Descartes’ Innate Ideas

“I think, therefore I am” these are the famous words of Rene Descartes. I found Descartes’ innate ideas to be interesting because of how he explains our ideas and where they come from. He states “even though he is imperfect, he still entertained ideas that were perfect”. Once I read this my first thought was “this makes perfect sense”. No one individual is perfect in any sense; however, we come up with perfect ideas every day. These ideas can range from anything along the lines of new medications, new technology, etc. However, after I read on I saw that he then states that something perfect cannot come from something imperfect and so it must have been placed there by something or someone.

Descartes final hypothesis was that these ideas must have been put in his head by someone more perfect than he nor anyone else was or could be. This individual would also have all the perfections you could imagine. In other words God put these perfect ideas in our heads. It is funny to think that even today we thank God for the ideas and miraculous things that happen to us even thousands of years after Descartes proposed this idea to be true.

I think I was drawn to Descartes’ ideas because of the fact that he states that the rational processes that the world gained through senses were valid because God would not deceive us. However, he also states that sensory information must still be analyzed rationally to be proved valid. I find this to be true because we cannot say that God tells us everything and makes all of our decisions for us. Some things we have to prove by researching and analyzing ourselves. I respect how Descartes’ tells us these two different sides, I feel like a lot of people only consider that God is the reason for all of our thoughts and actions. I think we still have to realize that a lot of the things we do are on a personal level and God is just there to guide us not necessarily give us the ideas or advice that we need on the dot.

This is a clip about all of the quotes and beliefs Descartes had. I found it interesting as it went over everything that he believes is true and how much it relates to how we live and perceive life today.
It talks about how if we can think, then we can doubt meaning we are not perfect. Also, we often go by what our 5 senses tell us when it comes to our bodies making decisions. But our senses often deceive us and do not tell us the truth. Descartes ideas have really opened my mind to think about how thought and ideas really work and what is true and valid in life.