Gut, Przemysław (2020). The Epistemic Significance of Current Clear and Distinct Perceptions in Descartes’ Epistemology. Roczniki Filozoficzne 68 (2):87-118.
In recent literature, we can find two interpretations about the epistemic status and function of current clear and distinct perceptions in Descartes’ epistemology.
The first one may be called the psychological interpretation. It states that in light of the radical skeptical hypothesis of the deceiving God from the First Meditation, which seems to imply that nothing is exempt from doubt, current clear and distinct perceptions are only psychologically certain, at least anywhere prior to when God’s existence is proven and the general rule of truth is established. Until we reach the conclusion of the proof of God’s veracity—which eliminates the danger of the deceiving God hypothesis—anything with no exception may in fact turn out to be false, including propositions that appear evident at the moment. Thus, even though, as Descartes claims, we cannot but assent to propositions while clearly and distinctly perceiving them, they nevertheless remain at most psychologically, not normatively, certain before knowing of God’s existence (see Gewirth 1941; Loeb 1992; Curley 2006).
The second interpretation can be termed normative. It states that Descartes believed that current clear and distinct perceptions are both utterly immune to doubt, including doubt occasioned by the deceiving God hypothesis (current clear and distinct perceptions can be doubted only when one is no longer attending to them), as well as true, even before God’s existence is proven and the general rule of truth is established. Thus, their certainty, according to that account, is for Descartes not merely psychological but normative. In other words, the normative interpretation has it that the inability to withhold assent to that which is currently perceived clearly and distinctly stems from possessing knowledge, not, as the psychological interpretation claims, from being psychologically compelled (Cot tingham 1986; Della Rocca 2005; Carriero 2008; Ragland 2016).
I endorse the normative interpretation for a number of what I believe to be cogent reasons. However, there are also some difficulties associated with it. These difficulties need to be tackled if one is to make a case for the normative interpreta tion as the correct one for the reconstruction of Descartes’ epistemological program. Therefore, after presenting positive arguments for the interpretation in part one of the paper, I will discuss the difficulties of textual and substantive nature that the normative interpretation needs to address if it is to be upheld. This will allow me to assess the tenability of the normative interpretation, as well as to establish the extent to which it is consistent with other claims that Descartes undeniably made. Before I turn to the above task, however, let me briefly say a few more words about the psychological interpretation. This will allow me to highlight the main points in which the two interpretations differ, as well as to make clear the reasons why I believe that the psychological interpretation, although subtle and philosophically appealing, is untenable.
I
It can be argued that accepting the psychological interpretation puts Descartes’ theory of knowledge in serious trouble. If psychological certainty is all Descartes has at the outset of his search for the foundations of knowledge, then it seems that the initial set of propositions he needs to get his epistemological project off the ground cannot serve as an absolutely secure and firm starting point for infer ring the rest of knowledge. Since everything that we know prior to proving the existence of God is only psychologically certain and it is subject to doubt in the face of the deceiving God hypothesis, then the path to knowledge that is absolutely certain, so extensively discussed by Descartes throughout his work, seems entirely blocked. The psychological interpretation appears therefore to be starkly at odds with Descartes’ general epistemological program.
Proponents of the psychological interpretation would most likely object to the above claim. Some of them argue that the psychological interpretation does have support in Descartes’ texts, and that it is not at all inconsistent with his epistemo logical project; that is, with the task of building knowledge on a “firm and solid foundation.” Descartes might start off with propositions certain only in a psycho logical sense, but once God’s existence is proven (and hence the deceiving God hypothesis eliminated), these psychologically certain propositions take on a higher epistemological status—they become normatively certain. This is nicely expressed by Gewirth, who claims that Descartes’ epistemology hinges on the assumption that “a metaphysical certainty can emerge from propositions whose certainty, at the point at which they occur in the demonstration, is only psychological” (Gewirth 1941, 387; see also Gueroult 1955, 41–45). Thus, he argues that the psychologi cal interpretation is consistent with Descartes’ objective of building knowledge on “firm and solid foundation.” In the same vein, Curley interprets Descartes by introducing “the idea of an assent-compelling argument.” Here is how he puts it in his article “The Cogito and the Foundations of Knowledge.
I claim that what Descartes is trying to do in the Meditations is to construct an assent compelling argument to the conclusion that God exists and cannot be a deceiver (2006, 42) … It is sufficient that the premises of the argument and the inferential moves be psychologically compelling. It is not necessary for them to be indubitable in the strong sense which implies that they cannot properly be doubted. (2006, 44; see also Gueroult 1955, 41–45)
The core of the problem is that there does not seem to be a way in which psychological certainty, which is a purely subjective state of mind, could found normative certainty about clear and distinct perceptions, which is an objective state (Van Cleve 2008, 104).5
Other supporters of the psychological interpretation offer a yet different exege sis of Descartes’ epistemology (Frankfurt, Bennett). They claim that neither does the psychological interpretation pose any serious problems as far as Descartes’ epistemological program is concerned, nor is it irreconcilable with his main ob jective....In other words, Descartes did not intend to build the edifice of knowledge on a true, certain, and absolutely warranted foundation. “These normative notions,” as Bennett puts it, “actually play a small part in the work [of Descartes], most of which concerns intellectual stability, tranquility, peace in the doxastic kingdom—a system of beliefs that will stay put” (Bennett 2001, 377).
This would in turn mean that there is no tight connection between the certainty (the quest for certainty) and truth (the search for truth) in Descartes’ account of knowledge. Truth is a property of propositions that is constituted by their conformity with reality, whereas certainty is a property of propositions in relation to their justification. Descartes clearly distinguished the two. He was, however, deeply convinced that certainty entails truth. When one can be certain of a proposition p, then it means that p is true (AT 7:15, CSM 2:11; AT 9B:2, CSM 1:179; compare Gierulanka 1962; Kulstad 1977).
A correct interpretation of Descartes’ epistemological program must account for, on the one hand, his claim that certainty about a proposition is bound up with its truth, and on the other, his claim that truth in the strict sense consists in “the conformity of thought with its object,” as he puts it in the letter of 16 October 1639 to Mersenne (AT 2:597, CSMK 3:139).
II
… when I turn to the things themselves which I think I perceive [percipere] very clearly, I am so convinced by them that I spontaneously declare: let whoever can do so deceive me, he will never bring it about that I am nothing, so long as I continue to think I am something; or make it true at some future time that I have never existed, since it is now true that I exist; or bring it about that two and three added together are more or less than five, or anything of this kind in which I see a manifest contradiction. (AT 7:36, CSM 2:25)
What is more, the final part of the cited excerpt suggests that this immunity to doubt stems from the fact that we have strong reasons for believing that our clear and distinct perceptions cannot be other than how we currently see them. This means that the immunity to doubt in question cannot be construed as a state of an exclusively psychological nature.
Further support for this interpretation comes from Descartes’ concept of percep tion (perceptio) in the context of perceiving clear and distinct ideas or propositions. In the Second Meditation, in the famous fragment about wax, Descartes states that perceiving (perceptio) something clearly and distinctly is not a matter “of vision or touch or imagination—nor has it ever been … —but of purely mental scrutiny” (AT 7:31, CSM 2:21). Of course, in order for such perception by the mind (per ceptio ab intellectu) to happen, some conditions have to be met.9 If they are met, however, we are, according to Descartes, capable of the kind of knowing that is (a) free of the distortive influence of the imagination, and which is (b) the result of a “clear and attentive mind,” or—as Descartes had it in Rules for the Direc tion of Mind—knowing “which proceeds solely from the light of reason (lumen naturale)” (AT 10:368, CSM 1:14).
Further support for this interpretation comes from Descartes’ concept of percep tion (perceptio) in the context of perceiving clear and distinct ideas or propositions. In the Second Meditation, in the famous fragment about wax, Descartes states that perceiving (perceptio) something clearly and distinctly is not a matter “of vision or touch or imagination—nor has it ever been … —but of purely mental scrutiny” (AT 7:31, CSM 2:21). Of course, in order for such perception by the mind (per ceptio ab intellectu) to happen, some conditions have to be met.9 If they are met, however, we are, according to Descartes, capable of the kind of knowing that is (a) free of the distortive influence of the imagination, and which is (b) the result of a “clear and attentive mind,” or—as Descartes had it in Rules for the Direc tion of Mind—knowing “which proceeds solely from the light of reason (lumen naturale)” (AT 10:368, CSM 1:14).
Whatever is revealed to me by the natural light — for example that from the fact that I am doubting it follows that I exist, and so on — cannot in any way be open to doubt. This is because there cannot be another faculty both as trustworthy as the natural light and also capable of showing me that such things are not true. (Med 3, AT 7:38, CSM 2:27)
Considering the above together with the fact that according to Descartes the natural light is a sure mark of discerning the truth, we can conclude that perceiving something in a clear and distinct way amounts to learning the truth. That, in turn, seems to legitimize the conclusion that, for Descartes, the reason for which we cannot help but assent to propositions currently clearly and distinctly perceived is the truth. Descartes claims in the cited passage that we do not have any other, more authoritative faculty which could make us think that such propositions which we perceive currently clearly and distinctly are not true. Thus, it is not merely a psychological impulse, but most of all the undeniable reason that the natural light unveils before us that compels us to affirm as true that which is currently perceived clearly and distinctly.
The Fifth Meditation provides further strong support for the view that Descartes sees clear and distinct perceptions as normatively certain, absolutely true, and im mune to doubt. He writes thus:
For example, when I consider the nature of a triangle, it appears most evident to me, steeped as I am in the principles of geometry, that its three angles are equal to two right angles; and so long as I attend to the proof, I cannot but believe this to be true. (AT 7:69/70, CSM 2:46)
He makes analogous statements in his Replies to the Objections brought against the Meditations. For instance, in his Replies to the Second Objections, Descartes explains that when he stated that nothing can be known for sure until God’s exis tence is ascertained, the word “nothing” was meant to refer solely to that which is not currently perceived clearly and distinctly. Therefore—Descartes continues—an atheist can be certain of that which he/she perceives currently in a clear and distinct way because the certitude of such perceptions does not hinge on the knowledge of God’s existence, but on what the light of reason clearly and distinctly reveals to him or her [???]. When we perceive something clearly and distinctly, we ipso facto know that it is true, without recourse to anything else.
… when I said that we can know nothing for certain until we are aware that God ex ists, I expressly declared that I was speaking only of knowledge of those conclusions which can be recalled when we are no longer attending to the arguments by means of which we deduced them. The fact that an atheist can be “clearly aware that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles” is something I do not dispute. (AT 7:140–141, CSM 2:100–101)
I have explained, in several places, the sense in which this “nothing” is to be under stood. It is this. So long as we attend to a truth which we perceive very clearly, we cannot doubt it. But when, as often happens, we are not attending to any truth in this way, then even though we remember that we have previously perceived many things clearly, nevertheless there will be nothing which we may not justly doubt so long as we do not know that whatever we clearly perceive is true. (AT 7:460, CSM 2:309)
Yet another piece of support for the normative interpretation can be found in Prin ciples of Philosophy, where Descartes states that the “mind [...] knowing itself” discovers in itself also “certain common notions for which it constructs various proofs; and, for as long as it attends to them, it is completely convinced of their truth” (AT 8A:9, CSM 1:197). Furthermore, Conversation with Burman also lends some strong support. Descartes explains there that even if we did not have the knowledge of God’s existence, we would still not doubt the truths that are clear and distinct to us. We know that they are certain and true, because we perceive them clearly and distinctly. Thus, the knowledge of that which is currently clear and distinct precedes the knowledge of God’s existence. If it was the opposite, we would not be able to prove His existence.
If we did not know that all truth has its origin in God, then however clear our ideas were, we would not know [sciremus] that they were true, or that we were not mistaken. I mean, of course, when we were not paying attention to them, and when we merely remembered that we had clearly and distinctly perceived them. For on other occasions, when we do pay attention to the truths themselves, even though we may not know God exists, we cannot be in any doubt about them; otherwise, we could not prove that God exists [nam alias non possemus demonstrare Deum esse]. (AT 5:178, CSMK 353)
Burman says: It seems there is a circle. For in the Third Meditation the author uses axioms to prove the existence of God, even though he is not yet certain of not being deceived about these.
To which Descartes replies: He does use such axioms in the proof, but he knows [scit] that he is not deceived with regard to them, since he is actually paying attention to them. And for as long as he does pay attention to them, he is certain [certus] that he is not being deceived, and he is compelled to give his assent to them. (AT 5:148, CSMK 334)
III
One of the major advantages of the normative interpretation is, I believe, that it provides the most effective way (both from interpretative and philosophical point of view) to show that Descartes is not guilty of circularity.
As long as we currently perceive a proposition p clearly and distinctly, or—to put it differently—if we are attending to the reasons that prove the proposition p, then our certainty of p does not need any further support or external guarantee. In other words, according to the normative interpretation, Descartes claimed that there are propositions that are epistemically privileged, the truth of which is given as something self-evident.
The above remarks might not be the clearest, but it is still possible to discern what Descartes meant by them. He seems to be claiming that in each of his proofs of God’s existence from the Third and Fifth Meditations, the link between the conclusion and the premises is perceived by one single act of thought, and so it is not a case of deductive reasoning, which would require appealing to proposi tions to which we are no longer attending. There is no inference involved: the proof of God’s existence does not proceed by retrieving premises from memory and drawing conclusions. Rather, the premises and the conclusions are seen “all at once” through a pure intellectual perception and therefore we cannot fail to know what is actually present to us (AT 10:407–8, CSM 1:37). In such a way, the mind “grasp[s] the proof of God’s existence in its entirety,” and as long as it is “engaged in this process, we are certain that we are not being deceived, and every difficulty is thus removed.”
V
First, one needs to consider the fact that Descartes distinguished between two kinds of genuine knowledge: cognitio, certus, or scire vs. scientia, plane certus, or perfect scire. The former he used to denote fragmentary knowledge of single truths or particular propositions; the latter was reserved for perfect knowledge of a unified system (Carriero 2011, 303; Nolan 2016, 424).
The difference between the two is nuanced and difficult to analyze briefly. For the present purposes, the central point is that scientia or perfect knowledge is according to Descartes the fullest realization of knowledge about reality that the human being can attain. In contrast to fragmentary knowledge, scientia is systematic and spans all the objects of human cognition. Thus, scientia includes not only those propositions that are being perceived clearly and distinctly at the moment, but all the true propositions discovered either through intuition or deduction.
Moreover, perfect knowledge as a system of truths, in contrast to fragmentary knowledge, is immune to any kind of doubt, including indirect doubt. The reason for that is that scientia or perfect knowledge contains according to Descartes a complete set of metaphysical un derpinnings (i.e. God exists, whatever we perceive clearly and distinctly is true): f irstly, they fend off the danger that we were created with a cognitive defect, which is posed by the deceiving God hypothesis. And secondly, they explain why clear and distinct ideas that are innate and that we discover in the mind are true of the things to which they refer
when Descartes concedes that nothing can ever be perfectly known (perfect scire) prior to know ing that God exists, he has only scientia in mind, not cognitio. It is the former that can only be attained once we know that God exists.
This is because only an individual who knows that he or she came into existence not “by fate or chance or a continuous chain of events” but through a perfect entity (God) can know both the thing which he or she is currently focusing his mind’s attention on, and that which he or she is not paying attention to any longer. The latter is made possible by the fact that he or she can effectively exclude the possibility of having a defective cognitive nature (AT 7:70, CSM 2:35).
VI
The first challenge I would like to address has to do with the role of the cogito in Descartes’ project of founding the edifice of knowledge. It can be argued that the normative interpretation is in conflict with the standard reading of the Cartesian epistemology. In brief, within the normative interpretation, the famous Cartesian cogito seems to lose its privileged position. Since all current clear and distinct perceptions are immune to doubt, then the cogito, the first indubitable discovery, becomes one of the many certain propositions that can serve as the point of de parture for Descartes’ epistemology.
Does the normative interpretation really play down the pivotal place of the cogito in Descartes’ epistemology? To answer this question, one needs to answer a more basic one: what exactly was the epistemic role of the cogito in Descartes’ construction of the edifice of knowledge?
According to Gouhier, the privileged class of propositions includes those that concern our own existence, our mental states and God’s existence. Only such propositions are absolutely certain and epistemically independent. In contrast, propositions about the physical world and mathematical truths are not epistemically self-sufficient: they need the proof of God’s existence to be considered absolutely true.
Gouhier argues that the difference between these two groups of clear and distinct propositions lies in their objects. In propositions about one’s own existence and mental states, the object of knowing is identical to the knower. As for God’s existence, there is also inseparable connection between the idea and the reality it refers to. It is impossible to think about God without asserting His existence. (“I cannot think of God except as existing, it follows that existence is inseparable from God, and hence that he really exists” [AT 7:67]). Things are different with mathematical truths and propositions about material reality. Their objects are transcendent to the knower and—importantly—wholly dependent on God’s will.
VII
A critic of the normative interpretation could argue that it forces the view that Descartes took reliability of our cognitive faculties simply on trust, without giving systematic and proper sup port for it. This, in turn, seems to run up—at least to some extent—against his own promise of building the knowledge “right from the foundations.” Moreover, one could reason that current clear and distinct perceptions, even though immediate, are still theoretically implicated in certain concepts, which could suggest a possibility of being arbitrary. These, and no doubt more, questions can be raised against the normative interpretation of current clear and distinct perceptions.