Essaying America: A Declaration of Independence

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Early in his Meditations, Descartes suggests that, at least once, one should set one’s epistemic bushel in order, as if beliefs were apples to be sorted. But that is not quite right, even though he uses the image in his replies to the seventh set of objections. Descartes’s principal concern is not each and every belief but the ways in which he justifies them. It is thus not a stretch to find a kind of ethics of belief in the Meditations, at least with regard to scientia. (Regarding the epistemic challenges of everyday life, Descartes is quite clear in his synopsis that “no sane person ever seriously doubted these things,” i.e., “that there really is a world, and that humans have bodies and so on” [1984, 11].) At its heart, then, and all doctrine aside, Cartesian philosophy responds to a call that asks us to formulate a rational basis for our epistemic commitments. I feel a similar obligation, though my concern does not lie with how to conduct myself in the way of belief or, better yet, with how to formulate commitments to assertoric speech acts. In its briefest form, it runs, “Am I an American philosopher?” though that wording is infelicitous insofar Essaying America: A Declaration of Independence