Arguments based on reason Flashcards
Arguments based on reason - Ontology
> Explores the nature of existence.
Claims that by thinking about the definition of God and its implications we can work out through reason that God must exist.
A priori - depends on logic rather than sense experience.
Arguments based on reason - A priori and a posteriori arguments
> Argued that a priori arguments are more persuasive because they rely on deductive logic. If the premises are true they lead to certainty.
Can only lead to strong probability because they rely on sense experience. Might be more persuasive though as people can see the evidence for themselves.
Arguments based on reason - Analytic and synthetic propositions
> An analytic proposition is true by definition and needs no experience or evidence to support it.
A synthetic proposition needs evidence and experience to support it.
Arguments based on reason - Anselm’s OA
> 11th century, Benedictine monk, became archbishop of canterbury.
Argument was made for ‘faith seeking understanding’ not an attempt to convert people
Refrences the ‘fool’ who doesn’t understand that God must exist. ‘The fool says in his heart, “There is no God ”’ (Psalm 53:1)
Appears in his writings called Proslogion
Arguments based on reason - Anselm’s first form
> God is that ‘that which nothing greater can be conceived’
A real existent being is greater than an imaginary being.
Therefore, God must exist because the concept of God is not as great as the real existent God.
Arguments based on reason - Anselm’s second form
> God is that ‘that which nothing greater can be conceived’
Contingent beings are inferior to necessary beings.
God is inferior to nothing else and so must have necessary existence.
God exists necessarily.
Arguments based on reason - Descartes’ OA
> 17th-century mathematician and philosopher.
Gave his OA in his book Meditations
People are born with some ideas already imprinted in their minds, including the idea of God.
We know God to have all the perfections as his attributes. God is the supremely perfect being.
Existence is a perfection, therefore God must exist.
Existence cannot be separated from God.
Arguments based on reason - Criticisms of OA: Gaunilo
> Flaws in Anselm’s argument become clear if we replace God with ‘lost island’
We can imagine the most excellent island which would not be the most excellent unless it existed, therefore, it must exist.
Just defining something as superlative doesn’t make it exist.
Anselm responded and said that the argument works only for God because he exists necessarily, the island exists contingently.
Arguments based on reason - Criticisms of OA: Aquinas
> God cannot be demonstrated through a priori argument because it is not self-evident that God is TWNGCBC
People have different ideas about what God is and are able to conceive of God not existing - the human mind cannot comprehend God.
‘Non-existent God’ can’t be contradictory in terms because people manage to imagine a world without God.
Shows that many people have a concept of God, not that there is an existent reality which matches that concept
Arguments based on reason - Criticisms of OA: Kant
> Addressed his criticisms mainly to Descartes.
Criticised the argument in his book Critique of Pure Reason
Argued that existence is not a predicate
A predicate is a descriptor or characteristic
Existence is not a characteristic of something. Just because we know something exists doesn’t mean we know anything of its characteristics
Arguments based on reason - Criticisms of OA: Russel
> Criticised the logic of the OA by using the example that ‘the present king of France is bald’
Statements about the king of France are neither true nor false because there is no present king of France.
Making statements about the attributes of God are only meaningful is there is an actual God; the statements themselves do nothing to answer this question.
