What is Descartes primary goal in the Meditations?

This is not a research assignment. All the material for the
successful completion of the
assignment has been covered in class. There are also notes and audio files on the
material available on Moodle.

Please do not plagiarize.

Topic: Explain in detail Descartes argument in the first Three Meditations. You paper
should explain Descartes goal in the Meditations, the dream argument, the demon
hypothesis, the self as certain foundation, the causal proof for the existence of God and
so forth.
Please email your file by the deadline given above. It is important that you name your
file in the format:
last-name_Descartes
I prefer the pdf format for writing assignments, but .docx files are fine as well. I cannot
open documents created in the Mac ‘pages’ format. If you use that program, please
save your file as a pdf or .doc file before sending.
Important: Your assignment should be formatted as an essay; do not use a question and
answer format. I have used questions in the outline below only as a guide to the issues
that your paper needs to address.
What is Descartes primary goal in the Meditations?
What method does he utilize to achieve his goal? How specifically does the
method work?

II. Doubt
What is the dream argument?
What is Descartes purpose in presenting it?
Why is the dream argument not enough? What is the demon hypothesis?
1

III. Certainty
Why does Descartes believe that he cannot be mistaken about everything?
What is the certain foundation?
To what does I refer?
What is the essential property of the I?
What does it mean to say that I exist is both clear and distinct?
What is the wax example and what point is Descartes attempting to do with that
argument?

IV. God
How does Descartes go about showing that something exists that is external to
him and greater than him?
What is the idea of God?
What are the main elements of the causal proof?
What are the ramifications of the proof for the demon hypothesis, and the status
of mathematical truth?

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