Sorry for my late thoughts on the discussion questions, but I have been finding myself thinking in circles.

I think the problem with skepticism is that it's never ending. Like with Descartes analysis, how do we ever actually know that something is real? You can doubt things forever, and even once you find something that you believe to be certain, someone else can find a justification for it to be wrong. I think one's truth or knowledge about life is very individual to one's surroundings, which in turn plays into one's common sense. I think for most people, their common sense is just easier to trust than to consider an alternative to the world and being that they have known and believed to be the truth. "Truth is definitely relative to the individual." As far as "no sane person seriously questioning these things," I think that no sane person doesn't question life at some point or another. It's just to much effort to analyze it to the extent that Descartes did, thus common sense and one's comfort level plays back into one's view of their own personal truth.

As far as one's body and soul, Descartes finally decided that he knew that he existed by the very act of doubting the fact that he existed. "I think, therefore, I am." And I would say that I agree. If you don't know that your feeling, thinking soul, exists then you can't know that your body exist. Therefore a soul must come first and is thus more certain than a body.

As for the problem of skepticism, Descartes thinks that without skepticism we will never get to the real bases for our beliefs. If we don't step back and take a good look at the things we hold as truths then we can't find the real basis for knowledge. However, I think I would question the idea that it could be done--Can one really step back from everything he holds to be a truth in his environment?