Descartes Meditations

Descartes attempts to discredit skepticism and tries to come to

the conclusion that knowledge is possible.
Whether or not he was successful is still debatable today,
however what can be taken from Descartes that is agreeable by
most modern philosophers is his methodology.
This method is a rationalist perspective of knowledge known
as Foundationalism.

Meditation I
Concerning those things that can be called into doubt
- Descartes opens with his realization of the many false beliefs he has
accumulated in life. He also realizes that to know the truth he has to break
down all these beliefs and start anew.
- He plans to attack not his specific beliefs but general principles. He attacks
his senses and how they can deceive, i.e. mad men, dream states.
- He then attacks the seemingly sound foundation of Math and Science: ..But
how do I know that I am not deceived every time that I add 2 and 3or judge
of things simpler? In short, God could be deceiving me into believing that
the simplest things are indeed there (simplest things being those things that are
most prevalent, cause and effect for instance).
- Descartes also imagines the non-existence of God, however he finds it
unreasonable to doubt this thought at this time: The greater will be the
probability of my being so imperfect as to deceive myself, as to the Author of
whom they assign my origin the less powerful.
- He then supposes a malevolent God exists who wishes to deceive. It is with
this scenario that Descartes has arrived to the point of doubting everything
almost.

Meditation II
Concerning the Nature of the Human Mind; and that it is
more easily known than the Body
-

After having broken down all that he thinks he knows Descartes found the one
thing that even a malevolent creator cannot deceive him inthat he exists.
He exists since he is actively thinking about himself (cogito ergo sum). In
other words, the act of thinking cannot be separated from him.
After having discussed the mind (thinking thing) Descartes attempts to
understand corporeal substances (tangible thing).
Descartes uses his now famous wax example to illustrate. We know it to
be wax only by an intuition of the mind.
Descartes will go on to say that not only wax, but an innumerable other things
can be compared to in much the same way.
Thus what I thought I had seen with my eyes, I actually grasped solely with
the faculty of judgment, which is my mind, (and hence) nothing can be
perceived more easily than my own mind

Meditation III
Concerning God, that He exists
-Descartes, having stripped himself of everything he thought he knew, now stands
on the foundation that the only thing he knows is that he exists and now he must
build from this all other things that can be known.
-To start, Descartes states that Ideas in themselves cannot be false, although he
realizes that there still remains the act of judgement on whether the ideas are true.
For example: I see the sun, the sun elicits an idea in my mind about what it might
be, it becomes my next move to ascertain what exactly the sun is; my judgement
to conform my subjective opinion to its objective reality. However the idea of the
sun, whether it is accurate or not is nevertheless real and itself true.
-It is clear to Descartes that there must be at least as much reality in the efficient
cause as there is in the effect of that same cause (Example of stone and heat).
-Then Descartes extends this to our idea of God: Ideas that I have, have to come
from somewhere that is true. I have an idea of God; although it is incomplete, He
does exist.

According to Descartes, a perfect being must exist and must have implanted in
us an awareness of itself. Why? Because we have in our mind the concept of
infinity in a world where everything is finite.
This is a simplified summary of Descartes ontological proof for the existence
of God, and this is what Descartes uses as one of his first steps in re-building
his system of knowledge.

Meditation IV
Concerning the True and False
-restates that the idea of God is obvious and wants to extend this to how the
knowledge of other things can be known-Descartes now attempts to prove that God is not a deceiver; Descartes believes
that deception is not a property of perfection and God is wholly perfect.
-If God created us, and He is perfect how is it that we are not perfect?
Answer: It just so happens that I make mistakes because the faculty of judging
the truth, which I receive from God, is not, in my case, infinite.
-Error, according to Descartes, is privation: There is nothing about reality I
cannot reason given the full context of reality.
Descartes inquires into the nature of our errors and believes there are 2 causes:
1.Our faculty of knowing (intellect); and 2. Our faculty of choosing (will).
The reason we err: The will extends further than the intellect
i.e. We make decisions concerning the things we think we know.

Meditation V
Concerning the Essence of Material Things; and again
Concerning God, that He Exists
-Descartes goes on a mission to analyze the ideas he has, to see which ones are
clear and distinct and which ones are confused. Descartes uses his idea of a
triangle to illustrate a clear and distinct idea.
-To Descartes, the existence of God has the same degree of certainty then the truth
of geometry.
Existence vs. Essence:
Existence-having being or actual reality.
Essence-the most important feature of a thing which determines its identity.
According to Descartes: Gods essence is his existence!
-But once I perceived that there is a God, and also understood at the same time
that everything else depends on him, and that he is not a deceiver, I then
concluded that everything that I clearly and distinctly perceive is necessarily true.

Meditation VI
Concerning the Existence of Material things, and the Real
Distinction between Mind and Body
-Much of the meditation is a recap of the previous 5 meditations.
-Descartes does however add what he believes to be the reason why materials
exist: In order to affirm our Mind and the existence of God.