In this part of the meditations, Descartes examines why, if God is good, man is imperfect. He says that man has received his faculty of judgment from God, yet still makes mistakes and errors. This cannot be due to any deceitfulness in God, as Descartes says "the will to deceive is undoubtedly evidence of malice or weakness, and so cannot apply to God."
Descartes explains that man's error is due to his lack of perfection. Man, being finite, is in many ways removed from perfection (in knowledge, understanding, power), so in that he lacks many things. Imperfection is not a thing itself, but rather a lack of goodness. This lack is not so much
a moral one, but rather a lack of complete understanding and knowledge that may lead to moral imperfection, that is, to making wrong choices.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment