Descartes Fifth Meditation Analysis

The fifth meditation starts off by Descartes straying away from meditating on the aspects of himself and God and compelling himself to focus on what he was pondering on a few days ago: material things. But before Descartes tries to reason if material things outside himself exist, he must first make sure material things can be definite outside his thoughts without being subjected to doubtfulness. Other than that, anything outside these parameters has to be omitted and seen as distractions from what he is trying to ponder on. He has to understand the difference between the material things that are definite and the material things that are ambiguous or bring about doubt and being deceived through the senses. Descartes first has to audit his …show more content…
The existence of God must be tested the same way as Descartes was examining material things. The way that Descartes did this was by differentiating what essence and existence is. The idea of a thing is its essence and the thing itself is the actual existence. Going back to the triangle example, Descartes stated that just like a triangle has fundamental properties that make it a triangle, so does God. One of the key properties that God has is eternal existence. This means that God exists independently of the finite thinking mind. By using this logic, if God did not exist then God would not hold this property. Therefore, God exists based on the support of his geometrical reasoning. God’s essence and existence are one and the same and cannot be separated just like the fundamental fact that two right angles equal three angles cannot be removed from the essence of a …show more content…
The objection is one that discusses how God may not even exist and that his essence is different from his existence. Descartes used the metaphor of a valley and mountain and how they are connected by having ascending and descending slope. Valleys lead into mountains and then back to valleys. Even though this valley and the mountain show the connection, there is not any proof of this valley existing. Descartes counters this objection by saying that we can very easily imagine a horse with or without wings or a mountain without a valley, but we cannot imagine God without him existing. The other objection that someone would make about Descartes logic and reasoning would be that God’s existence would never come into play if we never thought about his existence in the first place. Descartes replies by saying that by thinking of beings greater than ourselves ultimately leads us to thinking of God. In other words, God is legitimate whether we think about his existence or not. We ultimately are compelled to end up at this idea. In conclusion, Descartes deduced that every science that is studied is based and rests upon the knowledge of the one true God. Descartes mentions that before becoming aware of God, he was unable to attain certain and true knowledge about anything else. Now that Descartes has proven, through his logic, about material things existing outside of thoughts and God’s existence, it is possible for him