scepticism + evaluation

Question 1

Outline Descartes’ 3 waves of doubt

Answer 1

1. ILLUSION: senses have failed us before ✏️💧, how do we know we aren’t being deceived now?
   —> rejects this, seems nonsensical and crazy 🤪
2. DREAMING: nonsensical things happen in dreams. Maybe we r being deceived in dreaming 😴 rn? However, there are still fundamental principles common to dreams and reality e.g. 1+1=2. Surely thats undoubtable?
3. DECEPTION: nothing is undoubtable. What if there is an evil demon 👹 deceiving us? 1+1 then might not = 2 😧

Question 2

What does Descartes claim are 4 indubitable truths?

Answer 2

Cogito 🧠 ergo sum 😊

Clear + distinct ideas r true ✅

God exists 🙏

External world exists 🌎

Question 3

What are clear and distinct ideas?

Answer 3

Self-evident, obvious ideas.

Clear: can think of an idea fully with all our mind’s attention.
Distinct: not defined in terms of anything else that is unclear. Precise and different from other things.

Question 4

How does Descartes prove the existence of god?

Answer 4

TRADEMARK ™️ ARGUMENT.
1. CAP 🧢
2. My ideas must be caused by something.
3. I have an idea of God as a supremely perfect 🤩 being.
4. Bc I am imperfect, according to CAP 🧢 I CAN’T BE THE CAUSE OF MY IDEA 💡 OF GOD 🙏
5. Only a perfect being can cause my perfect 🤩 idea of God.
6. So GOD MUST EXIST and left his ™️ on each of our brains at birth

Question 5

Outline the causal adequacy principle (CAP🧢)

Answer 5

A cause has to be greater than or equal to its effect (e.g. weak baby can’t push heavy car)

Question 6

How does Descartes’ trademark argument respond to scepticism?

Answer 6

God exists.
God is omnipotent 💪 , omniscient 🧠 and omnibenevolent 😊.
So, it is impossible for there to be an evil demon deceiving us.
So, the external world we see must be real.

Question 7

Describe Hume’s fork🍴and why its an issue for cogito and C+D ideas.

Answer 7

ALL TRUE STATEMENTS ARE EITHER:

RELATIONS OF IDEAS: analytic a priori truths
or
MATTERS OF FACT: synthetic a posteriori

Descartes’ C + D IDEAS and COGITO are SYNTHETIC A PRIORI. They cross the fork 🍴 . So they can’t be true.

Question 8

Define global scepticism

Answer 8

view that questions the certainty of ALL knowledge

Question 9

Define local scepticism

Answer 9

the view that one cannot possess knowledge in some particular domain

Question 10

What is the purpose of scepticism?

Answer 10

to ensure we aren’t being deceived, that the knowledge we do have is indubitable

Question 11

difference between philosophical scepticism 🤨 and normal incredulity?

Answer 11

philosophical scepticism doubts even things that may seem certain. grounds for justification that are usually accepted are doubted.

Question 12

name 6 responses to scepticism

Answer 12

Descartes
Locke
Trotter-Cockburn
Russell
Berkeley
Reliabilism

Question 13

Descartes’ response to scepticism

Answer 13

Global scepticism disproved. God exists, preventing an evil deceptive demon from existing.

RESPONSES:
- CAP not always true. Counter examples (helium 🎈 , life 🌲 , cake 🍰)
- CAP not true: Hume on causation. WE ONLY KNOW CAUSE OF SOMETHING FROM EXPERIENCE.
- CAP not true: misapplying rules. True to physical things, but not metaphysical like GOD.
- Hume: we don’t ❌ have an idea of perfect being

Question 14

Locke’s response to scepticism

Answer 14

Voluntary imagination but involuntary perception. So, external world must exist bc we can’t control our senses.

RESPONSE:
Counters local scepticism of existence of external world, but doesn’t disprove the idea that we are being deceived,

Question 15

Trotter-Cockburn’s response to scepticism

Answer 15

Coherence of senses: different senses provide corresponding information so it makes sense that an external world exists.

RESPONSE:
Counters local scepticism of existence of external world but doesn’t disprove global scepticism or evil deceiver argument

Question 16

Russell’s response to scepticism

Answer 16

ABDUCTIVE REASONING/BEST HYPOTHESIS. Simplest, most plausible explanation = existence of external world + non existence of evil deceiver

RESPONSE:
it doesn’t completely disprove global scepticism, just chooses to assume otherwise bc it makes more sense

Question 17

Reliabilism response to scepticism

Answer 17

Accepts scepticism and knowledge at once, but threshold for knowledge is lowered (reliable, true belief)

Scepticism MIGHT be correct… but for convenience we assume that we know the world exists and we aren’t being deceived.

We know things, but don’t know that we know things.

Question 18

Berkeley’s response to scepticism

Answer 18

Whatever we perceive and experience is the only reality, so issues posed by scepticism don’t matter. We are brains in the vat of God’s perception.

Question 19

What are the 4 criticisms of trademark argument?

Answer 19

Counter examples of CAP 🧢
Hume on causation against CAP 🧢
Misapplying rules in CAP 🧢
Hume: no ❌ idea of perfect 🤩 being

Question 20

Critique Hume on causation

Question 21

What does Descartes say about substance?

Answer 21

WAX 🕯
1. Properties of wax can change (melt)
2. Even w different properties, I still recognise it as wax
3. SO wax as a substance isn’t understood through properties

4. Substance is something that is extended but changes
5. Wax can change into forms beyond my imagination 💭
6. So, wax as a substance is not imagined
7. SO: wax as a substance I understand in my mind alone, as innate knowledge that isn’t imagined and doesn’t come from perception of sensory qualities

Question 22

Name 2 responses to Descartes on substance

Answer 22

Berkeley
Hume

Question 23

Berkeley on substance

Answer 23

WTFFFF

Question 24

Hume on substance

Answer 24

As with the transient nature of the mind, we never perceive a single continuous object.
Instead, we experience a stream of different objects that we label 🏷 a single object through connection and similarity

Question 25

Hume on cogito

Answer 25

Just because we think, doesn’t mean there is a “self” that exists.
We aren’t 💭🧠💭 (single self having multiple thoughts)
We are 💭➡️💭➡️💭➡️💭➡️💭 (stream of separate thoughts that we collectively label “self” through connection and similarity)

Question 26

scepticism essay

Answer 26

scepticism remains unsuccessfully disproved, as although indirect realist responses from Locke and Russell support the existence of a mind independent real world, they fail to FULLY counter the doubt posed by scepticism as the existence of a real world does not disprove the existence of an evil deceiver. Descartes uses his trademark argument to show that the existence of GOD does disprove the existence of an evil deceiver, how it relies heavily on the problematic CAP and false lemma that we have an idea of a perfect being, so fails to counter scepticism

1. Locke: involuntary/voluntary

okay, but just because perception and conception are different, doesn’t mean one is mind-dependent and the other is mind-independent. They might be both mind-dependent, but different in another way.

also, even if perception was of mind-independent objects, this only proves a real world. It doesn’t disprove scepticism as we might be deceived about this real world.

2. Russell’s abductive reasoning.

this is better than Locke’s as it does deal with scepticism directly rather than merely proving a real world.

BUT all it does is say that scepticism is most likely wrong, and we can believe that we AREN’T being deceived about knowledge because this is the best hypothesis. this fails to deal with scepticism, as it argues that we can’t be 100% sure that our knowledge is true.
Russell’s A.R. does not prove that knowledge can’t be rationally doubted, all it says is “we can’t be 100% sure but its probable that we aren’t deceived” which doesn’t disprove Scep at all!!

3. Descartes Trademark Argument: if true this would be the most successful as it most directly deals with scepticism itself. While no flaws in logic, some premises are wrong:

CAP: counter examples. Misapplication of rules. Hume’s empiricist argument on causation

Hume: we don’t have an idea of a perfect being