Q In the fourth Meditation, Descartes claimed to have discovered the source of falsity and error -- the reason for deep seated skepticism. What is that source? How does freewill enter into his explanation?
According to Rene Descartes, humans are in a process of continuous improvement and are far from being perfect. Thus in tracing the genesis of his error or falsity, he invokes the considerations of intellect which refers to the faculty of knowledge and will which refers to the faculty of choice or the freedom to exercise one’s will. Descartes believed that intellect merely involves the process of perceiving things which are stored in the form of knowledge, it is not involved in the process of arriving at conclusions about things and hence it cannot be a source of error.
