Descartes Proof of God

Descartes Third Meditation: God Descartes begins his third meditation by saying that he is certain that he is a thinking being. This is the result after raising a doubt on every possible thing, i.e. cogito ergo sum. This fact is clear, vivid and distinctclarus et distinctus and so Descartes concludes that, whatever I perceive very vividly and clearly is true. The reason why Descartes needs to prove the existence of God can be explained in the following way. Descartes defines the concept of God as being an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, infinite and unchallengeable creator of everything except for himself. If there was a God, he would have supreme power, and could act like a deceiver by making even apparently clear and distinct facts like arithmetic knowledge to appear false. Thus there is a need to explain the existence or non-existence of God, and if He exists, whether or not he is a deceiver. Descartes then embarks on describing realities and ideas and how cause and effect relate to them. He says that the total cause of anything in this world must necessarily contain as much reality as the effect it produces. It can possess more reality, or as much reality as the cause, but under no circumstance can it possess lesser reality than the effect it produces. This seems obvious because it is inconceivable for a cause to have less reality, or less potential than the effect it produces. If this were so, then the effect produced could not have been real or more aptly, realized. This observation of Descartes leads him to two conclusions. One inference is that something cannot arise from nothing. The second inference is that a less perfect thing, i.e. a cause containing lesser reality, cannot give rise to something which is more perfect than itself, i.e. containing more reality. This, Descartes maintains, is true for both intrinsic reality, which means

Descartes Proof of God

the reality of an actual existence of a thing, and also for representative reality, which means the reality of the idea of an existent thing. In this context he says, any idea that has representative reality must surely come from a cause that contains at least as much intrinsic reality as there is representative reality in the idea... [Further,] Although one idea may perhaps originate from another, there cant be an infinite regress of such ideas; eventually one must come back to an idea whose cause is not an idea, and this cause must be a kind of archetype containing intrinsically all the reality or perfection that the idea contains only representatively. This implies that for all ideas existing, except the idea of God, man himself possesses as much reality as is required to cause an idea for them. The idea of God, Descartes finds is an idea which contains representative reality to such an extent that is impossible for man to possess. The cause for the idea of God needs to be at least as perfect as He is. Man cannot be this cause since he clearly and vividly knows that he does not possess the qualities of God. Thus the only one capable of being the cause of the idea of God is God himself. This implies essentially that God exists, simply because the idea of God exists. Further corroborating this, Descartes says: If I had derived my existence from myself, I would not now doubt or want or lack anything at all; for I would have given myself all the perfections of which I have any idea. But this is in fact not so. Existence of God is the only solution to this paradox since a thinking thing (the effect) which contains the idea of God, can only be created by something (the cause) which is superior to the idea itself. Thus the idea of God has been imprinted on man by God himself. This completes Descartes proof of the existence of God. 2

Descartes Proof of God

I refute Descartes proof of the existence of God because essentially, he converts an idea into an actuality. Concepts or ideas are not actual things. However clear and distinct the idea of an object might be, an idea always remains an idea. Existence of a reality represented by the idea never follows solely from the idea itself. Secondly, Descartes attributes existence as a mere quality to God. But a non-existent God is also attributed all those qualities which are attributed to an existent one. Thus proving the existence of God is not sufficient. Perhaps the personality of God needs to be proved and the fact that he is loving and compassionate needs to be shown in order to differentiate Him from a non-existent, and hence indifferent God.