Rene Descartes was a French philosopher during the 17th century. Descartes wanted to prove without a doubt that he and everything around him existed and that he was not being deceived by some "evil demon"(des. Med. 3). Descartes believed that proving that there was a good god meant that he could trust his senses and know that he was alive. And not dreaming his whole life away. One argument that Descartes uses to prove the existence of god and that god is good is the Ontological argument. This argument is built off of previous arguments he made but starts off with him having an idea of god. Descartes believed that there are two types of reality formal and objective. The objective reality of an object is the idea of that object or the image …show more content…
If he is unable to prove so then there is a chance that he is being deceived and his whole argument falls apart. In meditation four, Descartes wants us to believe that "fraud and deception always contain imperfections, and, while the ability to deceive may be a sign of cunning and power, the desire to deceive reveals malice or weakness and, therefore, can't be among god's desires." This is a weak argument to being used to prove that god is good. One objection that will certainly be raised is the premise that deception is a flaw. There is a case to be made that people-- and by extension god-- can be deceptive without having any malicious intent. For example, physicians who lie to patients or their families in order to save their life. Some doctors choose to withhold negative information from their patients until they recover especially in trauma cases. They are not doing this because they want to harm their patients, but to protect their patients as they recover. Descartes should be concerned with this argument because if he can not prove that god is not a deceiver then he does not have any proof that what he is experiencing and calling life is not all a dream making meditation two and three almost …show more content…
For the sake of argument, we will assume that Descartes was right about god being real. Having a good sense of humor is a perfection so god must own one. To him, we could be a joke. Human "life goes on and on and on, joke after joke after joke, life after life after life. None of them matter, they are all just jokes." He is watching people living and struggling hoping for some afterlife that does not exist for his amusement. " People go through terrible horrible things and are forced to continue in this world anyway. So murder, beatings, rape, genocide, war, poverty, persecution, cannibalism, mass suicide, child abuse, deformity, addiction, insanity, and being a member of society are all just bits to spice up" the fun for him. Descartes' god would be more than capable to create us for his entertainment. Descartes would say that the idea of god doing anything evil is preposterous. In which case I would argue that god then does not have all of the perfections meaning he is not perfect, and since he is no longer considered perfect, he also does not have the perfection of existence meaning he is not real either. Descartes would also argue that god would never put people in danger for the sake of a game. He would be mistaken. "And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job... a perfect and an upright man… Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, Doth Job fear God for
Descartes second argument for proving God’s existence is very straightforward. He has four possibilities that created his existence. Through process of elimination he is left with God being his creator.
Descartes argument for his existence came from the doubt he had about everything around him. This doubt was generated by the idea of an evil genius. Descartes invented the evil genius to be an all-powerful and all-deceitful being. By creating the possibility of an evil genius, Descartes found the doubt he needed in order to be able to doubt everything he once believed. The evil genius was able to deceive ...
The problem of the evil deceiver leads Descartes into determining where God exists, who Descartes believes will discredit the notion of an evil deceiver. Descartes does not only have to prove the existence of God, but must attribute one essential quality to God: omnibenevolence. For God to trump this evil deceiver, God must possess the highest quality of goodness. Thus, the existence of God as an omnibenevolent entity voids the existence of an evil deceiver, for an all-good God would not deceive humans. In turn, by proving the existence of God, Descartes disproves the existence of the evil deceiver and solidifies Descartes understandings of truth. After discussing the necessity of assuring God’s existence, Descartes follows his piece with the actual argument proving the existence of God. Desecrates provides several lines of reasoning for proving God, but one of the most compelling ones revolves around the idea of formal realities versus their existence as ideas and the associated hierarchy of the finite and and the
In earlier meditations Descartes proved that he existed through the Cogito argument. Descartes must now move on to examine and explore questions about the world around him, but instead of doing this he first stop to examine the question of whether or not God exists. Descartes wants to know that he was created by an all knowing, perfect creator that is good and wants to make sure that he was not created by an evil spirit or demon. If Descartes can prove that he was created by a perfect all knowing creator then his ideas must carry some semblance of truth, because God is not a deceiver and he must of placed these ideas in Descartes. Descartes has good reasons for searching for the answer to the question of God’s existence, now he has to come up with a good sound argument to prove it.
My thoughts on God are clear and distinct that he is existent. Descartes’ now has ‘rebuilt’ the world, solely because of his power and reasoning. Descartes’ is only able to use his power and reasoning because he knows God is a guarantor of his ideas and thoughts. As Descartes thinks about his own imperfections, it leads him to think about perfection, and how it has to come from something superior to him.... ...
In this paper, I will explain how Descartes uses the existence of himself to prove the existence of God. The “idea of God is in my mind” is based on “I think, therefore I am”, so there is a question arises: “do I derive my existence? Why, from myself, or from my parents, or from whatever other things there are that are less perfect than God. For nothing more perfect than God, or even as perfect as God, can be thought or imagined.” (Descartes 32, 48) Descartes investigates his reasons to show that he, his parents and other causes cannot cause the existence of himself.
Throughout the meditations Descartes refers to clear and distinct ideas. Descartes first introduces doubt to the reader by saying that one cannot trust these clear and distinct ideas. “I have noticed that the senses are sometimes deceptive; as it is a mark of prudence never to place our complete trust in those that have deceived us even once.” (Descartes, 60) He introduces doubt through the senses, dreams, and through the possibility of an evil genius at work. For instance he states that “There is no sure sign that I can tell that I am awake. If there are no sure signs that I can tell that I am awake then there is reason to doubt I am awake. Therefore there is reason to doubt I am awake.” (Descartes 60)This is how Descartes shows that we may be dreaming even though during these dreams we can experience authentic truths. He also he goes on to state that, “If there is reason to doubt that I am awake then there is reason to doubt that I am sitting by the fire. So then there is reason to doubt that I am sitting by a fire even though I see and feel a fire.” (Descartes 60)This Descartes believes could be true because there may be an evil genius at work, whose sole purpose is to put his entire effort...
Rene Descartes meditations on the existence of God are very profound, thought-provoking, and engaging. From the meditations focused specifically on the existence of God, Descartes uses the argument that based on his clear and distinct perception that cannot be treated with doubt, God does exist. In the beginning of the third meditation, Descartes proclaims that he is certain he is a thinking thing based on his clear and distinct perception, and he couldn’t be certain unless all clear and distinct perceptions are true. Before diving into the existence of God, Descartes introduces smaller arguments to prove the existence of God. For example, Descartes introduces in his argument that there are ideas in which he possess that exists outside of him. Utilizing the objective versus formal reality, Descartes states “If the objective reality of any of my ideas turns out to be so great that I am sure the same reality does not reside in me, either formally or eminently, and hence that I myself cannot be its cause, it will necessarily follow that I am not alone in the world, but that some other thing which is the cause of this idea exists” (29). In other words, the ideas of objective reality that resides in Descartes can potentially only come from a supreme being, which is God; God possess more objective reality than he does formal reality. We as humans, as Descartes states, are finite substance, and God is the only infinite substance. The only way for us as a finite substance to think of an infinite substance is possible if, and only if, there is an infinite substance that grants us the idea of substance in first place. After these smaller arguments, Descartes states that while we can doubt the existence of many things, due to the fact that ...
In the third meditation Descartes uses his existence as an example to find out whether God exist. Descartes explanation is whatever he perceived clear and distinct is true. The idea of the existence of God could have been caused by something out side of himself. Something had to put the idea of God in his mind for him to think about the existence of God. Descartes says, “I must examine whether there is a God, and, if there is, whether he can be a deceiver. Descartes has to prove that God exists and that he is no deceiver.
He argues that if he does not solve God’s existence, he will not be certain about anything else. Thus, Descartes says that he has an idea of God and, therefore, God exists. However, in order to be certain of His existence, Descartes provides proofs that will illustrate his reasoning. The four proofs include formal reality vs. objective reality, something can’t arise from nothing, Descartes cannot be the cause of himself, and therefore, the bigger cause is God. Now that Descartes knows God is real, he must solve another aspect, which is if God can be a deceiver.
Up until the Third Meditation, Descartes arguments made sense with minor flaws, but not every argument is perfect. Trying to prove God’s existence… I believe that people should not being trying to prove whether or not God is real. As Pascal said, “If there is a God, he is infinitely beyond our comprehension, since, being indivisible and without limits, he bears no relation to us… That being so, who would dare to attempt an answer to the question? Certainly not we, who bear no relation to him” (Pascal
In his third meditation, Descartes expresses doubts about whether he can be absolutely certain of things that seem “clear and distinct.” He finds it necessary to doubt whether even such obvious propositions as “Three plus two equals five” are true because there might be, he says, a supremely powerful deceiver who is causing him to “be deceived even about matters [such as “Three plus two equals five”] that [seem] most evident.” He goes on to make an argument for the existence of a perfect God, reasoning that if such a God exists, he cannot be a deceiver and will therefore make sure that Descartes is not deceived about things that seem to be true.
Descartes proof of the existence of God is derived from his establishment that something cannot come from nothing. Because God is a perfect being, the idea of God can be found from exploring the different notions of ideas. Descartes uses negation to come to the conclusion that ideas do not come from the world or imagination; because the world contains material objects, perfection does not exist.
Firstly, Descartes talks about “proofs” of the existence of God, explained in his third and fifth meditation. Meaning, his proofs are shown by experiment to prove that God exists. He reinterprets Archimedes ' saying, “required only one fixed and immovable point to move the whole earth from its place, I can hope for great things if I can even find one small thing that is certain and unshakeable (Descartes 159).” That he could shift the entire earth
Rene Descartes, a 17th century French philosopher believed that the origin of knowledge comes from within the mind, a single indisputable fact to build on that can be gained through individual reflection. His Discourse on Method (1637) and Meditations (1641) contain his important philosophical theories. Intending to extend mathematical method to all areas of human knowledge, Descartes discarded the authoritarian systems of the scholastic philosophers and began with universal doubt. Only one thing cannot be doubted: doubt itself. Therefore, the doubter must exist. This is the kernel of his famous assertion Cogito, ergo sum (I am thinking, therefore I am existing). From this certainty Descartes expanded knowledge, step by step, to admit the existence of God (as the first cause) and the reality of the physical world, which he held to be mechanistic and entirely divorced from the mind; the only connection between the two is the intervention of God.