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Wednesday 22 July 2015

Descartes' Proof for the Existence of God

Ideas are either innate (inborn or known from one's own nature), adventitious (come from outside me) or made by me.
Formal reality is characteristic of things.
Some things have more formal reality than others.
To exist is to be good.
Greater goodness or perfection therefore implies that some things have more existence than others.
Substances have a greater amount of formal reality than modes or accidents.
Infinite substances have more formal reality than finite substances.
Objective reality is the reality characterisic of ideas in virtue of the fact that the idea represents some realtiy.
Some ideas have more objective reality than others, depending on the formal reality of the things which they represent.
There is at least as much reality in an efficient cause as in its effect. (This is revealed by the natural light.)
The ideas in me are like images that may well fall short of the things from which they derive but cannot contain anything greater or more perfect. (This is revealed by the natural light.)
If I can be sure that the objective reality of one of my ideas is so great that it isn't in me either formally or eminently and hence that I cannot be the cause of that idea, I can infer that I am not alone in the world--that there exists something else that is the cause of the idea.
I have the ideas of myself, of God, of angels, of animals, of physical objects and of other men like me.
I could have composed my ideas of animals, other men and angels. (There is a brief argument on behalf of this premise.)
I could have composed my ideas of physical objects without these existing. (There is an argument to show that this premise is true.)
There is more reality in an infinite than in a finite substance.
The more perfect serves as a standard to judge the less perfect.
I use God as the standard to judge that I am imperfect.
My grasp of the infinite must be prior to my grasp of the finite.
The idea of God is completly clear and distinct and contains more objective reality than any other idea.
But perhaps I am greater than I have assumed and so could be the cause of the idea of a being with all perfections.
The gradual increase in my knowledge shows that I am imperfect. (All of these things are revealed by the light of nature)

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