Ontological Arguments Flashcards
Explain the difference between Necessary and Contingent existence
- Something exists contingently if it is possible for it to both exist or not exist (ie human beings - the earth can exist regardless of us)
- Something exists necessarily if it must exist, i.e. if its impossible for it not to exist.
Nothing has necessary existence apart from God (if there is one) and thus there must be something with necessary existence because otherwise it is infinite regress but we have to reject infinite regress as its impossible. Thus its impossible for God not to exist.
Explain Leibniz’s Principle of Sufficient Reason and Contingent Existence?
The principle of SR states; every true fact has an explanation that provides a sufficient reason for why things are as they are. The principle of sufficient reason applies to everything (even if in most cases we don’t know what that sufficient reason is)
There are 2 kinds of truth;
- Those of Reasoning + Those of Fact
When truth is necessary the reason for it can be found by analysis. We understand the reason for it by understanding why it is necessary.
Contingent Existence;
Reasons for contingent truths can be given in more and more detail but all this detail only brings in other contingent facts Eg i am the height i am because of my genes and these further contingent facts also need explaining; Why do I have the genes that i do? etc.
Therefore when we give explanations of this sort we move no nearer to the goal of completely explaining contingencies. Therefore we cannot keep relying on contingencies in order to explain other contingent fact. The sufficient reasons for contingent fact must be in a necessary substance
This necessary substance is God
(Leibniz is basically argues there is always a sufficient reason for something/explanation for everything. We could argue unless God exists, this question is unanswerable as there would be an ‘infinite regress’) So Leibniz principle of sufficient reason = argument god exists.
Outline the Ontological Argument + Alsems Ontological argument
Ontological A = The argument that God is perfect + greatest being and thus God must exists because a being that great existing is better than it not existing.
Alsems Ontological:
- Alsem states God is - ‘greater than which can be conceived’
- If we can think of a being greater than God then this would be better than God however this is nonsense as nothing is better than god and we cannot conceive of anything better than god.
- The greatest possible being, that we can conceive must exist as it is inconceivable that the greatest being does not exist. Therefore God must exists.
P1 - By definition ,God is a being ,greater than which cannot be conceived
P2- We can coherently conceive of such a being (the concept of god is coherent)
P3- It is greater to exist in reality than to only exist in the mind
C- Therefore God must exist
What does St Alsems version of the Ontological argument overarching idea?
Alsems argument basically States that God is the greatest conceivable being, it is greater to exist than to only exist in the mind/not to exist, therefore gods non-existence is inconceivable - so god must exist
State the 3 Main objections to Alsems Ontological argument
- Gaunilos ‘Perfect Island’
- Empiricist Objections
- Kants ‘Existence is Not a Predicate’
Explain Gaunlios ‘Perfect Island’ Objection to The Ontological argument
How great is the ‘greatest conceivable being?’
- If it doesn’t exist, it is not great at all!
- We are thinking how great this being would be if he existed
- But that doesn’t show that it actually exists
I can conceive of an island that’s greater than any other island and say therefore that it MUST exist, because it would be less great if it didn’t exist however this still does NOT show that it actually does exist.
Explain The Empiricist Objection to The Ontological argument
Empiricists object to ‘a priori’ arguments of existence
(claim nothing can be shown by a prioir knowledge + therefore would say it is NOT infact self-contradictory to say God doesn’t exist.
Hume’s Fork - can be applied to the Q of Gods existence
P1- Nothing thats distinctively conceivable implies a contradiction
P2- Whatever we conceive as existing, we can also conceive as not existing
C1- Therefore there’s no being whos non-existence implies a contradiction
(if go does not exist equals contradiction then that would mean the claim ‘God exists’ would have to be an analytic truth but it is NOT an analytic truth + so its wrong to argue denying Gods exitance = a contradiction.
What would Descartes response/counter to The Empiricist criticisms of The Ontological argument
Descartes response could be one of 2 counters;
1- Could Claim that ‘God exists’ is a synthetic truth but one that can be known by a priori reflection and so would reject Humes Fork
2- Or could claim that ‘God Exists’ Is an Analytic truth but just not an obvious one
Not everything we can conceive of existing can we also conceive as not existing. Gods an exception because our minds are Finite.
Explain Kants ‘Existence is not a Predicate’ objection to The Ontological Argument
Kant projects what philosophers view as one of te strongest objections to the Ontological argument.
- Ontological arguments misunderstand what existence is, or what it is t say something exists. Premise 3 of Alsems + premise 4 of Descartes Ontological arguments are false - things don’t have existence in the same way we do so existence cannot be a perfection.
- In saying ‘god does not exist’ being a contradiction - it seems Alsem + Descartes are taking ‘God exists’ to be an analytic truth but analytic judgements are predicable, whereas God exists adds nothing to the concept of God or whether it actually exists.
Explain Malcom’s Ontological Argument
Normans Malcom agrees w Kant that we cannot think of existence as a property in the same way Descartes + Alsems formular do in there Ontological arguments but Malcom argues we could interpret Alsems text in a different way.
Alsem says as a being who’s non-existence is conceivable we aren’t comparing what exists and what doesn’t but the concept of something(god) that by nature, must exist so whilst existence isn’t a perfection ‘Necessary’ existence is.
So Malcom claims Gods existence is Necessary rather than Contingent
P1- Either god exists or does not
P2- God cannot come into existence or go out of existence
P3- If god exists, gods existence is necessary
C1- Therefore if god exists gods existence is necessary
P4-If god doesn’t exist god cant come into existence
C2- Therefore gods does not exist, gods existence is impossible
C3- Thus gods existence is either necessary o impossible
P5 Gods exitance is only impossible if its self-contradictory
P6- Concept of god isnt self-contradictory
C4- Therefore gods existence isnt impossible + god exists necessarily.
What does Malcom argue?
Malcom argues that whilst ‘existence’ is not a perfection - god has a ‘necessary’ existence as its exitance does not depend on anything else , so god exists. However through showing that god exists necessarily (because he cannot be bought into or out of being) Malcom has not shown that god actually exists, only that if god exists then he must exist necessarily.
Explain Kants criticism of Malcom’s ontological argument + Malcom’s response
Kant objects that Malcom has not shown that Premise 6 is true. IS the concept of God Coherent + definitely not self-contradictory? Not really
Malcom relies that he agrees with Kant that contingent existence is not a property + discuses the claim ‘god exists’ but he doesn’t satisfactory distinguish the difference between god exists and god does not exist and so it remains possible god still does not exist.
What does Aquinas argue about the ontological argument?
Replies that the ontological argument only works for god, nothing else exists in such a way that there non-existence is inconceivable.
Explain objection/ criticism 6 ‘Necessary Being’ against the ontological argument
For Hume/Russel the concept of a being that exists ‘necessarily’ is problematic
- Nothing that is distinctively conceivable implies a contradiction
- Whatever we conceive as existent , we can also conceive as non-existent.
- Therefore, there is no being whose non-existence implies a contradiction
Reply;
Whilst Hume/Russels argue that we cannot say that god ‘exists necessarily’ - this is not relevant.
Discussion of the ontological arguments show that if ‘God exists then god exists necessarily’ incoherent and though it doesn’t show that ‘god exists’ it does show that the concept of being necessarily is coherent so god exits necessarily’ shows us what distance God has if God does in fact exist.
Explain Descartes Ontological argument
Descartes’ version of the ontological argument relies heavily on his doctrine of clear and distinct ideas and the concept of god being innate.
- Descartes argues that the idea of god (that of a supremely perfect being) is certainly one he can find within himself and claims he understands this idea that belongs to god’s nature that he always exists.
‘Descartes states that ‘I have the idea of God’
‘The idea of god is the idea of a supremely perfect being’
‘A supremely perfect being must exist’ and therefore God exists.
Consequently Descartes fixates on the idea that a supremely perfect being must exist and therefore does.
