Outline of Descartes’ Meditation Three:

What Am I? I am a thing that thinks

First Rule: “…everything I clearly and distinctly perceive is true” (D.p.35)

What are the divisions of Thinking?             Are they apodictically true or can they contain falsity?

1)Ideas                        true           

(Other Thoughts with Properties):

2)Volitions / Will                    true           

3) Affections / Emotions            true

4) Judgments                    can be false

Conclusion: (D.p.37-8)    Stick to ideas and one will not be in error

Ideas can be:Examples supporting each:

1)Innatewhat is true

2)Adventitioushear noise, see sun, feel heat from the fire

3) Produced by Selfsirens and hippogriffs

About Adventitious Ideas:

Example to support and example cast doubt: Fire  and  Sun                                

Six-Part Preliminary Argument Against Adventitious Ideas:

1) Spontaneous impulse to believe is not as strong as the light of reason

2) Just b/c they don’t depend on will, no necessity that their origin is from the outside

3) Even if adventitious, no necessity that idea resembles thing [i.e. the SUN]; here, he notes the disparity between ideas and things represented & equal/unequal ideas                                       

4) There must be as much reality in the efficient & final causes as there is in the effect

Aristotle’s Four Causes:

A) Material Cause        from which(material : stone)

B) Formal Causeto which (form : shape of sculpture)

C) Efficient Cause        by which (sculptor)       

D) Final Causefor the sake of which (end / goal:  public’s enjoyment)

5) Something cannot come from nothing       

6) What is more perfect cannot come from what is less perfect

Just like how an existant (a thing) cannot come into existence except by a creator who has every property of the existant in it either formally or eminently, likewise an idea cannot exist (in me) unless it has come (to me) from a source with as much reality as is in the object of the idea (D.p.41).

Because…

If idea X has Y and the cause of idea X does not have Y, where did Y come from?

1) from nothing           

2) from something prior           

Why can this not be?

1) something cannot come from nothing   

2) no infinite regress           

So…  every attribute of every idea in me must have come from something with those attributes.  So… Preliminary Conclusion: I must examine all my ideas to determine if any is SO GREAT that it can be in me neither formally nor eminently—if so, I cannot be its cause and I am not alone in the world; if not, there is no proof that I am not alone in the world (D.p.42).

Formal Properties: in something literally, according to definition(thinking)

Eminent Properties: in something in higher way as an accident (speaking French)

Thus, end investigation of adventitious ideas and move to the debate between Self-Produced Ideas and Innate Ideas:  i.e. we are seeking something SO great that it cannot have been produced by me.

What sorts of ideas do I have (D.p.43)? of myself, God, corporeal & inanimate things, angels, animals, other people -- we can self-produce all these except, possibly, 1 and 2 below ...

What two classes ideas will we seek greatness in?

1) Corporeal Things

A) Material falsity lends obscurity to ideas, but not affect the origin of the ideas.

a) Formal Falsity: in judgments

b) Material Falsity: in ideas   (heat as privation of cold gives more reality to cold than to heat, which would only be as a lack, a nothing, thus ascribes reality to that which is not and thus commits a material falsity)

B) If I am only a thinking Thing, how can I know other substantial things?

a) Formally: I am substantial, so can know others directly

b) Eminently: by my substantiality w/ eminent prop., I can accidentally know others’ eminent properties

C) Conclusion: There are no properties so great in corporeal things that I could not have produced these ideas myself

2) God

A) Define God: A substance that is infinite, eternal, immutable, independent, supremely intelligent and powerful, which created me and all else that exists                                       

B) My substantiality is finite; His is infinite

How can I know his substantiality? Not via negativa, but have a prior conception of Him

C) Conclusion: The idea of a supreme deity who is perfect and infinite ismost true and certain            andcould not have been produced by me

“but…” why not?

New line of argument:

Maybe all of the perfections of God are in me potentially and not yet actualized:

Potential: inherent, not-actual powersacorn has potential to be an oak

Actual: demonstrated powersoak has essence of oak-ness that was not in acorn

1) Three reasons FOR and AGAINST why I cannot have the potential for perfection within me:

A) I am gradually getting smarter

vsmy future intelligence is potential, nothing in God is potential, for this would be a flaw and He can have no flaws, thus, He is his actuality                                   

B) can gain other perfections

vsmy perfections will never be infinite like God’s perfections

C) potential for perfection gives idea of perfection

vsobjective being (of idea) cannot come from potential being                               

Revised line of Argument:

So… if God does not exist, can I, with the potential for perfection (thus, with the potential for having the idea of perfection) exist?

So… where do I get my existence from?

     1) myself

     2) parents

     3) other things less perfect put together

Against 1) (concerning creation): if I created me, I would have given myself all perfections and would not lack any       (thus, we know we are not self-created)                                                                       

Preservation vs. creation is only a conceptual distinction (D.p.49); so…

Against 1) (concerning maintenance): as thinking thing I have no power to maintain my existence                                                                                                                                           

Against 3) (somewhat 2 as well):

A) must be as much reality in cause as effect                   

B) cannot have an infinite regress  (somewhere there is as much reality)

C)partial things cannot have yielded me (compositeness is defect; unity is perfection)

Against 2):

A) they do not preserve me

B) they did not make me as a thinking thing, they only gave me dispositions to add to my thinking

Conclusion: God exists

How did I get this idea?Innately  (mark of the craftsman on his work)

Thus… I exist becauseGod exists

Define God: The being the idea of whom is in me; possessor of the perfections I do not grasp by reach in thought, i.e., perfections I do not make but know; who is subject to no defects

Does He deceive? Why or why not? No.  Deception is a defect; he has none, deception from us