Analysis Of Rene Descartes 'Meditations On First Philosophy'

Jacob Gray – Rene Descartes’ “Meditations on First Philosophy” Paper Rene Descartes started his first meditation with a simple question: “What can be called into doubt?” Descartes explains that many of his preconceived notions had been proven false and it made him question many things that he had found to be true in life. Instead of dismantling every belief or fact he thought he knew to be true, he started by undermining his own beliefs by questioning their foundations. The question remains, however, why he began doing this in the first place. Towards the end of the meditation in the eleventh paragraph, Descartes concludes “the task now in hand does not involve action but merely the acquisition of knowledge,” which nicely sums up what his