Questioning Descartes

by Laura Hein

Descartes claimed that he could prove the existence of God. In human minds, God is infinite. But as human beings cannot come to the idea of infinity by inference, and the idea is not intrinsic to us, God must have put the concept into our minds.

I have trouble accepting this reasoning, however. The idea of infinity could have come to the human race in other ways. Our ancient ancestors used to look up at the sun, or even look down at the earth, and believed that both are infinite. And why not? When they woke up and a new day dawned, the sun was going to come out without failing. The ground that they slept on today would still be there when they woke up the next morning. They could count on the sun and the earth being there forever, unfailingly sustaining their existence. They could take those things for granted. The sun, the earth, the oceans would still be there even if they departed from the world. Time would simply go on and on.

Of course, the idea that the sun and the earth will always be here has been dispelled. We know now that even the universe cannot be infinite. All things must come to an end. Our ancestors did not know this, however, and the concept of infinity must have been easy to accept. The idea was then passed onto to us. This does not mean that I don’t believe in God. One day, the existence of God and the ideas of science may be reconciled, but Descartes’ explanation does not persuade me much.