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Objective reality, which contrasts with formal reality, describes something that accurately represents reality. For instance, saying that a book of philosophy has objective reality means that its arguments about the nature of the world are correct. The concepts of formal and objective reality are the foundation for Descartes’s first argument for the existence of God in the Third Meditation.
Objective Reality Quotes in Meditations on First Philosophy
The Meditations on First Philosophy quotes below are all either spoken by Objective Reality or refer to Objective Reality. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Third Meditation
Quotes
Undoubtedly, the ideas which represent substances to me amount to something more and, so to speak, contain within themselves more objective reality than the ideas which merely represent modes or accidents. Again, the idea that gives me my understanding of a supreme God, eternal, infinite, immutable [sic], omniscient, omnipotent and the creator of all things that exist apart from him, certainly has in it more objective reality than the ideas that represent finite substances.
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Get LitCharts A+It is clear to me, by the natural light, that the ideas in me are like pictures, or [sic] images which can easily fall short of the perfection of the things from which they are taken, but which cannot contain anything greater or more perfect.
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It is enough that I understand the infinite, and that I judge that all the attributes which I clearly perceive and know to imply some perfection—and perhaps countless others of which I am ignorant—are present in God either formally or eminently. This is enough to make the idea that I have of God the truest and most clear and distinct of all my ideas.
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Objective Reality Term Timeline in Meditations on First Philosophy
The timeline below shows where the term Objective Reality appears in Meditations on First Philosophy. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Third Meditation
Something is objectively real if it represents reality, but formally real if it actually exists. The idea of God—who...
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...an idea exists because it came from someone’s mind (which also exists). But an idea’s objective reality , or its ability to represent reality, cannot come from the mind’s objective reality (which...
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...of any idea must have at least as much formal reality as the idea has objective reality . It’s true that one idea can cause another, but there has to be an...
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...enough—rather, infinite substance is altogether different. In fact, the idea of God has the most objective reality of any idea—even if minds like the Meditator’s can never fully comprehend what it means...
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