I heard about Plato’s Allegory of the Caves and Hooft’s Holographic Principle from a friend this summer. For the first time in my life, I deeply examined religion, creation, and perception-- learning more about the world in 2 months than I have in 18 years. Here’s the first of many articles on philosophy, written with the intention of sharing a few of my favorite learnings. I’ve found that the best way to understand is to first summarize what I’ve read using quick bullet points and then synthesize new ideas. This way there’s more clarity when discussing points other people have already made.

Here’s a quick summary of points:

• The meditator concludes that everything he already knows is a result of his sensory capability. Our senses can easily be deceived and therefore should not be trusted.

• Since your thoughts exist, you exist. “I think, therefore I am-- Cogito, ergo sum.”

• Since God is far more perfect than one can imagine, he doesn’t solely exist in the mind. Perfection proves God’s existence. This recapitulates Anselm’s famous “ontological argument for the existence of God.” Because God is perfect, he would not deceive the meditator. The meditator is not deceived by God but actually misunderstands his divine judgment.

• A second proof for the existence of God: just like the essence of a body is an extension of the mind, the essence of God is to be existent. A God that does not exist is as inconceivable as a body that is not extended.

• Descartes' discussion of essence is intended as a strong reaction against Aristotelian empiricism. Here’s a concrete example: According to Aristotle, we learn the essence of a triangle by examining instances of triangular-shaped objects in the world. Meanwhile, Descartes believes we learn the essence of a triangle first through the intellect, and only then do we look at the real world and see if there are instances of triangles.

• Senses are meant to navigate the world, not truly understand it. Therefore, the meditator has only an obscure perception of the secondary qualities of things.

• Secondary qualities are heat, color, and taste while primary qualities are size, shape, and texture according to Descartes. The Meditator can be certain about primary qualities since they are clear representations of a body in space but can be misled about secondary qualities because they are non-geometric and can only be perceived obscurely and confusedly.

• Rationalism= knowledge that arises prior to experience (a priori); belief in innate ideas, reason, and deduction; senses are unreliable sources of knowledge; Descartes’ stance questioning Aristotle

• Empiricism= knowledge that arises through experience; belief in sense perception and induction; Aristotle’s status quo accepted at the time

Descartes attempts to answer the age-old question of how we know anything is true--ultimately whether we can root our future conclusions in supposed fundamental truths. The Meditator here seeks to rebuild his knowledge from the ground up by only accepting claims that are absolutely certain. If you think this sounds familiar, it resembles Elon Musk’s infamous first-principles tactic: space travel is too expensive→ why? rockets are rebuilt for every launch→ simple solution: make them reusable. This first-principles approach is incredibly useful but in Descartes’ case, it quickly devolves into a circular argument. Descartes’ ‘If A, then B. If B, then A’ style is repeated to prove the existence of self and God. A concrete example is when he states that without his knowledge of God's existence, none of his knowledge could be certain. His argument is not valid because the premise of God existing is not falsifiable in itself.

So what can we learn from Descartes about how knowledge is possible? How do we determine which of our beliefs are warranted? Furthermore, if Descartes radically rejects all knowledge as unknowable or unwarranted, how can he contradict himself by affirming things he supposedly knows? Does he really believe his own logic? Shouldn’t he apply his own radical critique to his own knowledge of God?

To reiterate, Descartes mistrusts the information received through one’s senses, using hyperrealistic dreams and deceptive higher beings as examples (he evidently would have been president of the Matrix fan club). Here comes the most important part: in order to be certain about your knowledge, you must strictly apply reason. Descartes argues that all problems should be broken up into their simplest parts and that problems can be expressed as abstract equations. The Cartesian coordinate system, named for its creator, is a perfect example. By creating a two-dimensional graph on which problems could be plotted, algebraic ideas can be expressed in geometric forms. In essence (to use his favorite terminology) his method uses reason and formulae to understand objects in the real world instead of solely through perception.

This last part is why I love philosophy. Descartes’ iconic quote “I think, therefore I am” implies that humans have an innate reasoning capability, and are therefore the only beings in the universe that can possess true knowledge. Our in-built logical reasoning can break down the complexity that exists in the world in order to make sense of it. Once you get past the novelty of biocentrism, a new uncertainty may come to mind: our human minds make hasty generalizations that result in a fundamentally flawed understanding of space and time. This is precisely what happens to Descartes. In his search for true knowledge, he contradicts himself. There is no formula or geometric representation to make sense of the existence of God. Perfection proving God’s existence (feel free to reread the bullet point from earlier) is in itself an abstraction. Either God exists as a logical entity outside of the mind and beyond the physical world or is an exception to the triangle rule previously mentioned (we can enumerate all of the essential properties of a triangle without knowing whether there are triangles in the world).

During Descartes’ time, the concept of God had considerably more weight than it does now but there are good points to note nevertheless. Human perception is obviously flawed. One way of combatting the problems we face because of our nature is to critique even the most fundamental truths we hold to be true in order to arrive at new, potentially valuable conclusions.

I heard about Plato’s Allegory of the Caves and Hooft’s Holographic Principle from a friend this summer. For the first time in my life, I deeply examined religion, creation, and perception-- learning more about the world in 2 months than I have in 18 years. Here’s the first of many articles on philosophy, written with the intention of sharing a few of my favorite learnings. I’ve found that the best way to understand is to first summarize what I’ve read using quick bullet points and then synthesize new ideas. This way there’s more clarity when discussing points other people have already made.

Here’s a quick summary of points:

• The meditator concludes that everything he already knows is a result of his sensory capability. Our senses can easily be deceived and therefore should not be trusted.

• Since your thoughts exist, you exist. “I think, therefore I am-- Cogito, ergo sum.”

• Since God is far more perfect than one can imagine, he doesn’t solely exist in the mind. Perfection proves God’s existence. This recapitulates Anselm’s famous “ontological argument for the existence of God.” Because God is perfect, he would not deceive the meditator. The meditator is not deceived by God but actually misunderstands his divine judgment.

• A second proof for the existence of God: just like the essence of a body is an extension of the mind, the essence of God is to be existent. A God that does not exist is as inconceivable as a body that is not extended.

• Descartes' discussion of essence is intended as a strong reaction against Aristotelian empiricism. Here’s a concrete example: According to Aristotle, we learn the essence of a triangle by examining instances of triangular-shaped objects in the world. Meanwhile, Descartes believes we learn the essence of a triangle first through the intellect, and only then do we look at the real world and see if there are instances of triangles.

• Senses are meant to navigate the world, not truly understand it. Therefore, the meditator has only an obscure perception of the secondary qualities of things.

• Secondary qualities are heat, color, and taste while primary qualities are size, shape, and texture according to Descartes. The Meditator can be certain about primary qualities since they are clear representations of a body in space but can be misled about secondary qualities because they are non-geometric and can only be perceived obscurely and confusedly.

• Rationalism= knowledge that arises prior to experience (a priori); belief in innate ideas, reason, and deduction; senses are unreliable sources of knowledge; Descartes’ stance questioning Aristotle

• Empiricism= knowledge that arises through experience; belief in sense perception and induction; Aristotle’s status quo accepted at the time

Descartes attempts to answer the age-old question of how we know anything is true--ultimately whether we can root our future conclusions in supposed fundamental truths. The Meditator here seeks to rebuild his knowledge from the ground up by only accepting claims that are absolutely certain. If you think this sounds familiar, it resembles Elon Musk’s infamous first-principles tactic: space travel is too expensive→ why? rockets are rebuilt for every launch→ simple solution: make them reusable. This first-principles approach is incredibly useful but in Descartes’ case, it quickly devolves into a circular argument. Descartes’ ‘If A, then B. If B, then A’ style is repeated to prove the existence of self and God. A concrete example is when he states that without his knowledge of God's existence, none of his knowledge could be certain. His argument is not valid because the premise of God existing is not falsifiable in itself.

So what can we learn from Descartes about how knowledge is possible? How do we determine which of our beliefs are warranted? Furthermore, if Descartes radically rejects all knowledge as unknowable or unwarranted, how can he contradict himself by affirming things he supposedly knows? Does he really believe his own logic? Shouldn’t he apply his own radical critique to his own knowledge of God?

To reiterate, Descartes mistrusts the information received through one’s senses, using hyperrealistic dreams and deceptive higher beings as examples (he evidently would have been president of the Matrix fan club). Here comes the most important part: in order to be certain about your knowledge, you must strictly apply reason. Descartes argues that all problems should be broken up into their simplest parts and that problems can be expressed as abstract equations. The Cartesian coordinate system, named for its creator, is a perfect example. By creating a two-dimensional graph on which problems could be plotted, algebraic ideas can be expressed in geometric forms. In essence (to use his favorite terminology) his method uses reason and formulae to understand objects in the real world instead of solely through perception.

This last part is why I love philosophy. Descartes’ iconic quote “I think, therefore I am” implies that humans have an innate reasoning capability, and are therefore the only beings in the universe that can possess true knowledge. Our in-built logical reasoning can break down the complexity that exists in the world in order to make sense of it. Once you get past the novelty of biocentrism, a new uncertainty may come to mind: our human minds make hasty generalizations that result in a fundamentally flawed understanding of space and time. This is precisely what happens to Descartes. In his search for true knowledge, he contradicts himself. There is no formula or geometric representation to make sense of the existence of God. Perfection proving God’s existence (feel free to reread the bullet point from earlier) is in itself an abstraction. Either God exists as a logical entity outside of the mind and beyond the physical world or is an exception to the triangle rule previously mentioned (we can enumerate all of the essential properties of a triangle without knowing whether there are triangles in the world).

During Descartes’ time, the concept of God had considerably more weight than it does now but there are good points to note nevertheless. Human perception is obviously flawed. One way of combatting the problems we face because of our nature is to critique even the most fundamental truths we hold to be true in order to arrive at new, potentially valuable conclusions.