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At the end of Meditation 1, Descartes creates a hypothetical "evil demon" that works as hard...

At the end of Meditation 1, Descartes creates a hypothetical "evil demon" that works as hard as he can to "decieve him". What is nthe purpose of this thought exercise? What is Descartes trying to accomplish?  

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Descartes introduced the idea of an ‘evil demon’ as a device to allow him to rigorously doubt all his beliefs. He reasoned that an evil demon, who was intent on deceiving him, could easily manipulate make Descartes’ sensory experiences. From this assumption, Descartes concluded that all knowledge could be doubted because he could never rule out the possibility of being completely deceived. Having established the strict criterion for knowledge as being immune from doubt, Descartes then posited that only knowledge of one’s own existence was something he could not doubt any any circumstance.

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