Journal of the History of Philosophy

Intuition and the Cartesian Circle* ROBERT A. IMLAY WAS DESCARTESGUILTYOF cIRCULARREASONINGwhen he argued that those things which we clearly and distinctly conceive are true only because God exists? Arnauld, of course, thought that he was because, as he remarked, we cannot be sure that God exists unless we conceive it clearly mad distinctly. 1 And although he does not, he might have mentioned a statement Descartes makes in the third Meditation in the course of offering his first proof for the existence of God. For he says there that since the idea in question is very clear and distinct and contains more objective reality than any other one it is also the truest. 2 In the light of such a seemingly straightforward recognition of the relevance of a clear and distinct idea to the proof for God's existence one would have expected Descartes to plead guilty to the charge of circular reasoning. Or, if such Moorean candour is beyond our philosopher, one would at least have expected him to address himself to the charge as stated. Instead, he has recourse to a distinction between the things that we conceive clearly and distinctly and the things that we remember having conceived clearly and distinctly. And he insists that knowledge of God's existence is necessary in order to assure that our remembering having conceived something clearly and distinctly is sufficient to establish its truth, a Where memory is not involved no such assurance, presumably, is required. In the case of the proof for God's existence, for example, attending to the reasons which prove his existence is supposed to be sufficient. An appeal to God Himself would be not only circular but otiose. This line of defense, apart from changing the subject, seems to place enormous pressure on the concept of memory. Indeed, Descartes seems to be saying that knowledge of God's existence renders memory infallible, when it is clear and distinct ideas that are remembered. But can the concept of memory withstand this pressure? I do not think that it can. For, if knowledge of God's existence is going to eliminate the possibility of error when it is clear and distinct ideas that are remembered, it seems reasonable to ask why it does not eliminate it when * I wish to thank the Canada Council for granting me a Fellowship to work on the problem of the Cartesian circle. a Charles Adam and Paul Tannery, eds., (Euvres de Descartes (Pads, 1957), vol. VII, p. 214; hereafter cited as "A.T." Elizabeth Haldane and G. R. T. Ross, eds., The Philosophical Works of Descartes (New York, 1955), vol. II, p. 92; hereafter cited as "H.R." 2 A.T., VII, 46; H.R., I, 166. [191 20 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY anything is remembered. To make an exception for clear and distinct ideas in this way strikes one as being nothing more than an ad hoc device designed to guarantee the truth of just those memory-claims that Descartes seems to think an adequate epistemology requires. To allow, on the other hand, that all memoryclaims are true is nothing short of absurd. Moreover, Descartes himself makes perfectly clear that he is prepared to allow no such absurdity. In the Conversation with Burman he remarks that everyone can judge from his own experience whether he has a good memory or not. And if he suspects that he does not have a good one Descartes advises him to have recourse to writing or similar devices.4 This is hardly the kind of homely advice that one would expect from someone who thought that memory was infallible. Nor in the absence of any mention of clear and distinct ideas is it the kind of advice that one would expect from someone who thought that one could not misremember them. s Why, then, does Descartes introduce the concept of memory in the first place? It is because he is concerned with a phenomenon that is familiar to all of us. More specifically, he is concerned with the fact that we can remember the conclusion of a sound argument even though we are unable at that precise moment to reproduce the argument in question. This...