A Brief Reconstruction of Meditation Ⅲ.

3034961528

In Third Meditation Descartes provides a cosmological argument for the existence of

God for the first time. In this part he reaches the conclusion that God does indeed exist and ‘I’

am created by God, rather than other infinite and imperfect things.

At the beginning of the argument Descartes explains the meaning of ‘I’ that he used here.

In this section ‘I’ does not include the bodily things or sense such as sight, touch, etc. , while

‘I’ merely refers to a thinking thing, that is, what I am able to do are only modes of thinking

-- like perception and imagination. Besides, we should notice that in this situation what we

can perceive is not real object, but the ideas of object.

Then Descartes proposes an important rule: the truth rule, which is stated that ‘whatever I

perceive very clearly and distinctly is true’. Here comes a question that what is ‘clear’ and

‘distinct’. Descartes explains the two adjectives in Principles, in which he says that he calls

the perception ‘clear’ when it is present and accessible to the attentive mind, while distinct is

more strict than clear, which could be explained that except being clear, a distinct perception

is sharply separated from all other perceptions that it contains within itself only what is clear.

For instance, if I now pay all my attention to the idea of a chair, I may doubt whether the

chair exist, so the the idea of a chair is clear but not distinct; however, if I fully concentrate

on the idea of ‘I exist’, I will never doubt whether I exist after reading M.I and M.II, i.e. the
idea ‘I exist’ is sharply distinguished from other ideas, thus this idea is both clear and distinct.

What’s more, Descartes classifies thoughts into ideas and judgement, here in this argument

considering the former only.

After having these several definitions and explanations above, Descartes asks a question:

where are my ideas from? To make the answer clear he classifies ideas into ‘innate’,

‘adventitious’ and others invented by me. ‘Innate’ here refers to the ideas which is generated

from my own nature such as ‘what truth is’; adventitious ideas are those which come from

things outside from me; while the others are things made up by me, which is mixtures of

some innate ideas, some adventitious ideas or innate ideas and adventitious ideas. Descartes

here suggests that the three ways are where all ideas are generated from.

Then Descartes turns to examine the adventitious ideas, that why I think they resemble

the correspondent things existing outside me. In the first step he clarifies that the adventitious

ideas and things existing outside me are definitely two different things: the former is merely

spontaneous impulse which leads me to believe that the things outside me exist, rather than

the outside things are clearly and definitely perceived by myself. Besides, he finds that the

adventitious ideas do not depend on my will. Hence he reaches the conclusion that it is not

reliable judgement that makes me believe that there exist things distinct from myself.

However, it is natural for our mind to believe that the ideas we have of outside things are

to some extent real. So Descartes then proposes another rule to explain the process of this

thought: I believe that the ideas I have of things existing outside me to some extent is real

because it has ample objective reality. Here Descartes defines ‘objective reality’ and ‘formal
reality’. In the context ‘object’ reality refers to the function of the thing’s representational

content while ‘formal’ reality means the intrinsic reality of things.

Having considered the things existing outside me, Descartes embarks on arguing the

existence of God. He checks the attributes of corporeal things, finding that some of them can

be borrowed from the ideas of myself: extension, shape, position and movement. But here the

only remaining idea God can’t be found contained in me, which is understood as a substance

that is infinite, immutable, independent, supremely intelligent and supremely powerful. When

I concentrate I would find that the idea of God is clear and distinct, so according to the truth

rule God necessarily exists outside me. And he also suggests that I will have the motivation

that God actually exists out of me for I am a finite substance, but in my mind there is a idea

of an infinite substance, so the infinite God must exists independent of me.

To make this assertion that God exists more clear, Descartes considers a possible doubt:

because I can not grasp infinite, I can not perceive God clearly and distinctly. He replies this

doubt in this way: it is true that I can not fully grasp what infinite is, but I can understand the

idea of infinite, that is, perceive the existence of infinite in my mind clearly and distinctly

without fully grasping it, for I have the ability to judge that all attributes which I perceive

clear and distinct imply some perfection, and we can then think of a thing of the most

perfection -- that is God.

Up till now Descartes has almost finished the argument that God indeed exists in

Meditation III . Knowing the existence of God he then turns to scrutinizes my existence:

whether I have always existed or am derived from other things. He claims that a lifespan can
be divided into countless parts, each completely independent of the others, so I do not always

exist and my existence should be guaranteed by something outside me, in other words, my

existence is guaranteed by and derived from something outside me. The independence of

each part of my life seems to be not evident enough, but it will be further explained next.

Here remains this question: from which am ‘I’ derived? First Descartes examines the

possibility that my existence is derived from myself. If I scrutinize myself more carefully, I

will find that I have great potential to perceive ideas which is not grasped by me currently;

and this potential should not be thought limited, that is, there is no evidence that the ideas I

may have are countable. So if I created myself, I must have endowed me all this potential

ideas, which implies that I have all these potential ideas initially because I can not be created

by a less perfect thing. This is to say, I am myself God, the most perfect thing. But I can

easily find that I am not God because I am such a finite thing who still ask questions, thus my

existence should not be derived from myself. Furthermore, if I think that the former ‘I’ is God

and the derived ‘I’ is a finite thing, the statement that ‘my existence is derived from myself’

does not make sense, for in essence the thing implied by ‘I’ should be the same thing. If the

former ‘I’ is God, we should call it God rather than ‘I’ because here what I actually mean is

indeed God.

Here we will come back to check the statement above that each part of my life is

independent of the others. Considering that if I always exist, I shall not be generated by

anything else but by myself a little while ago. This is not true because here it implies that I

am derived by myself, which is proved false in the preceding paragraph.

 About this question, Descartes as well considers this proposition that my existence may

be derived from my parents or other finite things. According to causal axiom, i.e. a thing have

to be generated by a more, at least the same perfect thing, my parents or other finite things

can not be the thing from which I am derived, for they are finite but I in fact have the idea of

infinite. Therefore it only remains the idea of an infinite thing, God, from whom I am

derived.

The proof of God’s existence in Meditation III establishes a strong basis for the

following discussion in Meditation IV concerning the truth and falsity. Because of the

existence of God as a perfect thing, the truth rule is further established. What’s more, the

worry of a deceiver God in Meditation II is eliminated in Meditation III because God is the

most perfect thing, and he will not do what may make him less perfect. Here God is not only

an infinite, perfect and powerful thing, but also the thing which derives and preserves me.