Descartes talks about God as if God is infinite because he radiates out in every direction. Descartes imagines that he himself is perfect and has the perfect qualities of God. This leads him to the discussion of disobeying God and turning into what one wants rather than what God wants. By doing what oneself wills, not what God wills, one is basically implying the he or she sees him or herself as God-like. Descartes believes he is partially God because he is on his way to infinite knowledge, but since he is gaining little by little, he is in a state of potentiality.
Descartes then attempts to define what he is. He previously believed that he had a spirit and body, by methods for which he was fed, moved, could sense, absorb space, had a distinct area and think. Each one of those methods are thrown into uncertainty except thinking. Since he can think, he should exist. He thinks about whether he no longer exists once his reasoning comes to a halt.
However, Descartes is indeed certain of the fact that he is a thinking being, and that he exists. As a result of this argument, Descartes makes a conclusion that the things he perceives clearly and distinctly cannot be false, and are therefore true (Blanchette). This clear and distinct perception is an important component to the argument that Descartes makes in his fifth meditation for the existence of God. This paper explains Descartes ' proof of God 's existence from Descartes ' fifth meditation, Pierre Gassendi 's objection to this proof, and then offers the paper 's author 's opinion on both the proof and objection.
Descartes describes God as infinitely perfect within “Meditations of First Philosophy.” By this, Descartes means that God
Descartes gave a few arguments that God exists and is real. Desocrates believed our idea of God is that God is a perfect being, he believed he is more perfect to exist than not to exist. Desocrates also believed that God is a infinite being. Descartes idea would be that God gave us this idea to type this paragraph about him so he must be real. When he thinks negative of an idea or thought he wonders if an evil demon plotted those thoughts.
Firstly, the possibility of the idea originating from nothing is ruled out for obvious reasons, as Nolan and Nelson highlight how ‘nothing’ does not posses the ability to cause, as it does not contain any properties and the effect cannot have more reality than the cause (Nolan and Nelson, 2006:108). Furthermore, as humankind are imperfect beings, Nolan and Nelson state that as we are finite beings we cannot conjure the idea of a more perfect and infinite being ourselves (Nolan and Nelson, 1996:110). Therefore, Descartes argues that this leaves only the possibility that an infinite being could cause the idea of an infinite being to exist innately within the mind of the finite cogito, like ‘the mark of a craftsmen stamped on his work’ (Descartes, 1996:35). Moreover, Descartes further believes that it would be impossible to exist with the idea of God, if God did not exist, and that this God could not be one that
The argument for God’s existence is that God is a perfect being, he is infinite, independent, supremely intelligent, and supremely powerful. Descartes goes on to talk about how God exists because he can conceive of him as better than himself (AD 40). God is perfect and perfect at everything, and was the first thing that sent everything into motion (AD 45). God is the ultimate cause.
Descartes, in his Meditations on First Philosophy, used a method of doubt; he doubted everything in order to find something conclusive, which he thought, would be certain knowledge. He found that he could doubt everything, expect that he was thinking, as doubting is a type of thinking. Since thinking requires a thinker, he knew he must exist. According to Descartes if you are able to doubt your existence, then it must mean that you exist, hence his famous statement cogito ergo sum which is translated into ‘I think, therefore I am.’ Descartes said he was able to doubt the existence of his body and all physical things, but he could not doubt that his mind exists.
In Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy, the wax passage is a very simple piece of writing and train of thought to follow. The idea of the passage is that Descartes believes, and is trying to convince the reader that the “clear and distinct” thoughts that one might have of outside things to one’s body are not seen through the senses, but are through the intellect. As we examine a piece of wax, one has certain ideas, ideas which are initially believed to have come from the senses. However, all can be established from the senses can be proven to be false. “Let us take, for instance, this piece of wax….Its
his existence), so there has to be some kind of cause behind his idea of this perfect, powerful, infinite being which he associates with God. While Descartes realizes that he (himself) is not a perfect, powerful, infinite being, he also realizes that a being lesser than him on some hierarchical scale could not have put this idea in his mind. With this in mind, he reasons that without this incredibly perfect and infinite being, he could not have possibly came up with this idea. This idea would simply not exist. Therefore, God, or some perfect being like God must
Question 1 After reading the synopsis of the Matrix, Plato’s “The Republic” and “Meditation I from Meditations on First Philosophy by Rene Descartes” I can see various connections, but I can also see different points of view. When comparing and contrasting, I think that in the movie they are actually showing what they believed as reality is really like a dream. In the movie the human world is just an illusion and that all human thought is controlled by a computer. So going to work, going to school, having a family and everything we do on a daily basis wasn’t happening for real, it was all just an illusion. In the synopsis of the Matrix it talks about how would we know what is a dream and what is reality?
According to Descartes, God must exist because humans could never have been able to ever fathom the idea of a perfect and all powerful God, and that the idea of God has been inscribed in our innate beings. Descartes describes how their are three different kinds of ideas, some that are “innate, some to be adventitious, and others to have been invented.” Innate ideas are born with us, while invented ideas are ones that we create with our imagination. Adventitious ideas are ones that are minds process when they have been imposed on us by an outer force. Most of what we have learned as we develop as human beings is from ideas and perceptions that we observe in the world and surroundings we encapsulate ourselves within.
Rene Descartes’ philosophies on dualism is one that still to this day philosophers ponder about, and have not fully answered all of the questions that have stemmed from the famous theory. The major thought behind his philosophy was that after God there are two natures known as extension and thought. According to the text “On one hand is material substance, whose sential attribute is extension (occupancy of space), and on the other hand is mind whose essential attribute is thought.” (Moore, Bruder, 99) Essentially what Descartes was saying was that while the mind and the body are both two separate entities, they work as one from time to time.
It embodies the insight that there is a serious muddle at the centre of the whole of Descartes theory of knowledge. He says that we do not hold a clear idea of the mind to make out much. ‘He thinks that although we have knowledge through the idea of body, we know the mind “only through consciousness, and because of this, our knowledge of it is imperfect” (3–2.7, OCM 1:451; LO 237). Knowledge through ideas is superior because it involves direct access to the “blueprints” for creation in the divine understanding, whereas in consciousness we are employing our own weak cognitive resources that
This makes him doubt everything that he was taught. He claims that what he believes is from his own senses, which sometimes may be deceived. He compares this with a basket of apples. In that basket there are rotten apples, therefore we shall be forced to remove all the apples from the basket so that we can return those apples we are sure of to avoid all apples rotting. The same way human beings tend to discard all beliefs according to Descartes and examine each and the importance it has to our lives.
