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'Gaunilo offers the most convincing criticism of the Ontological…
'Gaunilo offers the most convincing criticism of the Ontological argument' - (26/11)
Gornillo
Overload Argument
Proslogion 2 - He says that it is possible to understand the defintion Anselm gave without committing oneself to accepting its existence or even reality
Proslogion 3 - He argued that one couldn't define God into existence by saying that God's perfection required existence
Uses idea of a 'perfect island' to counter Anselm's ontological argument. It is a type of argument which is called and
overload argument.
Kant
Existence isn't a predicate
Example of a yellow chair.
Anselm - Proslogion
Proslogion 2
God is a being than which nothing greater can be conceived
(TTWNGCBC)
It is greater to exist in the mind
(In intellectu)
and in reality
(in re)
than in the mind alone
Proslogion 3
God is a being than which nothing greater can be conceived
Necessary
existence >
Contingent
existence
Response to Gaunilo
You can't compare God to an island as God is a
necessary existence
whereas the island is a
contingent existence
.
Argument
only works for God
Descartes Ontological argument
'It is not in my power to concieeve God without existence, that is a being supremely prefect, and yet devoid of an absolute perfection, as I am free to imagine a horse with or without wings.'
God's existence needed to be discovered rather than proven
Ontological Argument
Strengths
Descartes
- Existence is a predicate the same way that 3 sides is a predicate of a triangle
Plantinga
- Pointed out that the counter-argument offered by Gaunilo couldn't possibly undermine Anselm's Ontological argument due to the fact that an island has no intrinsic maxima that could make it perfect due to it being a contingent existence whereas the existence of God is necessary
Charles Hartshorne
- Agreed that existence added to the properties of a thing.
Used example of sickness
. Discussing the symptoms of an illness could never compare to actually having the illness. The existence adds to the understanding of the illness. Therefore we can say that the existence of God is more than just a
de dicto
definition.
Weaknesses
Counters Aquinas' idea that God isn't self evident offered in Summa Theologica.
Ontological argument assumes we know God's nature which in reality is impossible.
Kant argued existence isn't a predicate. The statement 'God exist' is of the form
S
is
P
(Subject is predicate). This is wrong due to that fact that existence doesn't operate like other properties and therefore cannot be categorised like one of them. Therefore we can't class existence as a predicate.
Bertand Russell - Argued in his book ' Philosophy of Language' that we use instantiation to describe abstract things. Therefore if we can't instantiate God then he cannot exist.