René Descartes substituted astonishment, as one of the genesis of philosophy, with doubt. To doubt implies that there must be a thinking being. Cartesian doubt is a method influenced by the objective of attaining certainty about the essence of skiing, i.e., what skiing really is.
When skiing we are faced with situations in which we are unsure of what is the correct action, or the most appropriate for that situation, then we doubt. This doubt persists until we have decided, but does it disappear once we have decided?
Ludwig Wittgenstein pointed out that if we doubt on everything, we will go no further than doubting everything. We cannot doubt our ability to verify everything that makes up our skiing, and this verification is given by our senses. Now, if our intention is to seek for a safe skiing experience, can we rely solely on our senses? Clearly not, as the senses once deceived us when, for example, the consistency of the snow was not as we visually anticipated it, so we cannot fully trust them. For this reason, we apply the Cartesian method: we doubt. What we cannot doubt is that we are skiing in the here and now moment, because it is unquestionable. Our doubts have a limit, and it is our immediate present.
Within the philosophical doubt we find the systematic or Pyrrhonian doubt (by Pyrrhon of Elis), that is, to doubt for the sake of doubt itself in terms of questioning all previous knowledge; and the methodical or Cartesian doubt (by René Descartes) which consists of taking doubt to the extreme, since absolute knowledge and certainty are not possible, as the senses, being subjective, deceive us. By doubting the obvious and being astonished by the surroundings, a distinct dimension emerges, whereby we begin to perceive the known with a “beginner’s eye“.
It is normal to doubt when we find ourselves in confusing and disorganized situations. When we are skiing poorly, we naturally have doubts about our own skiing, but not so when it is developing as we wish, when we are certain about what we are doing.
To ensure certainty, our skiing experience must be stable, but why do we need to adhere to stability when skiing is unstable? Is it because of fear of losing that illusory ‘stability’, of falling, or of hurting ourselves or others?
