The Ontological Argument

Overview

Recall questions on the argument as a priori and analytic, Anselm's two formulations, the definition of God and aseity, Gaunilo's island, Kant on existence as a predicate, Russell's account of existence, and proof against probability.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1. 1

   Why is the Ontological Argument a different kind of argument from the Design and Cosmological Arguments?

   Model answer

   It is a priori and deductive. It appeals to no observation at all, working purely from what the word God means, and if it succeeds the conclusion follows with the force of logic rather than as a probability. That gives it a strength the others lack, since no discovery could overturn it, and a matching weakness, since it is hard to see how a fact about what exists could be squeezed out of a definition.

2. 2

   What does it mean to claim that the statement that God exists is analytic?

   Model answer

   An analytic statement is true or false purely because of what its terms mean, as with unmarried bachelors. The argument claims existence belongs to the concept of God in that way, so that denying God is not a mistake about the world but a self-contradiction, like denying that a triangle has three sides. Everything then depends on whether existence can belong to a concept at all.

3. 3

   Set out Anselm's first formulation.

   Model answer

   Anselm defines God as that than which nothing greater can be thought. Even the person who denies God has that idea in mind, so it exists in the understanding. But a thing existing in reality as well as in the mind is greater than one existing in the mind alone. So if the greatest conceivable being existed only in the understanding, something greater could be thought - which contradicts the definition. Therefore it exists in reality as well.

4. 4

   How does Anselm's second formulation differ, and why do some think it stronger?

   Model answer

   The second concerns the manner of existing rather than existence as such. A being that could not fail to exist is greater than one that merely happens to, so the greatest conceivable being must exist necessarily and cannot even be thought not to exist. Defenders such as Malcolm argue this escapes the objection that existence is not a property, because what is predicated is necessary existence, a mode of being, rather than bare existence.

5. 5

   Why does the argument depend so heavily on how God is defined?

   Model answer

   Because the whole inference is drawn out of the definition. Anselm's phrase is deliberately not a description of a very impressive being but a limit concept - whatever is greatest, however that turns out. Weaken it to a merely very great being and nothing follows; call it unintelligible and the argument never starts. Critics say the definition builds in the answer; defenders say it only unpacks what worshippers have always meant.

6. 6

   What is aseity, and how does it fit the argument?

   Model answer

   Aseity is God's existing from and through himself, depending on nothing else for being what he is. It is the positive content behind necessary existence: God is not the most impressive item within a system of things but the kind of being whose nature is to exist. The argument aims at exactly this, since a being who owed its existence to something else would not be the greatest conceivable.

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