The Reasons Of Descartes: The Dream Argument For Skepticism

The Dream Argument for Skepticism

Presentation of the argument

Premise 1: Sometimes when you are dreaming, you cannot tell whether or not you are dreaming.

Premise 2: Hence, even when you are awake, you cannot tell whether or not you are dreaming.

Premise 3: So, you cannot know that you are not dreaming right now (from P2).

Premise 4: In order to know anything about the external world though your senses, you have to be certain that you are not dreaming.

Conclusion: So, you cannot know anything about the world through the senses.

Explanation of technical terminology

Certainty: The opposite of doubt. If something can be doubted, then it is not certain. Clear: Something that is present and accessible to the attentive mind so that it stimulates our senses with a sufficient degree of strength and accessibility (e.g.. pain, which is vivid and not obscure or a proposition such as “X=X”).

Distinct: Something that sharply separated from all other perceptions that every part of it is clear.

Support for each premise

The first premise for Descartes’ argument comes from this moment in his life in which he is seating next to a fire. He asserts that he is certain that he is indeed seating next to the

Just because the person is so engulfed in a dream that it is impossible for that individual to recognize disparities between these 2 experiences, these same person can nevertheless tell the difference once he or she has awakened. Moreover, a sensation as clear as pain cannot feel the same as the pain we feel when awaken, some argue. After all, Descartes premise is based on the idea that there is nothing in reality that a dream cannot replicate so vividly that we are unable to tell the difference. But he also said that dreams borrow, in a sense, some but not all things from reality so these may not be but somewhat plausible events made up by our