mething to question, therefore a questionable object exists. And in order for there to be questioning, some thinking thing, i.e. Descartes, must be doing the questioning, therefore, he exists. Even if the Evil Genius is constantly deceiving him, that fact that he is being deceived means that he exists. For this reason, Descartes could not doubt that he was doubting, and thus was able to " conclude that this proposition, I am, I exist, is necessarily true whenever it is put forward by me or conceived in my mind." (17). To completely prove his point to the skeptics he had to go further, for how could one realize that he/she is doubting? Descartes answers that this is possible through natural light- intuition. By establishing that he is a thing that, doubts, questions, thinks, affirms, denies, imagines, and perceives, through examples, he is able to prove how one could realize his/her doubting. Descartes gives us the example of the wax that is melted, and the people on the street with coats. If the wax melts, one still perceives such as wax because the wax is "merely something extended, flexible, and changeable" (21). On the street, one could see coats and hats, but one determines that one is seeing people. This, like the wax, is done through judgement alone, by the intellect alone. With this, Descartes posits that an object can be grasped even when stripped of its outer form and "perceived by the mind alone" (21). He follows that by arguing that the awareness of one’s self is more certain than that of wax and coats, for one understands one’s self more clearly and distinctly than anything else. If one is able to do such, than, through nature of light, one is able to realize that one is doubting.The main qualm that I have with Descartes’ argument, is with his nature of light argument, that he is only sure that he is doubting from judgements solely based on perception. In order to grasp a concept, one must do ...
