WJ

TNM!

The ontological argument fails (from a pure analytical epistemological understanding-of knowledge about a thing). It's based on the the apriori and lacks meaning. You must already have had a religious experience for it to have any meaning whatsoever.

God and apriori logic don't and can't mix. It is not germain.

Aposterior!

Hope that helps some.

Walrus

Automaton

a priori statements can be made about the concept of God, for example, "God is not an animal." But a priori logic only extends as far as properties, positive existence claims cannot be derived from it.

Malaclypse the Younger

There is certainly something (perhaps the universe) that does exist, which (by some definition) is greater than anything else that does exist.

However it is purely chauvanistic to assume that intelligence and power necessarily are properties of such a being.

bd-from-kg

Augustine:

No. Here are some choice excerpts on the subject from his Critique of Pure Reason. (I got this from the [url=http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/sbook.html[Internet Medieval Source Book[/url]; specifically <a href="http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/anselm-critics.html" target="_blank">this page</a>.)

I can’t say that I understand all of this perfectly, but the general meaning is clear enough: existence is not a predicate, and therefore the Ontological Argument fails.

jupstin

This seems to assume some set rules for establishing "greatness." I suppose the only objective criteria for greatness can be established by the greatest, which becomes circular. If there is no objective way to measure greatness, then we have a new problem: potentially infinite gradations of greatest. There will always be the potential for something greater, so nothing "greatest" can exist. &lt;My head may explode&gt; It's like the Kalam argument in reverse - without an objective greatest, we run into the problem of infinite greaters. Of course this is vastly different than Kalam since it does not require transvering an actual infinite; there's nothing to prohibit someone from spending their entire life trying to count to infinity. In any case, it's hard to wrap my brain around the idea that whatever the greatest thing in the universe happens to be is infinitely less great than an infinite number of potential greater things.

[ March 22, 2002: Message edited by: jupstin ]</p>

The Naked Mage

wanderer: thus far my class has only barely scratched the surface of the opposing view. The instructor says we'll actually get into it at some point, but I'm not so sure...

John Page

You don't have to accept the notion that there exists an infinite number (that you can't add a little bit more to!) in reality. Using the same reasoning, you don't have to accept the concept of a greatest being (or greatest anything, except from a numerable set). Bertrand Russell gave up trying to show what the set of all sets looked like (for it must surely contain everything). Stuff doesn't "contain" other stuff, it just looks like that through the representation of reality in the human mind.

Cheers!

Sojourner553

Here is a source for you A summary of the proof and its rebuttal:


According to St. Anselm, God's existence is proved as follows:

(1) By definition, God is "an absolutely perfect being".
(2) A "perfect" being MUST have the qualities of "existence"--or else
it would not be a perfect being.
(3) Any other concept can be conceived as non-existent--but the concept
of an absolutely perfect being, implies existence by its very definition.

Per Anselm, "Therefore, Lord, not only are You that than which a greater
cannot be thought, but You are also something greater than can be thought. For
since such a being can be thought to exist, if You are not this being, then
something greater than You can be thought--which is impossible." (Proslogion,
1100)

Anselm's Argument from Form was NOT very convincing even in his day:
St. Thomas Aquinas rejected Anselm's Argument, stating that it did not
prove that God existed--except "only in the intellect". (As we have seen
above, Aquinas favored his own, more rational proofs for the existence of God.)

The monk Gaunilon, a contemporary of Anselm, criticized Anselm's theory
on two fronts: (1) Using Aristotle's argument that our ideas arise out of our
experience, it followed that the idea of a "most perfect" God has no foundation
in our experience. And (2) the mere presence of an idea in our mind is no proof
that it really exists. Gaunilo argued for example that the image of a "perfect"
island does not prove that it "has" to exist.

Anselm countered that his argument could ONLY be applied to God, and nothing
else--as only the concept of God occurs universally in humans!

Centuries later, the French philosopher Descartes deduced the existence of
God using a variation of Anselm's Ontological argument. First Descartes
philosophically "proved" his own existence based on his self awareness of the
activity of his mind in thinking.("Cognito, ergo sum"--"I think, therefore I
am".) Secondly, Descartes argued that when we doubt, we are faced with the
limitations of our human ego. It followed from this, that we could have this
idea of "imperfection"-- ONLY if we had a previous innate idea of "perfection".
Like Anselm, Descartes concluded that it is a contradiction of terms to state
that a perfect being could not also have existence. Therefore, our previous
conception of perfection "proves" that there must be a God who exists.

There have been numerous problems with the ontological proof. The presence of
atheists and agnostics who claim they do not possess an innate impression of
God, is of course one difficulty. The fact that no one can prove they have
physically "seen" God, has been invoked by others. As Voltaire once put it, "All
men are born with a nose and ten fingers, but no one was born with a knowledge
of God."

The skeptic, David Hume, effectively quashed the Ontological Argument's
premise with the following rebuttal:

"It is still "possible for us, at any time, to conceive the nonexistence
of what we formerly conceived to exist". "Any particle of matter... may
be CONCEIVED to be annihilated; and any form may be CONCEIVED to be altered.
Such an annihilation or alteration, therefore is not impossible."
(Hume quoting Dr. Clarke).

Thus, according to Hume, one should be able to apply this argument equally
to the existence of God-or likewise, "That the human mind can imagine Him to be
non-existent or his attributes altered."

Taken from
<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/PHILOSOP.TXT" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/PHILOSOP.TXT</a>

(which tackles all the philosophical proofs of God)

from this site:
<a href="http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/index.html" target="_blank">http://mac-2001.com/philo/crit/index.html</a>

Kip

Kant

The Ontological arguments begs the question by defining God as existing. The Cosmological Argument commits the composition fallacy (and confuses rearrangement with creation ex nihilo). The Argument to Design is not a an argument towards the existence of God in the Western tradition. Such a Creator could be finite, dead, natural, and evil. Moreover, the evidence for design is rather suspect, especially after Darwin.

This is my personal summary of the fallacies commited by traditional theistic arguments.

Jonsey3333

If there exists a "Greatness Meter", there must be a greatest conceivable being, or a number of beings tied for greatest (perfect 10s). However, all that we know is that it(they) is(are) the greatest, and that it(they) exist. It could George the Turnip God (my new diety). Do us a favor and bring up George in your conversations!

-Mike