Finally, Descartes’ universal methodic doubt leads logically to universal skepticism. No certitude can ever be attained in a system where the very foundations of human reason are completely destroyed. When he rejects as doubtful and even as “absolutely false” all in regard to which he could imagine the least ground for doubt, he saws off the very limb upon which he is seated.
If the nature of his mind and the laws of thought are called into real doubt (not to speak of considering them to be “absolutely false”), then all acts and facts of consciousness, all ideas, judgments, and inferences, can no longer be trusted.
But how can the mind attempt to validate its own trustworthiness except by means of these things? If Descartes mistrusts the simple judgments of “2+3=5″ and “A square has four sides,” how can he trust his faculties in making the far more complicated arguments with which he tries to prove God’s existence and infinite perfection?
Conclusion
The effort of Descartes to find his way back to certitude by means of the roundabout detour of the existence and veracity of God, shows the desperate plight in which he had placed himself by his universal doubt. The steps he takes in retracing his way are these:
· His own existence;
· The existence and infinite perfection of God;
· God’s absolute veracity;
· His creation by God;
· The trustworthiness of his faculties, due to the veracity of God who created him;
· The truth and validity of all those spontaneous convictions of his mind which are “clear and distinct.”
But we have seen that Descartes could not consistently prove God’s existence, since he could only do so by means of a reasoning process which, according to his own principles, was essentially doubtful in its validity, and even “absolutely false.” The only thing of which he could ever be certain was his own existence; and this, too, strictly speaking, Descartes should have doubted, because he had doubted the principle of contradiction and the testimony of his own consciousness. Our modern Archimedes had indeed found his fulcrum, namely his own existence; but now he could not move the world, because he had thrown away his lever.
Descartes, if he had been consistent, should have embraced universal skepticism, because his universal doubt left him no other choice: he had no way of retracing his course. He was like a mariner who scuttles his boat and swims to a rock in mid-ocean. The rock is the solitary fact of his own existence. True, he had found a solid point. But it is a lonely and desolate spot; and he is marooned on it forever, doomed to die of mental starvation, surrounded by an unbridgeable ocean of doubt.
The Cartesian universal methodic doubt, therefore, is not a proper approach to the problem of human knowledge. It is in reality only a variation of universal skepticism, and as such it is absurd. We will have to make our approach in a different fashion.
The necessary conclusion to be drawn from the above critical examination of universal skepticism is obvious:
Complete doubt cannot be the proper approach to the problem of human knowledge. It would be fatal. Starting with complete doubt, we can no more reach a solution of the problem of human knowledge than a bird can fly with amputated wings.
Another important conclusion is this:
Any theory of knowledge which leads logically to universal skepticism is intrinsically false.
Nothing could be plainer. There must be an essential flaw in a theory which, if consistently carried out to its logical conclusions, ends in the absurdity of skepticism.
Bibliography
References:
1. Taken from: “The Principles of Philosophy”; “Meditations on First Philosophy”; “Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting the Reason.”
2. Meditations, I.
3. Discourse, IV.
4. Meditations, I, toward the close.
5. Loc. cit., II, beginning.
6. Loc. cit., II, beginning.
7. Principles of Philosophy, Part I, XVIII.
8. Ibid., Part I, XVIII.
9. Ibid., Part I, XX.
10. Ibid., Part I, XXIX, and XXX.
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