Bouwsma

If you enjoy philosophy and ever get the chance to read O.K. Bouwsma's essay "Descartes' Evil Genius" don't pass it up. How I wish more philosophers (including myself) wrote with such wit and in a style that both captivates and gives enjoyment. I recently purchased a book of his essays and have not wanted to put it down. Pure pleasure. Also, his argument in "Descartes' Evil Genius" is worth considering.

Last year I wrote a post "The skeptic's dependence on common sense" (here). In that post I tried to articulate an intuition I have about external world skepticism. My intuition is that the skeptic's argument only makes sense if it is already assumed that there is a distinction between illusion and external reality (in the post I used the distinction between hallucination and external reality). The skeptic argues that if our perceptions of the world were an illusion, we would not be able to distinguish those perceptions from perceptions of an actually existing external world. In short, our perceptions alone cannot guarantee that what we perceive is not an illusion. And since they can't do that, there is good reason to be skeptical. My question is: How can a skeptic even propose the distinction between perception of an external world and perception of an illusion unless we already know how to distinguish between the two? And, if we already know how to distinguish between the two, doesn't that undercut the skeptic's position?

If you read that post, you can tell I am not all that confident about this intuition. But I thought it was worth noting. Well, happily for me, I read Bouwsma's essay and it seems to touch on that same intuition! In "Descartes' Evil Genius" Bouwsma imagines a scenario where the evil genius (EG) creates a world that appears just like ours in every way, except it is an illusion. The only problem is, for those in this illusory world, it is just like ours and therefore nothing changes. See, I'm not even sure if I am saying that right, so let me give a quote or two (spoiler alert). In this passage EG creates an illusory world in which a young man, Tom, and his girlfriend, Milly, must live. Previously, EG had created an illusory world made wholly of paper. Unfortunately, Tom figured out the illusion because he knows the difference between a real world and a paper one. So, now EG makes a world just like the real one, yet it's an illusion made of nothing.

"The design then is this. The evil genius is to create a world of illusions. There are to be no flowers, no Milly, no paper. There is to be nothing at all, but Tom is every moment to go on mistaking nothing for something, nothing at all for flowers, nothing at all for Milly, etc. This is, of course, quite different from mistaking paper for flowers, paper for Milly. And yet all is to be arranged in such a way that Tom will go on just as we now do, and just as Tom did before the paper age, to see, hear, smell the world. He will love the flowers, he will kiss Milly, he will blink at the sun. So he thinks. And in thinking about these things he will talk and argue just as we do. But all the time he will be mistaken. There are no flowers, there is no kiss, there is no sun. Illusions all. This then is the end at which the evil genius aims." (p. 91)

So, EG creates this grand illusion, but then there is a problem. Tom goes along just a he would in the real world. When he touches a flower it has depth (unlike the previous paper world), it smells like a real flower, it looks like a flower, etc. Everything is the same for Tom as it would be in the real world. Of course, none of that is a problem, unless you're the EG. What's the point in creating an illusion that no one realizes is an illusion? So, EG has a plan. EG will enter into Tom, possess him in other words, and plant the seed of doubt, the seed of skepticism from within.

"It seems then that on the next day, the evil genius "going to and fro" in Tom's mind and "walking up and down in it," Tom once again, as his custom was, entered the room where the flowers stood on the table. He stopped, looked admiringly, and in a caressing voice said: "Flowers! Flowers!" And he lingered. The evil genius, more subtle "than all the beasts of the field, " whispered "Flowers? Flowers?" For the first time Tom has an intimation of company, of some intimate partner in perception. Momentarily he is checked. He looks again at the flowers. "Flowers? Why, of course, flowers." Together they look out of the same eyes. Again the evil genius whispers, "Flowers?" The seed of suspicion is to be the question." (p. 93)

Eventually EG reveals to Tom that it is all an illusion. But, Tom is incredulous. How can it be an illusion, when it all seems so real, so clear and distinct? So, EG attempts to explain the illusion to Tom by placing the flowers in front of a mirror. EG tells Tom the flowers in the mirror are a "thin" illusion. The ones being reflected are an illusion still, even if a they are a "thick" illusion.

"'In the first place let me assure you that these are not flowers. I destroyed all the flowers. There are no flowers at all. There are only thin and thick illusions of flowers. I can see your flowers in the mirror, and I can smell and touch the flowers before the mirror. What I cannot smell and touch, having seen as in a mirror, is not even thick illusion. But if I cannot also cerpicio what I see, smell, and touch, etc., what I have then seen is not anything real. Esse est cerpicio. I just now tried to cerpicio your flowers, but there is nothing there. Man is after all a four- or five- or six-sense creature and you cannot expect much from so little'
    Tom rubbed his eyes and his ears tingled with an eighteenth-century disturbance. Then he stared at the flowers. 'I see,' he said, 'that this added sense of yours has done wickedly with our language. You do not mean by illusion what we mean, and neither do you mean by flowers what we mean. As for cerpicio I wouldn't be surprised if you'd made up that word just to puzzle us. In any case what you destroyed is what, according to you, you used to cerpicio. So there is nothing for you to cerpicio any more. But there still are what we mean by flowers. If your intention was to deceive, you must learn the language of those you are to deceive. I should say that you are like the doctor who prescribes for his patients what is so bad for himself and then is surprised at the health of his patients...'" (p.95-96)

When I first read this passage I thought, "What the dang heck is cerpicio?" Well, apparently it is a sense ability, above the human five senses, that only the EG has. As Bouwsma states later in the essay, cerpicio is EG's ability to perceive the thing-in-itself. As you may have guessed, esse est cerpicio is a play on Berkeley's esse est percipi. EG made a world out of nothing, but only EG realizes this because only EG has the sense to perceive the thing-in-itself, which of course there is none.

This wonderful story highlights the intuition that the skeptic's argument depends on our already being able to distinguish between illusion and reality (which is why EG's paper world didn't quite work as planned). And if that is the case, isn't the whole argument concerning skepticism about the external world undercut? If we already know the difference between reality and illusion, don't we also already know that the external world is not an illusion? And if it is an illusion, albeit one that fits perfectly with reality as we know it, does it really matter?

Source
O.K. Bouwsma, Philosophical Essays, University of Nebraska Press, 1965, pp. 85-97