ABSTRACT
As we have seen, Descartes thought that some of the meditator’s beliefs were in error and needed changing (just as he had previously revised his own beliefs). The doubt begins a process of replacing error with truth. According to the Synopsis, its purpose is threefold: (1) “freeing us from all our preconceived opinions”; (2) “providing the easiest route by which the mind may be led away from the senses”; and (3) eventually making it “impossible for us to have any further doubts about what we subsequently discover to be true” (7:12; also 7:171-2). In other words, the doubt is undertaken to get rid of old, bad opinions and to withdraw the mind from the senses so as ultimately to achieve indubitable, or absolutely certain, truths.
