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Rene Descartes Wax Analysis

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Descartes’ Wax Example
In Meditations on First Philosophy, Rene Descartes discusses how a piece of wax recently taken from a honeycomb can explain certain things about himself and the way that he thinks (11). His goal is to explain what he is and how he thinks as well as suspend judgment about any of his beliefs, which are even slightly doubtful. In the following paper, I will discuss his famous “wax example.”
While Descartes begins the second meditation in radical doubt, he learns that he can know one thing for sure, and this is that nothing is certain. The only thing that he can be certain of is that he is a thinking thing. He also explains how he cannot trust the senses and the imagination. He believes that the imagination can conjure up …show more content…

By saying that he knows the wax by means of vision, he is saying that he can see it with his eyes and notice the shape and color. By knowing the wax by intuition of the mind Descartes is explaining that he knows the piece of wax is still the same piece of wax as it was before it …show more content…

The reason he does this wax example is because he wants to know if he can rely on his senses, imagination, or his mind. Descartes seeks to answer how he knows that the wax has changed. If he relied on only his senses, he would decide that the wax before and after melting it is completely different (11). However, he knows that this is not the case. He discovers that he must use the intuition of his mind, as mentioned before, to know the wax fully. By using the intuition of the mind, he knows the wax is still the same.
In the end, Descartes concludes from his meditation on the wax that the mind is more clearly known than the body. This is because the body could possibly be false as the result of the actions of an evil demon. Descartes believes that it is impossible that he could be deceived about his existence of his nature as a thinking thing. He also decides that there are two ways of knowing the wax: through the senses and through intuition. Knowing the wax through the senses is deemed inadequate while knowing the wax through intuition is more sufficient (12). Knowing the wax through the senses is inadequate for the reason that the senses can be deceived. After
Descartes finishes his mediation on the wax example, he decides he must stop at this point,

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