There is a certain sense of obviousness to the world that we should learn to use. What is this obviousness?

Well it is so ubiquitous that it is going to be impossible for me to cover all the aspects of it; this is because it is just a way for me to understand the world and myself. I will try to explain it as best I can, but I dont know how well that will turn out. I think I can start by saying people have a sense of certainty or obviousness regularly. We all experience it, especially when we get something wrong and we say Oh, that answer was obvious. Or you look at a question on a multiple choice test. You read A) and it is obviously not the answer, then you see B) and you get this feeling of certainty. You know that, that is the answer; there is no way around it. These feelings are ever so present in our lives, and when you can make it obvious to oneself what is right and wrong (in all regards, not just morals or justice), the better off you will most likely be. If you can have certainty in almost all of your actions, and for those actions to align with your certainty and are right, then you might say that you are living a good life. I hope we can all say that we know of the sense of certainty and obviousness in at least some form. My problem is that I see something I am certain about and the world or general consensus doesnt agree. When Descartes is so certain that he has Proved the existence of God, I am so certain he is wrong, because there is no actual proof of God or evidence. Descartes ends up making assumptions that dont really have any grounds (assuming causality works exactly the same with ideas and the like, and assuming that causality is absolutely true are a couple examples). Our certainties are relative and what is obvious to one may not be so to another. However, I feel certain views on what is obvious can be better and more accurate than others (just as any theory by one person could be better than anothers). I base what is obvious on what happens to basically everyone, what has been established from science and from my own experience and logic. There is a bias, but there is a bias for everyone. A recent example given to me involves Kants rule on telling to truth. He gives us the moral universal of not lying because if everyone lied no one would trust each other and we couldnt know anything as we cannot trust anyone. There are so many problems with this that I a certain in rejecting it. Why look at a hypothetical situation like if every person lied all the time? That is not going to happen! We know this. Our world will go on and we will all still lie when it is appropriate and go on about our lives. If it is better to tell our friend they did a good job, thats what we are going to do. Why would we use this universal when there are so many cases in which we can tell ourselves it is wrong? Not everyone would agree with me, but I know plenty of people that do (enough so that I can predict that they will agree with me and most likely I will be right in my prediction). If this is not obvious to one (as in if I lie to my friend and it will only make him happier, and not mislead him or anything in a bad way- Im sure almost everyone can picture a situation like this) then there isnt much more that can be discussed. But I still think we should question everything and understand that we cant know some things. There are things beyond us, so we cannot understand or know it all. I will never know what the planet in some solar system of Andromeda looks like. Do I absolutely know this? Of course I dont, we cant absolutely know anything, but thats just proves my point. There are things we cant know because we are limited by our bodies, minds and experiences. However, there are certain things that we see happen a lot, there are things that we have observed that we can be fairly certain will happen again. Like the sun coming up and something falling when we drop them. It is obvious to us that these things will

happen again, and that there are scientific laws behind these outcomes. This helps us derive what is obvious based on how much of it we know. Some of the things I feel are obvious will be wrong, but given how right they have been or how logical they have been, I will continue to trust what is obvious to me if I feel there is reason to. It is obvious to me that I will not come to a conclusion of whether there is or is not a God just from thinking of it. Others should see this too. Others should understand that the can believe in a God without having reasons for Gods existence. God doesnt even have to exist. You can question both sides of if he exists or not until the end of time, but you still wont conclude anything. We should understand that this is the nature of us (we have things we cannot know on a technical level). So we should take what is most obvious and certain (based on what I said above) and try to work out conclusions from that as well. I am not saying to stop asking the question of God, but for us to realize we cant know yet (show me proof that you know God does or does not exist, because I dont have proof of either). Knowing what is obvious and being certain about the most right things will probably produce a lot of good results. This is what science does. Learns from observation, that thing is made obvious, and until that thing is proved wrong, we keep using what is known (what is obvious) to understand the universe. It is obvious that gravity acts on all objects, but that doesnt mean it most definitely does. Using it as something we are certain of has led to many more observations of the universe, which lead to more observations. Sometimes we learn that what is obvious is wrong, and we should keep that in mind too; we can always be wrong (which is a point I try so strongly to make).

Ill examine morals slightly further. Kant gives an example of a murderer looking to murder your friend. Kant says you have to tell him the truth about your friends whereabouts even though he will probably get killed if you tell the truth. If you have selfish intentions such as liking to help people, then you arent morally good if you help people for those reasons (reasons that are biologically natural to us; altruism and empathy). If I meant to show up someone by beating them at solving the cure for cancer I am in a way bad due to those intentions; helping cure the most common cause of death in developed countries would not even matter. If you cannot see how obviously flawed this system is then I am sorry for you. I will continue on as if one understands that it is better to not let their friend die and that there is more to things than just intentions. We have consequences and outcomes. Utilitarianism responds with a universal code of making the most people happy that one can. If happiness is maximized the world will be better. The problems with this system arent as apparent to me as with Kantianism as one is more uncertain of the rule rather than certain of its falsity. Can we know what makes everyone happy? The intensity of that happiness? The purity of it? What counts as being a greater happiness? What counts as pure? Who decides these things? There is just so much uncertainty involved with judging what is best with utilitarianism. It can be useful in many cases, but we are bound to run into some that arent so good. An example being if the happiness of the majority is acquired by the inhibition of a minorities happiness. You are a cop, you want to arrest someone that is known to be a terrible person (killed and raped several women). You dont have absolute proof that they did these things, but you are pretty darn sure. You feel that you can frame him for another crime and that he will be punished appropriately if

you do this; and in addition it will keep him from harming others. Is it good to do this? There are arguments that are logical for both sides. We shouldnt arrest him because we cant know for sure that he even did murder anyone and even if you absolutely knew yourself and didnt have proof, framing him will keep the person who committed the real murder from being searched for. There are so many circumstances and complexities to every situation, as can be seen. This makes the utilitarian model for morality not so universal and perfect, as happiness is not universal; most things arent.