The Devil in "Meditations on First Philosophy"

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In Meditation One of his "Meditations on First Philosophy", Rene Descartes introduces his "evil Demon" as a device in his logical proof for the coherence of his intellect and thereby the basis of his argument to extend his famous deduction of individual existence - "I think therefore I am" - beyond the boundaries of individual consciousness. However, the "evil Demon" scenario undermines Descartes' argument as the Meditations progress in that it represents a challenge to his argument for the existence of God and thereby for the assertion of the certainty of sensory apprehension in Meditation Six. Thus, it will be argued that although the device of the "evil Demon" functions effectively in the assertion of radical doubt, it also undermines Descartes' argument in the rest of his text.

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