The 17th century philosopher Rene Descartes believed that God exists. His proof of an all perfect being’s existence was explained by having an idea of God that had to have been caused by God. But simply having an idea of God is not enough for there to necessarily exist such a being. This paper will critically examine Descartes’s causal argument though its premises and conclusion.
Descartes makes an attempt to prove God’s existence throughout his third meditation. In his first premise he states that he has an idea of an infinitely perfect being. He uses the Principle of Sufficient reason to advance his argument; it states that everything must have a reason or cause. This put forth his second premise; that the idea of god must have a cause.
Another claim that goes alongside the previous principle is that the cause of an idea must contain at least as much reality as the idea. Descartes calls this the Principle of Adequate reality. This makes up his third premise in his argument. The additional principle implies that if X has less reality than Y, then Y could not have been caused by X. Descartes considers this principle to be self-evident. The principle of adequate reality is applied to objective reality which will be described in detail later in the composition.
Descartes believed that there were varying degrees or levels of reality, to put simply, certain things have more reality or are more real than others. He explains that properties or modes have less reality than substance; this is because the existence of a property relies on the existence of the substance. Descartes defines a substance as any particular thing, also called a material substance. Modes are described as the characteristics of substances. Another type of ...
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...hat having two distinct forms of reality were necessary to show that lacking a degree of formal reality would result in finite beings not being able to have the idea of God independently of the being and therefore deems them both necessary for proving Gods existence.
In conclusion, Descartes first Argument for the existence of God relied too heavily on principles that were easily manipulated into disproving that God necessarily exist. And although it was masterfully written all it took were one faulty principle and a lack of uniformity of the property of reality to prove an argument invalid.
Works Cited
Thompson, Garrett, ed. Bacon to Kant. second. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, Inc., 2002. 30-31. Print.
Beardsley, Monroe, ed. The early European Philosophers From Descartes to Nietzsche. second. New Yorkcity, New York: random house, inc, 1960. 56. Print.
... God alone remains; and, given the truth of the principle that whatever exists has a cause, it follows, Descartes declares, that God exists we must of necessity conclude from the fact alone that I exist, or that the idea of a supremely perfect – that is of God – is in me, that the proof of God’s existence is grounded in the highest evidence” Descartes concludes that God must be the cause of him, and that God innately implanted the idea of infinite perfection in him.
Through Descartes’s Meditations, he sought to reconstruct his life and the beliefs he had. He wanted to end up with beliefs that were completely justified and conclusively proven. In order to obtain his goal, Descartes had to doubt all of his foundational beliefs so that he could start over. This left Descartes doubting the reality of the world around him and even his own existence. In order to build up to new conclusively proven and justified true beliefs, Descartes needed a fixed and undeniable starting point. This starting point was his cogito, “I think, therefore I am.” In this paper I will argue that Descartes’s argument that he is definite of his own existence, is unsound.
In the “Mediations of First Philosophy” Descartes tries to prove the existence of God in the third meditation. He does this by coming up with several premises that eventually add up to a solid argument. First, I will explain why Descartes ask the question, does god exist? And why does Descartes think he needs such and argument at this point in the text. Secondly, I will explain, in detail, the arguments that Descartes makes and how he comes to the conclusion that God does exist. Next, I will debate some of Descartes premises that make his argument an unsound one, including circular reasoning. Finally, I will see if his unsound argument has diminished and undermined his principal goals and the incorrigible foundation of knowledge.
According to Descartes, “because our senses sometimes deceive us, I wanted to suppose that nothing was exactly as they led us to imagine (Descartes 18).” In order to extinguish his uncertainty and find incontrovertible truth, he chooses to “raze everything to the ground and begin again from the original foundations (Descartes 59).” This foundation, which Descartes is certain to be the absolute truth, is “I think, therefore I am (Descartes 18).” Descartes argues that truth and proof of reality lies in the human mind, rather than the senses. In other words, he claims that the existence of material objects are not based on the senses because of human imperfection. In fact, he argues that humans, similarly to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, are incapable of sensing the true essence or existence of material objects. However, what makes an object real is human thought and the idea of that object, thus paving the way for Descartes’ proof of God’s existence. Because the senses are easily deceived and because Descartes understands that the senses can be deceived, Descartes is aware of his own imperfection. He
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.
The next stage in the system, as outlined in the Meditations, seeks to establish that God exists. In his writings, Descartes made use of three principal arguments. The first (at least in the order of presentation in the Meditations) is a causal argument. While its fullest statement is in Meditation III, it is also found in the Discourse (Part IV) and in the Principles (Part I §§ 17–18). The argument begins by examining the thoughts contained in the mind, distinguishing between the formal reality of an idea and its objective reality. The formal reality of any thing is just its actual existence and the degree of its perfection; the formal reality of an idea is thus its actual existence and degree of perfection as a mode of mind. The objective reality of an idea is the degree of perfection it has, considered now with respect to its content. (This conception extends naturally to the formal and objective reality of a painting, a description or any other representation.) In this connection, Descartes recognized three fundamental degrees of perfection connected with the capacity a thing has for independent existence, a hierarchy implicit in the argument of Meditation III and made explicit in the Third Replies (in response to Hobbes). The highest degree is that of an infinite substance (God), which depends on nothing; the next degree is that of a finite substance (an individual body or mind), which depends on God alone; the lowest is that of a mode (a property of a substance), which depends on the substance for its existence.
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 ...
Descartes often referred to as the “Father of Modern Philosophy” acquired his status by methods of reasoning to attain knowledge through one of his most influential philosophical writings Meditations on First Philosophy. One of the most pronounced and skeptical pieces from the mediations is Meditation III: “Of God: that He exist” where he tries to prove the existence of God, and his existence through God. I will be examining Descartes’ proof through its premises and conclusion as well as explain my reasoning for agreeing with the argument on the existence of God.
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. Descartes believes “it is clear enough from this that he cannot be a deceiver, since it is manifest by the natural light that all fraud and deception depend on some defect” (89). In other words, God possesses all of the perfections that Descartes cannot have but those perfections that are in his thoughts, concluding that God has no defects whatsoever according to the natural
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.
...rmal and objective reality. I don’t agree with the fact that in order for me to have an idea, it would exist. For example, I can think of God and I can also think of a person being so imperfect. Since Descartes holds that existence is perfection, how can this idea of an absolutely imperfect being exist? Stated in Descartes’ rule, objective reality is derived from formal reality but in this case there is no formal reality. Therefore I do not see how the existence of God is possible.
Descartes thinks that we have a very clear and distinct idea of God. He thinks God must exist and Descartes himself must exist. It is a very different way of thinking shown from the six meditations. Descartes uses ideas, experiments, and “proofs” to try and prove God’s existence.
...In addition, Descartes is not capable to figure out spontaneous impulse from light of nature either. Plus, the examples of the idea of heat and the idea of sun do not tend to support Descartes’ reasoning, as the alternative interpretations are offered in this paper. The consequence of this weakness is to undermine Descartes’ overall argument that there is something else in the world. Ultimately, this weakness results in the loss of the necessity of proving the existence of God. At last, this paper does not prove Descartes’ argument to be false, since I have only indicated some explanations and consequences of the weakness in his argument.
Descartes’ attempts to extricate himself from his sceptical doubts of the meditations had a varying degree of success, his doubt of his own existence was well surmounted with the indubitable ‘cogito’ argument. The second of his doubts, that of the existence of God was not extricated as successfully with the unconvincing trademark argument and the out of date ontological argument. Descartes then went on to tackling his doubt regarding the existence of the external world, which was done well but was based on the shady proofs for the existence of God. Descartes may not have proven the existence of God or the existence of the external world however he did produce a new style of philosophy in which he attempted to base all of his epistemological knowledge (or beliefs) on a single indubitable premise, this style of philosophy now known as foundationalism has been and is still used by philosophers today at great credit to Descartes, Rene Descartes proved himself within this book to be the father of modern philosophy.
In the Third Meditation, Descartes forms a proof for the existence of God. He begins by laying down a foundation for what he claims to know and then offers an explanation for why he previously accepted various ideas but is no longer certain of them. Before he arrives at the concept of God, Descartes categorizes ideas and the possible sources that they originate from. He then distinguishes between the varying degrees of reality that an idea can possess, as well as the cause of an idea. Descartes proceeds to investigate the idea of an infinite being, or God, and how he came to acquire such an idea with more objective reality than he himself has. By ruling out the possibility of this idea being invented or adventitious, Descartes concludes that the idea must be innate. Therefore, God necessarily exists and is responsible for his perception of a thing beyond a finite being.