The Ontological Arguement

Question 1

Who came up with the ontological arguement?

Answer 1

Anselm of Canterbury

Question 2

List the philosophers who supported the ontological arguement

Answer 2

Descartes, Malcolm, penelhum and plantinga

Question 3

List the critiques of the ontological arguement

Answer 3

Gaunilo, Russell, Hick and Kant

Question 4

What is ontology?

Answer 4

A field within philosophy concerned with what there is and what existence means

Question 5

Tye ontological arguement uses deductive reasoning. What is deductive reasoning?

Answer 5

This means that if you agree with the premise of the arguement, it is logical or necessary to agree with the conclusion. However, you are, of course, able to disagree with the premises

Question 6

What does Anselm define god as?

Answer 6

A being than which nothing greater can be conceived

Question 7

How does Anselm prove his is omnipotent?

Answer 7

God would be greater if he were omnipotent, therefore god is omnipotent, since god is that which nothing greater can be conceived

Question 8

What does in intellectu mean?

Answer 8

In the mind

Question 9

What does in re mean?

Answer 9

In reality

Question 10

How does Anselm prove god exists?

Answer 10

Something that exists in reality is greater than something that exists in the mind. God must therefore exist in reality, since god is that which nothing greater can be conceived

Question 11

Anselm uses reductio and absurdum reasoning. What does this mean?

Answer 11

This is a way of disproving an arguement by showing it’s logical consequences are absurd or contradictory. He suggests it would be absurd to think of the greatest conceivable being as not existing in reality

Question 12

Summarise Anselm’s deductive arguement for god’s existence

Answer 12

P1: god is the greatest conceivable being
P2: to be the greatest conceivable being, God has necessary existence and must exist in reality
C: god exists

Question 13

How is the ontological arguement different from the teleological and cosmological arguements?

Answer 13

It uses a priori reasoning instead of a posteriori reasoning

Question 14

Define necessary existence

Answer 14

A being which cannot be thought not to exist and wasn’t brought into being by anything else

Question 15

Define contingent existence

Answer 15

A being or entity which depends on something else for its existence as it can be conceived of as not existing

Question 16

Define a priori reasoning

Answer 16

A form of reasoning independent of experience - through reason alone

Question 17

Define asiety

Answer 17

The idea of a.being which is independent and exists in and of itself, being self causing

Question 18

Anselm made reference to which psalm in his writings about the ontological arguement?

Answer 18

53

Question 19

Recite psalm 53

Answer 19

‘the fool says in his heart “there is no god”. They are corrupt and their ways are vile’

Question 20

What is the god of classical theism?

Answer 20

Largely seen as the judeo Christian sense of god

Question 21

What four characteristics are most commonly associated with the god of classical theism?

Answer 21

• omnipotent
• omnibenevolent
• omnipresence
• omniscient

Question 22

What is a synthetic statement?

Answer 22

One where the predicate is not necessarily part of the subject

Question 23

What did Anselm believe about the statement ‘god is the greatest conceivable being’?

Answer 23

He thought this was an analytic a priori statement - the existence of God is part of the concept of god

Question 24

What was guanilos response to Anselm’s ontological arguement called?

Answer 24

The list island refutation

Question 25

Explain the lost island refutation

Answer 25

Replace the world god with island and it is easy to see how Anselm’s arguement is flawed. If o e arguement was sound then the other must also be sound. But clearly they aren’t, so they’re both unsound. Guanilo beloved you could not move from thought to reality

Question 26

Briefly describe guanilo

Answer 26

• contemporary to Anselm
• French monk
• his letter to Anselm was called ‘on behalf of the fool’

Question 27

How did Anselm respond to guanilos critique?

Answer 27

Says that guanilo had ignored the fact that God has necessary existence. God has necessary existence, whereas everything else in the universe has contingent existence

Question 28

How long after Anselm’s time did Aquinas’s criticisms come?

Answer 28

Around 200 years

Question 29

Explain Aquinas’s first problem with the ontological arguement

Answer 29

Aquinas believed god’s existence was not self evident. It is not impossible to have a mental concept of the non existence of God, as there are many atheists in the world who hold this belief. Aquinas thinks the statement ‘god exists’ is not analytic and god is not a necessary being, since you can imagine a world where he did not exist

Question 30

Explain Aquinas’s second problem with the ontological arguement

Answer 30

God is transcendent so we can’t describeor define him using human language.

Question 31

Aquinas developed the idea of via negatival when talking about his, what does this mean?

Answer 31

Advocated the use of analogy when speaking about God. we can only understand his by saying what he is nit

Question 32

What was Aquinas’s third problem with the ontological arguement?

Answer 32

He believed you had to do more than just define god into existence. He believed it need firm evidence, which he looked to provide in his five ways

Question 33

What is David and Marjorie haigts criticism of the ontological arguement?

Answer 33

-You could invert the logic to prove that the devil must exist
- Anselm countered this by saying that God has necessary existence, whereas the devil wouldn’t

Question 34

What was Bertrand Russels’s issue with the teleological arguement?

Answer 34

Like Kant, he argued that existence could not be treated as a predicate, and that something should only be described as having existence when occurances can be found in the world. Only if there are such examples can predicated be discussed

Question 35

Why does Bertrand Russel think the statement ‘Tom exists and has blonde hair’ is an excessive statement?

Answer 35

Because Tom’s hair colour could only be meaningfully discussed on the basis that Tom exists in the world

Question 36

Why does Hume dispute the idea of necessary existence?

Answer 36

Because it will always be possible for us at any time to conceive the non-existence of something we formerly conceived to exist

Question 37

Why does Hume consider God’s existence to be contingent rather than necessary?

Answer 37

Because there is no contradition in saying God does not exist

Question 38

What does Hume consider strange about necessary existence?

Answer 38

That it is attributed only to God