed in the category of ideas I class as ‘adventitious’. This idea represents the sun as very small. The other, however, derives from astronomical reasoning—that is to say, it is derived from some notions innate within me, or has been produced by me in some other way. This idea represents the sun as several times larger than the earth. But certainly, both cannot be like one and the same sun existing outside me; and reason persuades me that the one that seems to have flowed directly from the sun itself* is in fact the one that is most unlike it. Third Meditation 29 All these considerations are sufficient proof that, up to now, it is as a result not of a certain judgement, but only of some blind inclination, that I have believed in the existence of various things distinct from myself, and conveying ideas or images of themselves to me through the sense-organs or in some other manner. But there is yet another way that occurs to me by which I could investigate whether any of those things of which the ideas are in me exist outside me. Certainly, in so far as these ideas are only various modifications of my thinking, I acknowledge that they are all on the same footing, and they all seem to derive from me in the same way. But, in so far as one represents one thing, another another, it is plain that they differ widely among themselves. For beyond doubt those ideas that represent substances to me are something greater, and contain, if I may use the term, more ‘objective reality’ in themselves, than those that represent merely modes or accidents. And by the same token, the idea by which I conceive a supreme God, eternal, infinite, omniscient, all-powerful, and the creator of all things that exist beside himself, certainly has more objective reality in itself than those by which finite substances are represented. But now it is manifest by the natural light that there must be at least as much reality in the total and efficient cause as in its effect. For, I ask, from where could the effect derive its reality, if not from the cause? And how could the cause give it reality, if it did not also possess it? Hence it follows, both that nothing can come from nothing, and that what is more perfect (that is, what contains more reality within itself ) cannot derive from what is less perfect. And this is not only plainly true of those effects whose reality is actual or formal, but also of ideas, in which only the objective reality is considered. For instance, a stone that did not previously exist, cannot now begin to be, unless it is produced by some thing in which everything exists, either formally or eminently,* that enters into the composition of the stone. Nor can heat be brought about in a subject that was not hot before, unless by a thing that belongs to at least the same order of perfection as heat; and the same is true elsewhere. But, by the same token, the idea of heat, or of the stone, cannot exist in me, unless it is produced in me by some cause in which there is at least as much reality as I conceive to be in the heat or in the stone. For although this cause transmits none of its actual or formal reality to my idea, we must not therefore think that it (the cause) must be less real; rather, 40 41 30 42 43 Third Meditation the nature of the idea itself is such that it requires no other formal reality outside itself,* except what it borrows from my thought, of which it is a mode. But the fact that this idea contains this or that objective reality, and not some other kind—this must certainly be due to some other cause, in which there is at least as much formal reality as the idea contains objective reality. For if we suppose that something is found in the idea that is not in its cause, it would have this something from nothing; and however imperfect the kind of being by which a thing exists objectively in the understanding in the form of an idea, it is certainly not nothing, and therefore cannot come from nothing. Nor should I suppose that since the reality I am considering in my ideas is purely objective, there is no need for the same reality to exist formally in the causes of these ideas, but that it is enough for it also to exist in them objectively. For just as this objective mode of being pertains to ideas from their very nature, so the formal mode of being pertains to the causes of the ideas—at least the first and dominant causes—from their nature also. And although perhaps one idea can be born from another, we cannot here have an infinite regress, but in the end we have to arrive at some first idea, the cause of which takes the form of an archetype, which formally contains all the reality that is only objectively in the idea. So that it is clear to me by the natural light that the ideas in me are of the nature of images, which can easily fall short of the perfection of the things from which they derive, but cannot, however, contain anything greater or more perfect. And the longer and more carefully I examine all these things, the more clearly and distinctly I realize [cognosco] they are true. But what conclusion am I to draw from them? Certainly, if the objective reality of some one of my ideas is so great that I am certain that that reality does not exist in me either formally or eminently, and therefore that I myself cannot be the cause of this idea, it necessarily follows that I am not alone in the world, but that some other thing also exists that is the cause of this idea. But if in fact no such idea is found in me, I shall certainly have no argument that can convince me with certainty of the existence of any thing distinct from myself; for I have examined all these things very closely, and up to now I have found no other such argument. Of these ideas I have—apart from the one that represents me to myself, about which there can be no difficulty here*— one represents Third Meditation 31 God, others bodily and inanimate things, others angels, others animals, and others, finally, other human beings like myself. As regards the ideas that represent other human beings, or animals, or angels, I can easily see that they might have been put together from the ideas I have of myself, and bodily things, and God, even if there were no other human beings, or animals, or angels in the world. As regards ideas of bodily things, they contain nothing that is so great that it cannot apparently derive from myself: for if I inspect them more closely, and examine them one by one in the same way as I yesterday examined the idea of the wax, I realize that there is very little in them that I clearly and distinctly perceive: there is only magnitude, or extension in length, breadth, and depth; shape, which results from the limitation of this extension; place, the situation differently shaped bodies occupy relative to one another; and motion, that is, change of place. To these substance, duration, and number can be added. But the rest, such as light and colours, sounds, smells, tastes, heat and cold, and the other tactile qualities are thought by me only in very confused and obscure fashion—so much so that I do not even know whether they are true or false, that is, whether the ideas I have concerning them, are ideas of actual things or of non-things. For although I remarked not long ago that falsity in the proper (‘formal’) sense can be found only in judgements, there is nonetheless certainly another (‘material’) kind of falsity in ideas, when they represent what is nothing as if it were something. For example, the ideas I have of heat and cold are so unclear and so indistinct that I cannot tell from them whether cold is nothing but a privation of heat, or heat a privation of cold, or whether both are real qualities, or neither. But there can be no ideas that do not seem to represent something to us. And therefore, if indeed it is true that cold is nothing other than the privation of heat, the idea that represents it to me as something real and positive can very properly be called false. The same applies to all other such ideas. Certainly, I do not need to ascribe any author to these ideas apart from myself. For if indeed they are false—that is, if there is nothing they actually represent—it is known to me by the natural light that they derive from nothing: that is, they exist in me purely on account of some shortcoming in my nature, which indeed is far from perfect. But if, on the other hand, they are true, the degree of reality they 44 32 45 Third Meditation represent to me is so scanty that I cannot even distinguish between it and unreality; and therefore I cannot see why they might not derive from myself.* But of the clear and distinct elements in my ideas of bodily things, there are some that it seems possible I borrowed from the idea of myself, namely substance, duration, number, and any other things there may be of that sort. For when I think that a stone is a substance, that is to say, a thing capable of existing by itself, and likewise that I am myself a substance, then although I conceive myself to be a thinking and not an extended thing, and the stone, on the other hand, to be an extended and not a thinking thing, so that there is a very great difference between the two concepts, they seem, however, to have this in common: they both represent a substance. Again, when I perceive that I exist now, and also remember that I existed at some time before now, and when I have various thoughts of which I know the number, I acquire the ideas of duration and number, which then I can transfer to other things, of whatever kind they are. On the other hand, all the other elements from which the ideas of bodily things are put together, namely extension, shape, place, and motion, are not contained formally in myself, since I am nothing other than a thinking thing. But because they are only various modes of substance, and I moreover am a substance, it seems they could be contained in me eminently. And so there remains only the idea of God, in which I must consider whether there is anything that could not derive from myself. By the name ‘God’ I understand an infinite, independent, supremely intelligent, supremely powerful substance, by which I myself and whatever else exists (if anything else does exist) was created. But certainly, all these properties are such that, the more carefully I consider them, the less it seems possible that they can be derived from me alone.* And so I must conclude that it necessarily follows from all that has been said up to now that God exists. For indeed, even if the idea of substance is in me as a result of the very fact that I am a substance, the idea of an infinite substance would not therefore be in me, since I am finite, unless it derived from some substance that is really infinite. Nor should I think that I perceive the infinite not by a true idea but only by negation of the finite, as I perceive rest and darkness by Third Meditation 33 the negation of motion and light; for on the contrary, I manifestly understand that there is more reality in infinite than in finite substance, and that therefore the perception of the infinite in me must be in some way prior to that of the finite: the perception of God, in other words, prior to that of myself. For how could I possibly understand that I doubt, and that I desire, that is, that there is something lacking in me, and that I am not completely perfect, if there were no idea in me of a more perfect being, by comparison with which I could recognize my own shortcomings?* Nor can it be said that perhaps this idea of God is materially false, and could therefore derive from nothing, as I remarked not long ago apropos of the ideas of heat and cold and suchlike. For on the contrary, since it is supremely clear and distinct, and contains more objective reality than any other, there is no idea that is truer in itself and in which less suspicion of falsity can be found. This idea of a supremely perfect and infinite being is, I say, supremely true; for although it perhaps might be imagined that no such being actually exists, it cannot be imagined that the idea of it represents nothing real to me, as I previously said of the idea of cold. It is also supremely clear and distinct; for whatever I clearly and distinctly perceive that is real and true and that contains some perfection is all included within it. And this remains no less true even though I do not comprehend the infinite, or even if there are innumerable other attributes in God that I can neither comprehend, nor even perhaps apprehend* in the slightest by my thought; for it is of the nature of the infinite that it should be incomprehensible to me, who am finite. Provided that I understand this and judge that everything I clearly perceive, and that I know [scio] to involve some perfection, as well, perhaps, as innumerable other attributes I do not know, exists in God either formally or eminently, the idea I have of him will be the truest and most clear and distinct of all my ideas. And yet perhaps I am something greater than I understand myself to be, and all the perfections I attribute to God, are in some sense in me potentially, even if they have not yet revealed themselves, or been brought into actuality.* For I am already experiencing a gradual increase in my knowledge [cognitio]; and I cannot see any reason why it should not be increased in this way further and further to infinity; nor why, if my knowledge were so increased, I could not by means of 46 47 34 48 Third Meditation it obtain all the other perfections of God; nor finally why the potentiality of these perfections, if it exists in me already, should not be enough actually to produce the idea of them. But none of this can be true. For, first of all, even granting it to be true that my knowledge [cognitio] is gradually increasing and that there are many things in me in potentiality that are not yet so in actuality, nothing of this is relevant to the idea of God, in which indeed there is absolutely no potentiality: for this very fact of gradual increase is an infallible index of imperfection. Besides, even if my knowledge did continually increase, nonetheless I understand that it would still never be actually infinite, since it will never get to the point of being incapable of further increase; but I judge God to be infinite in actuality in such a way that nothing can be added to his perfection. And finally I perceive that the objective being of an idea cannot be produced from purely potential being, which properly speaking is nothing, but only from actual or formal being. And indeed there is nothing in all this that is not manifest by the natural light to one who considers it carefully; but because, when my attention wavers, and the images of sensible things blind the eye of the mind, I do not remember so easily why the idea of a being more perfect than myself necessarily proceeds from some being that is truly perfect, I wish to investigate further whether I, who have this idea, could exist if no such being existed.* From what indeed could I derive my being? From myself, perhaps, or from my parents, or from some other beings less perfect than God: for nothing more perfect than him, or even equally perfect, can be conceived or imagined. But if I existed of myself, I would not doubt, or wish, or lack anything at all: for I would have given myself all the perfections of which there is some idea in me, and thus I should myself be God. Nor should I suppose that what is lacking in me is perhaps more difficult to acquire than what is already in me, since on the contrary, it is plain that it was far more difficult for me, that is, a thinking thing or substance, to emerge from nothing than to acquire knowledge of the many things I do not know, since such knowledge is only an accident of this substance. But certainly, if I had this greater thing [existence] from myself, I should not have denied myself at least the things that can more easily be obtained; what is more, I should not have denied myself any of those things I perceive to be contained in the idea of Third Meditation 35 God; for indeed none of them seems to me more difficult to achieve. But if any were in fact more difficult to achieve, certainly they would appear to me to be so, if I did indeed derive my other properties from myself, since I would experience the limits of my power with respect to them. And I cannot elude the force of these reasons by supposing that perhaps I have always been as I now am, as if it followed from that that there is no need to seek an author of my existence. For since all the time of a life can be divided into innumerable parts, of which each particular one in no way depends on the rest, it does not follow from the fact that I existed not long ago that I have to exist now, unless some cause, so to speak, creates me again at this moment, or in other words, conserves me in being. For it is clear, if one considers the nature of time, that the same power and action is required to conserve any thing, whatever it may be, in being during the individual moments in which it continues to exist, as would be needed to create the same thing from the start if it did not yet exist. So clear is this in fact that we may add to the list of things manifest by the natural light that the distinction between conservation and creation exists purely in our thought.* So therefore I need now to inquire of myself, whether I have some power, by means of which I can bring it to pass that this ‘I’* that now exists shall still exist at some time in the near future. For since I am nothing other than a thinking thing, or at least, to speak precisely, since I am now dealing only with that part of myself that is a thinking thing, if any power of this sort were in me, I should beyond doubt be conscious of it. But I can find no such power, and from this I very clearly realize [cognosco] that I depend upon some being distinct from myself. But perhaps this being is not God, and I was and am produced either by my parents or by some other causes less perfect than God, whatever they might be. No: for, as I have already said, it is plain that there must be at least as much in the cause as there is in the effect; and therefore, since I am a thinking thing, and one that has the idea of God in myself, it must be admitted that whatever cause is finally assigned to me must also itself be a thinking thing and one that has the idea of all the perfections I ascribe to God. And then of this thing too we can ask whether it exists of itself or by virtue of some other thing. For if it exists of itself, it is clear from the above that it must 49 36 50 51 Third Meditation itself be God, because since it has from itself the power to exist, it undoubtedly has the power to possess in reality all the perfections of which it has the idea in itself, that is, all the perfections I conceive to be in God. But if, on the other hand, it exists in virtue of some other thing, then we shall ask whether this thing too exists of itself, or in virtue of some other thing, until finally we come to an ultimate cause: and this will be God. For it is sufficiently plain that here there is no possibility of an infinite regress,* especially because I am not dealing so much with the cause that produced me at some time in the past, as, above all, with the one that conserves me in the present time. Nor can it be imagined that perhaps many partial causes have come together to produce me, and that from one of them I received the idea of one of the perfections I attribute to God, and from another the idea of another perfection, so that all these perfections are found, indeed, somewhere in the universe, but not all combined together in any one being that would be God. For on the contrary, the unity, simplicity, or inseparability of all those things that are in God is one of the principal perfections that I understand to inhere in him. Nor, certainly, could the idea of this unity of all his perfections have been implanted in me by any cause from which I did not also derive the ideas of the other perfections: for such a cause could not have brought it about that I should understand them as simultaneously combined and inseparable, unless it had at the same time enabled me to know what they all were. Finally, as far as my parents are concerned, even if everything is true of them that I have ever thought to be so, certainly they do not conserve me in being, nor did they in any way produce me insofar as I am a thinking thing; they only implanted certain dispositions in the matter that I judged myself (that is, my mind, which for the moment I take to be identical with my self ) to inhabit. And so there can be no difficulty here about them; but we must necessarily conclude that, from the bare fact that I exist, and that in me there is an idea of a supremely perfect being, that is, God, it is proved beyond question that God also exists. It remains for me only to examine in what manner I received this idea from God. For I did not derive it from the senses, nor did it ever thrust itself spontaneously on my attention, as do the ideas of sensible things, when the things themselves make an impression on Third Meditation 37 the external sense-organs (or appear to do so). Nor is it a fiction, a creation of my own, for I cannot subtract anything from it, or add anything at all to it. It must therefore be that the idea is innate within me, in the same way as the idea of myself is innate within me. And certainly it is no wonder if God, when he created me, inscribed this idea within me, to serve, so to speak, as the mark by which the craftsman makes himself known in his handiwork. This mark does not have to be something distinct from the object itself. But, given this one basic fact that God created me, it is highly credible that I was in some way created in his image and likeness,* and that the likeness, in which the idea of God is contained, is perceived by me by the same faculty by which I myself am perceived by myself. That is, when I turn the eye of my mind on myself, I do not only understand myself to be an entity that is incomplete and that depends on another, and that is endowed with an indefinite aspiration to greater and greater or better things; but at the same time I understand that the being on whom I depend possesses all these greater things not only indefinitely and in potentiality but in actuality and infinitely, and is thus God. The whole force of the argument comes down to this, that I recognize that it cannot be that I should exist, with the nature I possess (that is, having the idea of God within myself), unless in reality God also exists—the same God whose idea is within me, that is, the one who possesses all the perfections that I cannot comprehend but can to some extent apprehend in my thinking, and who is subject to no kind of deficiency. From this it is sufficiently clear that he cannot be a deceiver: for all cunning and deception presuppose some shortcoming, as is plain by the natural light. But before I go more thoroughly into this, and at the same time investigate the other truths that can be deduced from it, I wish to remain here for some time in the contemplation of God himself, to ponder on his attributes, and to gaze on, wonder at, and worship the beauty of this immense light, as much as the eye of my understanding, shrouded as it is in darkness, is capable of doing. For, just as we believe by faith that the supreme happiness of the other life consists purely in the contemplation of the divine greatness, so we find also by experience that this contemplation, though far less perfect, affords us the greatest pleasure of which we are capable in this life. 52 Fifth Meditation 45 by the intellect, it certainly cannot come about that I should make a mistake; since every clear and distinct perception is something, and therefore cannot come from nothing, but necessarily derives from God—God, the supremely perfect being, whose nature is incompatible with deception. It is therefore undoubtedly true. And I have learned today not only what I should avoid in order not to be deceived, but at the same time what I must do in order to attain truth; for I certainly shall attain it, provided I pay sufficient attention to everything I perfectly understand, and keep it quite separate from everything else that I apprehend more confusedly and obscurely. And I shall take particular care to do this in future. FIFTH MEDITATION 63 of the essence of material things; and again of god, that he exists There remain many attributes of God, and many aspects of the nature of myself, or my mind, for me to investigate. But perhaps I shall return to these another time, and for the moment nothing appears more urgent (now that I have realized what to avoid and what to do in order to attain truth) than to attempt to extricate myself from the doubts I have fallen into during these past days, and to see whether any certainty is possible with respect to material things. And indeed, before investigating whether any such things exist outside me, I should first consider the ideas of them, in so far as these ideas exist in my thought, and see which of them are distinct, and which confused. I can certainly distinctly imagine the quantity that philosophers commonly call ‘continuous’: that is, the extension of this quantity (or rather, of the thing to which the quantity is attributed) in length, breadth, and depth. I can count various parts within it. To each of these parts I ascribe various magnitudes, shapes, positions, and local motions, and to the motions I ascribe various durations. Not only are these things, considered in these general terms, clearly known and grasped by me: I also, if I pay close attention, perceive innumerable particular facts involving shape, number, motion, and suchlike—facts so plainly true, and so much in conformity with 64 46 65 Fifth Meditation my nature, that when I first discover them I do not seem to be learning anything new, but rather to be remembering something I knew before, or to be noticing for the first time something that was in me already, although I had not previously turned the gaze of my mind in its direction. And what I think particularly needs to be considered here is this: that I find in myself innumerable ideas of certain things, that, even if, perhaps, they do not exist anywhere outside me, cannot yet be said to be nothing. And although, in a sense, whether I think of them or not is up to me, yet they are not inventions of my own mind, but they have true and immutable natures of their own. For instance, when I imagine a triangle, even if perhaps such a figure does not exist, and has never existed, anywhere at all outside my thought, it nonetheless certainly has a determinate nature, or essence, or form, that is immutable and eternal, which was not invented by me, and does not depend on my mind. This is clear from the fact that it is possible to demonstrate various properties of the triangle (for instance, that its three angles are equal to two right angles, and that the hypotenuse subtends the greatest angle, and so forth) which, whether I like it or not, I now clearly recognize to hold good, even if up to now I have never thought of them in any way when imagining a triangle. And therefore these properties were not invented by me. It would make no difference if I were to say that perhaps this idea of a triangle has come to me from things outside myself via the sense-organs, because, that is, I have occasionally seen bodies of a triangular shape. For I can think up innumerable other shapes that it is impossible to suspect ever reached me via the senses; and yet I can demonstrate several of their properties, just as I can with the triangle. And all of these properties are certainly true, since they are clearly known [cognoscuntur] by me, and therefore they are something, and not a pure nothing. For it is clear that everything that is true, is something; and I have already abundantly demonstrated that everything I clearly know [cognosco], is true. And even if I had not demonstrated this, the nature of my mind is such that I cannot in any case help assenting to the things I clearly perceive, at least, for as long as I clearly* perceive them; and I remember that even in past times, when I was as closely attached to the objects of the senses as it is possible to be, I always considered that truths of this kind that I clearly recognized, concerning shapes, or numbers, or other matters 50 70 71 Fifth Meditation adduced that would easily (were I ignorant of God) shake me out of my opinion. And thus I should never have true and certain knowledge [scientia] of anything, but only vague and shifting opinions. Thus, for example, when I am considering the nature of a triangle, it certainly appears utterly evident to me (being, as I am, well versed in the principles of geometry) that its three angles are equal to two right angles; and I cannot not believe this is true, as long as I am concentrating on the proof; but, as soon as I have turned the eye of the mind in a different direction, then however well I remember that I grasped the proof very clearly, I can still easily find myself doubting its truth, if I am ignorant of God. For I can persuade myself that I was so made by nature that I am sometimes deceived in matters which I think I perceive entirely clearly, especially since I remember counting many things as true and certain that later, when guided by other reasons, I judged to be false. But once I have perceived that God exists, then because I grasped at the same time that everything else depends on him, and that he is no deceiver, and from this deduced that everything I clearly and distinctly perceive is necessarily true, then, even if I am no longer concentrating on the reasons why I judged this to be true, provided I remember that I did see it clearly and distinctly, no contrary reason can be adduced that can induce me to doubt it; and thus I have true and certain knowledge [scientia] of it. And not only of it, but of all the other propositions I remember demonstrating at some stage, such as the truths of geometry and others of the same kind. For what objections can now be raised against me? That I am so constituted as often to be deceived? But I know now [scio] that in matters I clearly understand, I cannot be deceived. That I once counted many things as true and certain that I later realized to be false? But I had perceived none of these clearly and distinctly, but, unaware as I was of this criterion of truth, perhaps I believed them for other reasons, which I later discovered to be less sound than I had thought. So what further objection can be raised? Perhaps (an objection I put to myself not long ago) I am sleeping, or all the things I am now thinking are no more true than the thoughts that occur to one who is asleep. But this makes no difference. For certainly, even if I were sleeping, if something is evident to my understanding, then it is altogether true. And so I plainly see that the certitude and truth of all knowledge [scientiae] depends on the knowledge [cognitione] of the Sixth Meditation 51 true God alone: so much so, that before I had discovered this knowledge, I could have no perfect knowledge [scire] of anything else at all. But now innumerable truths, concerning both, on the one hand, God himself and other intellectual things and, on the other, the whole of this bodily nature which is the object of pure mathematics,* can be plainly known to me with certainty. SIXTH MEDITATION of the existence of material things, and the real distinction between mind and body It remains for me to examine whether material things exist. And indeed, I now know [scio] at least that, in so far as they are the object of pure mathematics, they can exist, since I perceive them clearly and distinctly. For there is no doubt that God is capable of producing everything I am capable of perceiving in this way; and I have never judged that anything was impossible for him to do, except when, in attempting to perceive it distinctly, I ran up against a contradiction. Besides, it seems to follow from the existence of the imaginative faculty, of which I experience myself as making use when dealing with these material things, that they exist. For if I consider more closely what kind of thing the imagination is, it appears to be nothing other than a certain application of the knowing faculty to a body intimately present to that faculty, and therefore existing. To make this plain, I shall first examine the difference that exists between imagination and pure intellection. For example, when I imagine a triangle, not only do I understand it to be a shape enclosed by three lines, but at the same time, with the eye of the mind, I contemplate the three lines as present, and this is what I call imagining. But if, on the other hand, I wish to think of a chiliogon, I do indeed understand that this is a shape consisting of a thousand sides, no less clearly than I understand that the triangle consists of three: but I do not imagine the thousand sides in the same way, that is, contemplate them as present. And although at the time, because I am accustomed always to imagine something whenever I am thinking of bodily things, I may perhaps picture some figure to myself in a confused fashion, it is quite clear that this is not a chiliogon, 72 52 73 74 Sixth Meditation because it is not at all different from the picture I would also form in my mind if I were thinking about a myriogon,* or some other many-sided figure. Nor is it of any assistance in recognizing the properties by which the chiliogon differs from other polygons. But if I am dealing with a pentagon, I can certainly understand its shape, like that of the chiliogon, without the help of the imagination: but I can also imagine it, that is, by applying the eye of the mind to its five sides, and at the same time to the area contained within them; and here I observe very plainly that I need to make a particular mental effort in order to imagine, that I do not make when understanding. This further effort of the mind clearly indicates the difference between imagination and pure intellection. At this point, I consider that this power of imagining I possess, in so far as it differs from the power of understanding, is not integral to my essence, that is, to the essence of my mind; for even if I lacked it, I should nonetheless certainly remain the same person as I now am. From this it seems to follow that the imagination depends on something distinct from me.* And I can easily understand that if some body exists to which the mind is so closely joined that it may, whenever it chooses, apply itself, so to speak, to looking into it, it could be the case that this is exactly how I imagine corporeal things. So that this mode of thinking would differ from pure intellection in the following respect alone: that the mind, while it understands, turns itself in some way towards itself, and gazes on one of the ideas that are contained within itself; but, while it imagines, it turns itself towards the body, and considers something in it that corresponds either to an idea it understands itself * or to an idea perceived by the senses. I can readily understand, I say, how the imagination may function in this way, provided, that is, the body exists. And because no other equally convenient way of explaining it occurs to me, I therefore conclude with great probability that the body exists. But this is only a probability, and although I am investigating the whole matter with great care, I do not yet see that, from this distinct idea of bodily nature that I find in my imagination, any argument can be derived that will lead necessarily to the conclusion that some body exists. But I am accustomed to imagining many other things, besides this bodily nature that is the object of pure mathematics,* such as colours, sounds, pain, and suchlike: but none of these with equal distinctness. Sixth Meditation 53 And because I perceive these things better by the senses, from which they seem to have made their way, with the help of memory, to the imagination, in order to examine them more conveniently, I should examine sensation at the same time, and see whether, from those things that are perceived by the form of thinking I call ‘sensation’, I can derive some decisive argument in favour of the existence of bodily things. And first of all, I will here go over in my memory what those things were that I previously thought were true, because they were perceived by the senses, and the reasons I had for thinking this. Then I shall weigh the reasons for which I later called these things into question. Finally, I shall consider what view I should now take. First of all, then, I had the sensation of having a head, hands, feet, and all the other parts comprising this body I used to consider as part of myself, or perhaps even as the whole of myself. Then I had the sensation of this body as situated among many other bodies by which it could be affected—harmed or benefited: and I measured the benefits by a certain feeling of pleasure and the harm by a feeling of pain. And besides pain and pleasure, I also had the sensation of hunger, thirst, and other such appetites in myself, not to mention various bodily propensities, to joy, to sadness, to anger, and other such passions. Outside myself, besides the extension, shapes, and motions of bodies, I had sensations of hardness, heat, and other tactile qualities in them; light, as well, and colours, and smells, and tastes, and sounds, the variety of which enabled me to distinguish the sky, the earth, the sea, and other bodies one from another. And surely it was not without reason that, on account of the ideas of all these qualities that presented themselves to my thought, and of which alone I had personal and immediate sensations, I believed I was sensing certain things quite distinct from my thought, that is to say, bodies from which these ideas proceeded. For I experienced these ideas as coming to me without any consent of mine: so much so, that neither could I have a sensation of any object, however much I wanted to, unless the object itself were present to a sense-organ, nor could I help having the sensation of it when it was present. And since the ideas perceived by the senses were much more vivid and emphatic,* and in their own way more distinct, than any of the ideas that I deliberately and knowingly formed* by myself in my meditations, or that I found engraved upon my memory, it seemed impossible that they should proceed from myself.* And so 75 54 76 77 Sixth Meditation it had to be the case that they derived from some other things. But since I had no knowledge of these other things except from these ideas themselves, I could only suppose that the things were like the ideas. And also because I remembered that I had made use of my senses before I made use of my reason, and saw, as well, that the ideas I formed myself were not as emphatic as those I perceived by the senses, and were mostly put together from those ideas, I readily convinced myself that I had nothing at all in the intellect, that I had not previously had in the senses.* Nor was it without reason that I judged that the particular body I seemed specially entitled to call my own belonged more closely to me than any other body. For I could not ever be separated from it, as I could from the other bodies; I felt all my appetites and passions in it and for it; and finally I was aware of pain and pleasure in parts of it, but not in any other body existing outside it. But why this mysterious feeling of pain is followed by a feeling of sadness in the soul, and why the awareness of pleasure is followed by joy, or why the mysterious pangs in the stomach I call hunger prompt me to take food, while a dryness in the throat prompts me to drink, and so on, I certainly could not explain except by saying that nature teaches me that it is so. For there is plainly no affinity (at least, none that I understand) between the pangs in the stomach and the will to eat, or between the sensation of a thing that is causing pain and a thought of sadness arising from this feeling. And all the other things I judged concerning the objects of the senses, I thought I had also learned from nature. For I had persuaded myself that this was the way things were before I had considered any reasons by which this could be proved. But afterwards many experiences gradually undermined all the faith I had placed in the senses. For sometimes towers that from a distance had seemed round appeared from close up as square;* and giant statues perched on the top of those towers did not look particularly large to one gazing up from below; and by innumerable other such experiences I came to realize that in matters of the external senses our judgements are at fault. Not only the internal senses, moreover; the internal ones as well. For what can be more intimate than pain? Yet I had often heard from people whose arm or leg had been amputated, that they still occasionally seemed to feel pain in the part of the body they were missing; and therefore even in myself it did not seem to be wholly certain that one of my limbs was hurting, even though I was feeling pain in it. To these points I recently added Sixth Meditation 55 two very general reasons for doubting. The first was that everything I have ever believed I was having a sensation of while awake, I can sometimes think I am having a sensation of while asleep; and since I do not believe that what I seem to see when asleep comes from anything existing outside me, I...
Purchase answer to see full attachment
User generated content is uploaded by users for the purposes of learning and should be used following Studypool's honor code & terms of service.

Explanation & Answer

Attached.

1

Running head: THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN KNOWING AND BELIEVING

The Difference Between Knowing and Believing
Name:
The institution of Affiliation:

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN KNOWING AND BELIEVING
Introduction
The concepts of justified belief, knowledge, and opinion all fall under the
umbrella of epistemology. Epistemology stems its philosophical weight from the earlier Greek
philosophers. From a philosophical point of view, it is the scrutiny of everything that pertains to
knowledge. It is the study of the philosophical forms of knowledge, the rationality of belief, and
justification. Belief, on the other hand, is someone’s state of mind. It is a state of thought in
which people think about, a phenomenon or an aspect of society to be true and valid without
considering evidence to ascertain that it is, in fact, true with tangible, verifiable facts. Another
definition of belief is the attitude inclined towards the possibility of something being true. It is
easy to assume the thought that belief and knowledge are in perfect meaningful proximities,
but philosophy offers an opportunity to explore the possibilities of existing a broad divergence
between the two concepts. This paper aims at bringing out the disparities that lie between the
two conflicting yet mistakenly similar terms similar concepts.
Observations and arguments that lead to the topic in question
There is the issue of whether knowledge is at all possible, that is if someone can
boldly say without fear of contradiction, that they know something, and that it is the absolute
truth of the matter. Such a scenario can be termed as skepticism. Skeptics argue that the senses of
humans are often under some external force, like a demon and perception. In this case,
everything that they see is fake, and they can never know the ‘real world.’ Agrippa the Skeptic,
one whose work has been quoted by many skeptics, claims that only a certain degree of belief
can be achieved. The achievement of the same is subject to the level of external factors one is
exposed to. This level of exposure is mostly due to perception, and ultimately, belief. Thus, one
can only know the extent to which one believes. According to Agrippa, knowledge is a function
of experience and perception, all of which cannot be fully definitive of the real knowledge one
has on the world. These factors surrounding knowledge are subject to inclinations that one has
whether a subject, aspect of the phenomenon is true. In this regard, knowledge ultimately
depends on belief.
Critics of skepticism find some flaws in those ideologies, mostly the mention that
there is only probable truth, and not knowable. Agrippa’s line of philosophical thought is
oblivious of the general possibility of justification, either through philosophy or logical (often
empirical methods).
Filling Gaps- Truth, Justification, and Belief
In mathematics, for instance, it is known that 1 + 1 = 2, but other than that, there
is a knowledge of how to add two or so numbers, knowing other people or oneself, a place,
activity, or a thing. Philosophers argue that one should make a clear distinction between knowing
a concept and understanding a process or operation. In the English language, however, these
terms are not explicit, but are in other languages such as Portuguese, Fren...


Anonymous
Awesome! Perfect study aid.

Studypool
4.7
Trustpilot
4.5
Sitejabber
4.4

Similar Content

Related Tags