Descartes:Arguing the Non-Ontological Theory

Descartes’ third meditation of his Mediations on First Philosophy, he goes from searching into the nature of doubt and knowledge to proving the existence of God. Descartes uses the non-ontological argument to prove the existence of God. I believe there are problems in this argument which will be discussed in this paper. First I look at the argument itself before attempting an analysis, where Descartes’ objections and responses will be argued.
Descartes’ first major statement in the third meditation is that “whatever I clearly and distinctly grasp is true.” But, he objects, there are many things which one thinks they have a clear and distinct grasp upon, then later recognizes they only had an idea of the thing. Descartes questions if he errs because God is a deceiver. This idea I feel is a weak argument. He then sets the reader up for the argument for God with the statement that “until I know these two things, if God exists and if he deceives, I can never be completely cer...