The image of the evil demon does not arouse the thoughts and use power over people to accept the things that are not true. Instead, the evil demon is a device which is a way by which Descartes thinks everything he used to think true to be false. It leads him to all his doubts he has acceptably raised regarding those things he regularly held to the truth. The acknowledgment that the understanding that he had gained on false grounds is at best uncertain and leads him to make up his mind to overturn all those things that he once thought he knew. To achieve this he states that it is not possible for him to demonstrate that all his previous beliefs are false.
His arguments are all aimed at establishing the conclusion that people have a reason of doubting everything they believe. Every argument he gives becomes more effective than the previous one. He does not reject the senses but what he only says is that there is a reason to doubt them. He does not give any reason of the truth so it is hard to decide whether something is wrong or true. The fact that he was formed by a perfect God clearly proves that Descartes does not have casual background. There is no possibility of being deceived by the demon (Descartes, René, and Cottingham 45).
Descartes believes that that the evil demon talks to him directly with his mind which causes him to have all the sense understandings he does even though there is no physical world at all. He believes that the world consists only of his mind and the mind of the evil demon lying to him. Descartes searches for the truth which could be something that he basically cannot doubt. With the evil demon assumption, he finds that it is possible not to believe everything that he gets from his senses.
Most of the people would think that God has the power to mislead even in situations concerning mathematics but Descartes can doubt that there is existence of God. It can be argued out that since God is extremely good, He would not deceive him in the things that he believes. By reasoning this way, Descartes would think that God would not lie to him concerning anything, but on the other hand, this might turn to be false. Supposing there is no God, there could be high chances of being lied to because imperfect senses of human beings would have to be created by a perfect being. This could mean that the evil demon deceives him about the things, his body and even about mathematics. The evil demon cannot persuade him that he does not exist and that he is all those things that cannot be taken apart from thought, for instance, he can imagine, doubt, feel and understand. All understanding is obtained from the mind (David, Bluhm, and Descartes 78).
Nobody really have doubts as to whether other humans being exist, but on the other hand it is difficult to give good reason for a dismissal of doubt. Descartes thought of being deceived by an evil demon is a practical and a rational doubt. He is not just randomly putting everything in doubt, but he is also giving good reasons for everything that he doubts. He refuses to agree with the possibility that he might be insane because that would weaken the reasonableness that motivates his doubt. The same precision that might be believed to make a distinction between the actual perceptions from an imaginary one applies equally to both waking occurrences and dreams (Descartes 26).
The experiences of confusion planted in Descartes by most of all the memories he have had enables him to perform his decision to doubt because he can believe that he is asleep and even imagine other things happening. By imagining that he is actually dreaming, he is then capable of doubting all the sensory images. To such doubts it might be objected that God, whose characteristics include kindness and goodness as well as omnipotence would never lie to anybody. The realities that Descartes held on the basis of the senses and imaginations are all shown to lack enough evidence. All human beings are the source of the mistakes they make. The senses deceive the body thus leading the humans to be the only source of all committed errors. The evil demon can only be humans since it is figure dedicated to deceive and induce faults (Descartes, Cottingham, Stoothoff, and Murdoch 57).
There is a possibility for Descartes to escape from this doubt because he believes he has found an answer to his doubt. His escape is through Cogito moments which arise through reasoning. He thinks that if it is true that he is being deceived by the evil demon, then he would therefore be in existence at this time. Descartes would not be deceived by the evil demon while he is alive as a thinker especially when he thinks that he is being deceived within him. It is clear that he has understanding of his own thinking. He clearly knows that he is thinking as well as what he is thinking about. Descartes would be able to escape from this doubt since his beliefs about his thinking are far much beyond the reach of the evil demon. There is no evil demon that can give him the thought that he is actually thinking and thus existing, and therefore be deceiving him.
Works Cited
Descartes, René, and John Cottingham. Meditations on First Philosophy: With Selections from the Objections and Replies. Cambridge [Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1986. Print.
Descartes, René, David Weissman, William T. Bluhm, and René Descartes. Discourse on the Method: And, Meditations on First Philosophy. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996. Internet resource.
Descartes, René, John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff, and Dugald Murdoch. The Philosophical Writings of Descartes. Cambridge [Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1984. Print.
Descartes, René. Meditations on First Philosophy. Raleigh, N.C: Alex Catalogue, 1990. Internet resource.
