Rene Descartes Analysis

proof of his existence that cannot be doubted. Descartes has in himself the idea of God

Descartes’s mission in the meditations was to doubt everything and that what remained from his doubting could be considered the truth. This lead Descartes to argue for the existence of God. For the purpose of this paper, I will first discuss Descartes’s argument for the existence of God. I will then take issue with Descartes’s argument first with his view on formal reality and varying levels of reality, then with his argument that only God can cause the idea of God. I will then conclude with

In Rene Descartes Meditations on First Philosophy, Descartes is seeking to find a system of stable, lasting and certain knowledge, which he can ultimately regard as the Truth. In his methodical quest to carry out his task, Descartes eventually arrives at the proverbial fork in the road: how to bridge the knowledge of self with that of the rest of the world. Descartes’ answer to this is to prove the existence of God. The purpose of this essay will be to state and explain Descartes' Third Meditation: Proof of God's Existence by identifying relevant concepts and terminology and their relationship to each other and examining each premise as well as the conclusion of the proof and finally

Prior to his method on error, Descartes has already proven a pair of foundational beliefs. In meditation one, Descartes proved that he was “a thinking thing” and that in order to be a thinking thing, “I exist”. In mediation three, he proved that God exists due to the fact that in order to have an idea of God, one must already have the idea innately implanted in their mind. Since Descartes is finite he believes that God innately implanted the thought of an infinite perfect being in his mind, so therefore God exists.

After giving his first proof for the existence of God Descartes concludes by mentioning that this proof is not always self-evident. When he is absorbed in the world of sensory illusions it is not quite obvious to him that God’s existence can be derived from the idea of God. So to further cement God’s existence Descartes begins his second proof by posing the question of whether he could exist (a thinking thing that possesses the idea of an infinite and perfect god) if God itself did not exist.

Descartes’ method offers definitive conclusions on certain topics, (his existence, the existence of God)but his reasoning is not without error. He uses three arguments to prove existence (His and God’s) that attempt to solidify his conclusions. For his method to function seamlessly, Descartes needs to be consistent in his use of the method, that is, he must continue to doubt and challenge thoughts that originate in his own mind. He is unable to achieve this ideal state of mind, however, and his proofs are shown to be faulty.

The existence of God has been a question since the idea of God was conceived. Descartes tries to prove Gods existence, to disprove his Evil demon theory, and to show that there is without a doubt something external to ones own existence. He is looking for a definite certainty, a foundation for which he can base all of his beliefs and know for a fact that they are true.

The existence of God has always been an arguable topic. Descartes’ however, believed that he had proof of God’s existence through an intense analysis of the mind. Throughout this paper I will discuss what he has provided as proof and some of the complications that arise throughout his argument.

This paper aims to argue why Descartes would not think that an atheist can have the same certainty about existence of material object as he, himself has. First, it will outline the definition of Descartes’ existence theory of material object. It will then outline the atheist’s theory about existence of material object. Second, it will outline why an atheist cannot have the same inevitability about existence of material objects as Descartes believe. Finally, it will conclude that Descartes believed that our knowledge does not come from the senses, instead it comes from God. Conversely, atheists reject God’s existence as they believe all that exists are material objects identified by sense.

Descartes’ First Proof of the Existence of God tend to be variety of cosmological argument made in meditation 3, where he is saying that if God did not exist than where did the idea of God come from in our minds(Descartes, p.78).This idea of God has a greater type of reality than those of other idea. This is kind of complex argument .For better understanding of this argument, he classified reality into two classes. The “formal reality” which is the degree of reality that something has and the “objective reality” that applies to ideas (Descartes, p.73&74). The ideas have lowest degree of formal reality because ideas rely upon a thinker for existence, so that should thinker not exist the idea would not have either. God, consider by Descartes

The Meditations on First Philosophy gives us with an assumed evidence for the existence of God those progresses from the existence of an idea of an unlimited existence in the human mind—an idea of God—to the being of God himself. Insofar as we have an idea of an unlimited existence, an idea with “infinite independent reality”, we can reasonably ask when it arrived to us. The only thinkable reason of this impression, prerogatives Descartes, is an countless existence, explicitly, God. The manifestation of correct this knowledge in the proof is crucial. In element, Descartes continues that any such fundamental proof for God’s existence fatefully trusts on this idea.it performs to myself that all these proofs originated on his exceptional belongings are reducible to a single one; and also that they are incomplete if we do not add to them the impression which we must of God

The Meditations on First Philosophy by Rene Descartes is a thorough analysis about doubt. Descartes describes his method of doubt to determine whether he can truly know something. One of his major arguments is the proof of the existence of God. In this paper, I will attempt to unravel the flaws in Descartes proof that God exists.

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 believes that God's existence is clear and distinct. God exists because the thought of God is derived from a "completely clear and distinct" idea from within his being (which he concedes is a thinking being). Having come from distinct thoughts, the idea of God can therefore never be considered a falsity. From this very distinct idea of God comes everything else that one grasps distinctly and clearly.

In A Discourse on the Method, Descartes attempted to prove the existence of God in a priori manner. He did not trust his own senses when trying to prove the existence of God and therefore he relied on the ontological argument. By making the same assumption made by Anselm, which was that an ontological argument assumes that existence is a predicate of God, Descartes is able to conclude that ‘God exists’ is true by definition because the subject ‘God’, who already contains all perfections, already contains the predicate – exists, which is a perfection. Although this may be perceived as a strong claim to believers, many such as Gaunilo would have disagreed. Descartes postulates his argument in the fourth part of his Discourse in order to try and prove the existence of God. One must discuss why one feels Descartes attempted to do so and exactly how convincing his claim is. However, before one can understand his claim, it is important to grasp an idea of the background that Descartes was writing from when he wrote the Discourse and the meaning of proof.