Doubt - a Reflective Essay on Rene Descartes Philosophy

Doubt;

a reflective essay on Rene Descartes philosophy.

Jeremy Elhadad

A831358

Tuesday, Spetember 30th 2008

Humanities: The Big Questions in Philosophy

Nadia Khouri

Dawson College

I believe that in order to know myself, I must doubt everything that I know. Rene Descartes is known as the founder of modern philosophy because he brought an entirely new and avant-garde philosophy on the human self. Rene Descartes once said “If you would be a real seeker of truth it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things”.

I agree entirely with this statement, we need to use our own thinking abilities to investigate, analyze, experiment and develop our own conclusions. In order to develop beliefs that are yours and not someone else’s, you must systematically doubt all things you have been taught. It requires courage to doubt things such as religious beliefs, cultural values, and who you truly are but this is necessary.

         Being absolutely certain about everything is the worst way of going about life. In order to distinguish what you believe to be true from what you believe to be false you must doubt. If you are absolutely certain about everything you know, then this in a way means you think you are right about everything and have no room for improvement. Being perfect doesn’t exist; this is why it is necessary to be open about new opinions. In order to know what your own philosophy is you must think about things critically. Doing this means you must analyze and evaluate your beliefs, view situations from different perspectives, support your point of view with reason and evidence, evaluate the validity and the importance of the information you are given, ask questions, express your philosophy clearly to yourself and to others and systematically exchange ideas with others. In the aforementioned methods of thinking, we repeatedly see the aspects of doubting yourself and thinking. These concepts are very present in Descartes philosophy; doubt includes thinking and if you think this is a proof of your existence therefore to doubt is to know yourself.