Question

In his first Meditation, Descartes questions all of the beliefs that he has ever held and finds that he can doubt every one of them. Do you think Descartes is right that all of our beliefs can, at least on some level, be doubted? Or are there some beliefs that we can know with absolute certainty?

Answer 1

I certainly do believe that Descartes is right and that all of our beliefs, at least on some level, can be doubted.

This is because possibilities of certain knowledge can always be questioned and hence all knowledge claims can be subjected to scrutiny. It is only the basic beliefs or the foundational beliefs that cannot be doubted even at some level. We cannot always and systematically prove that our ground and our basis for reasoning with regards to any knowledge are true. Our primary mode of knowledge is based on sensory experience and this tends to be often erroneous. Thus there is reasonable rationale to doubt most of our beliefs at some level.

It can be said that our senses can fool us easily and so it will be pragmatic to doubt all our beliefs, at least on some level.