Our senses are our main way of intermingling with the world. Even before one learns to be in control of their emotions, before learning the use of language or reason, senses plays a great role in one’s knowledge acquisition. Sense perception is expected to offer a sense of direction but in many cases it has proven that the knowledge acquired through perception is largely ambiguous and impractical and has thus deceived or misdirected many people (Descartes, 13). Many people therefore find themselves at crossroads whether to believe the knowledge acquired through sense perception or not and this has actually culminated in a hot debate.
The real source of knowledge lay in the mind and not in the senses. The senses only perceive but the mind interprets what has been perceived. It is therefore not important to realize whether our senses are deceiving us since the final information that triggers action comes from our minds and if the senses were somehow faulty, the mind will automatically rectify it and process fundamental reliable knowledge. We need to learn how to trust our senses without disquieting whether what is being perceived is essentially true or not.
Additionally, doubting the accuracy of our senses will make us doubtful beings and this will make us doubt even the basic truths that we hardly have the capacity to test their accuracy or trustworthiness. Rather than doubting the accuracy of our senses, we should adopt a method that will avert errors by tracing what we already know back to a firm basis of certain beliefs since some things happen with a sense of reality (Mandelbaum, 96). Furthermore, it is really hard for us to determine when our senses are decorously reporting facts the way they are and when they are deceiving us. It is therefore pointless to take our time in assessing whether our senses are deceiving us or not. The mere fact that some of our senses experiences are mistaken is not an enough reason for us to suspect all other senses.
Moreover, there is little that we can do to alter our senses’ perception ability. This therefore means that even if we understand that our senses are not reporting things the way they are, there is little that can be done to make them more accurate in reporting. Though we need to gain knowledge that is certain and indubitable, artificially enhancing our senses perception ability so that they reveal the finer details about what they perceive will be interfering with God’s creation and this might have devastating consequences to the human race (Mandelbaum, 198).
Our minds perceive not only the simplest possible form but also strive to give the most correct interpretation. As such, we therefore see things not as they are but as our minds think they should be. This process of interpretation and correction takes place automatically and without our conscience. The mind therefore gives us the information as it should be and not as perceived by the senses (Mandelbaum, 56). This therefore indicates that there is no need for worrying whether our senses are deceiving us or not since if the senses error in any way, the brain will automatically correct the perception and give us the best information that will ultimately be used in making the final judgment or decision (Descartes, 142). It is therefore pointless to waste time in identifying illusions that do occur as we interact with the environment in the pursuit of knowledge.
According to René Descartes, the sense of perception depends on the mind. He points out that it’s easier for us to understand our mind than our body. Our senses lie in seeing, touching, hearing, smell and imagining. It is true that human mind is used in the understanding of the real nature of objects but the senses are not adequate in establishing the truth. This is because of the fact that senses can be deceptive. I also think that our certainty towards particular objects will help us in passing judgment and also in understanding how our mind operates. The ideas of René Descartes agree with the roles played by our senses in understanding different processes.
The essence of understanding that our senses can be deceptive or inaccurate matters. Descartes says that mostly people knows that there exists high chances that they can be deceived by their senses. The entire understanding matters because despite the fact that at times we are deceived by the senses, they also rectify us in the instances that the senses deceives us. If this ability of the mind to correct the deception never existed, individuals could never realize that they were deceived at a certain point.
Understanding that our senses can be deceptive matters due to the fact that individuals have the ability to discover that deception once took place. Descartes claim that an individual can never be certain in what he observes or believes in. it is impossible for individuals to rule out error since it’s said that,” to err is human.” Since human beings are mortal, their beliefs are not so perfect. When we are in a position to understand that our senses deceive at time, we will always be right in passing judgments and calculating before we make any step (Bermúdez, 310).
The understanding also matters since it’s said that an intended sense deception can be used as a platform to activate positive thinking. There are times when people decides to trick the mind and its senses by believing that better things are on the way coming despite existence of a dissimilar situation. With time, tricking self-deception to believe that a certain condition will change to the better materialize in future and this grateful in human life. Deceiving our senses may at some point be very helpful in the way we handle certain events ad situations.
In most cases, deception of our own senses might kill the trust that we believes in. when a person reaches the level of interfering with his own personal trust, this may be very dangerous. For those who use sense deception to violate certain doctrines, their efforts will prove futile because lying to your conscience is the hardest task.
It is true to conclude that our senses are part of the thinking process and it is wrong to deceive our perceptions. Since any living organisms will experience the sense of see, smell, feel, touch and hear, it is right when we respect and value our feelings (Bermúdez, 311). In a nutshell, I strongly affirm that understanding that our senses can be deceptive or inaccurate really matter in human life. The process of making informed decisions will always be successful if only we resist deceiving our senses.
Work cited
Bermúdez, José Luis. “Self-Deception, Intentions, and Contradictory Beliefs.” Analysis 60.4 (October 2000), pp. 309-319.
Descartes, R. Meditation on First Philosophy. Lanham: Start Publishing LLC, 2012. Print.
Mandelbaum, M. Philosophy, science and sense perception: Historical and critical studies. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 2004. Print.
