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René Descartes 'Meditations Of First Philosophy'

1368 Words6 Pages

Midterm Essay
March 19th, 2017
Philosophy 020
Professor Lewis
Section 09: 10:00 a.m
Madeline Eller
Word Count: 1370

Error in the Faculty of Judgement In “Meditations of First Philosophy” René Descartes argues that human errors in the faculty of judgement are not God’s fault, even though God is all good and all powerful. Instead, Descartes asserts that humans have a lack of perfection that lead them to make errors. I will argue that this is incorrect, because if God is all good and all powerful, he could make all humans with the ability to have a perfect faculty of judgement, which would prevent them from making errors. Descartes describes God as infinitely perfect within “Meditations of First Philosophy.” By this, Descartes means that God …show more content…

God is all good and all powerful. (from 1)
God is not a deceiver. (from 1)
Humans have a faculty of judgement given to us by God.
Humans also have an idea of nothingness which is furthest from all perfection.
Humans lie in between being a supreme being and nothingness.
We are not supreme beings and lack countless perfections. (from 6)
Humans make errors. (from 6 and 7)
Thus, God does not cause our errors in judgement, instead it is from a lack of perfection. (from 7 and 8)

Within this argument by Descartes, my objection is with premise 2. If this premise is true, it would contradict the conclusion in number 9. If God is truly all good and all powerful, he would have the ability to give us a faculty of judgement that does not allow us to make errors. Thus, any errors in judgement would be his fault, which would contradict the conclusion in number 9. I will now continue by breaking down my objection in more …show more content…

As before, God is all good and all powerful. God would determine that murdering someone would be an error in the faculty of judgement of the man, which was given to him by God. However, this is where Descartes’ rebuttal differs. Descartes would acknowledge that the man made an error in his faculty of judgement, but would say that this man is not protected from making errors. Coupled with that, Descartes’ would claim that this man’s error has actually occurred to make the universe a perfect place, even if the man’s life is not perfect. If Descartes was this man, he would say that “I am not entitled to complain about God’s giving me a lower role in his scheme of things.” (Descartes pg. 22A). This rebuttal from Descartes would overturn my objection to his argument. The conclusion made in number 9 from above would then fit within the premises 1 through 8. God would no longer be accountable for errors in the faculty of judgements in people, because those people would not have been protected from making errors in judgement. Thus, their lack of protection, perfection, and subsequent errors in judgement, would then have the purpose of making the universe a perfect place, according to

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