The Cartesian Circle is an objection to Descartes’ proof of God’s existence as it begs the question. In his proof, Descartes starts off with his two premises, his idea of God and the principle, which states that the cause of an idea must have at least as much formal reality as the idea has objective reality, which leads to a conclusion that God exists. Descartes’ conclusion then adds on to say that God is not a deceiver that will then follow to develop the General Rule, which states that if we have a clear and distinct perception of something, we would be certain of it. According to critics, Descartes is able to use the principle as his premise because Descartes relies on the General Rule in order to be certain of it.
Using the two premises,
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However, the critics are wrong to assume that the principle depends on the General Rule because Descartes explicitly states that the principle depends on the Light of Nature and not the General Rule (pg. 73). Critics also get this idea when Descartes mentions that every effect has a cause which then follows to say that everything must come from something, and then forming the principle (pg. 73). However, Descartes himself is wrong about his claims. When Descartes mentions that everything must come from something follows the fact that every effect has a cause (pg. 73), Descartes is assuming that everything is an effect. Without any justification that everything is an effect, we cannot say that everything comes from something follows from the fact that every effect has a cause. Furthermore, the principle cannot come from Descartes’ claim that everything comes from something because that claim would not be able to pass the dream doubt. In Meditation 6, Descartes mentions that if someone were to appear from thin air and disappear into thin air again, it would be a situation that would exist in a dream (pg. 103). This means that Descartes’ claim that the principle follows from the fact that everything