Editing Evil demon (section)

==In context==
Prior to the ''[[Meditations on First Philosophy|Meditations]]'' proper, Descartes gives a synopsis of each Meditation and says of Meditation One that "reasons are provided which give us possible grounds for doubt about all things, especially material things" and that whilst the usefulness of such extensive doubt may not be immediately apparent, "its greatest benefit lies in 
*freeing us from all our preconceived opinions, and 
*providing the easiest route by which the mind may be led away from the senses. 
The eventual result of this doubt is to 
*make it impossible for us to have any further doubts about what we subsequently discover to be true."

Descartes offers some standard reasons for doubting the reliability of the senses culminating in the dream argument and then extends this with the deceiving God argument. Descartes refers to "the long-standing opinion that there is an omnipotent God who made me the kind of creature that I am" and suggests that this God may have "brought it about that there is no earth, no sky, no extended thing, no shape, no size, no place, while at the same time ensuring that all these things appear to me to exist just as they do now". Furthermore, this God may have "brought it about that I too go wrong every time I add two and three or count the sides of a square, or in some even simpler matter, if that is imaginable".

After the deceiving God argument Descartes concludes that he is "compelled to admit that there is not one of my former beliefs about which a doubt may not properly be raised". {{Citation needed|date=March 2018}}

It is only after arriving at this conclusion that Descartes introduces the evil demon.

Although Descartes has provided arguments for doubting all his former beliefs he notes that "my habitual opinions keep coming back". It is to deal with this problem that Descartes decides he must do more than just acknowledge that the beliefs are open to doubt and must deceive himself, "by pretending for a time that these former opinions are utterly false and imaginary" and that he shall do this "until the weight of preconceived opinion is counter-balanced and the distorting influence of habit no longer prevents my judgement from perceiving things correctly".

It is to achieve this state of denial that Descartes says he will suppose that "some malicious demon of the utmost power and cunning has employed all his energies in order to deceive me".

The evil demon is also mentioned at the beginning of Meditation Two. Descartes says that if there is "a deceiver of supreme power and cunning who is deliberately and constantly deceiving me" then he himself must undoubtedly exist for the deceiver can "never bring it about that I am nothing so long as I think that I am something". A little later he says, "But what shall I now say that I am, when I am supposing that there is some supremely powerful and, if it is permissible to say so, malicious deceiver, who is deliberately trying to trick me in every way he can?"