Descartes Meditations On First Philosophy

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Humans can grasp certain ideas to a certain extent but how do we grasp ideas beyond our finite selves. In Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes claims that we have the idea of an infinite substance and are able to grasp infinite ideas but we should not be able to do this because we are finite beings. Descartes goes on to say that the idea of an infinite substance could not have come anywhere else but from some infinite being namely God so he has to exist because we are finite. Descartes argues that the more he thinks about the characteristics of God which are that he is all-knowing, all-powerful, and eternal the more he thinks that those characteristics could not have originated from him. Descartes talks about god’s characteristics: “the more diligently I attend to …show more content…

Even though we cannot imagine this perfect being, he has to exist because the idea of the perfect being has to count as something and it has to represent something real. I am a human and I know that I cannot imagine God based on the fact that it would be impossible for me to imagine him because he is infinitely perfect and I am finite. Descartes says: “I should judge that all things which I clearly perceive and in which I know there is some perfection, and possibly likewise an infinitude of properties of which I am ignorant, are in God formally and eminently” (Descartes 126). In other words, God knows that we might find something perfect in a certain thing that we clearly can perceive and we know has to to be in, infinitely perfect God, will never cover his infinitude. When we find something perfect that has to be in God, it will almost always strengthen our definition of him because he has that certain perfect thing in him plus an infinite amount more that will make his definition the most clear, true, and distinct in our

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