St. Anselm Of Canterbury

In the bible, it says that “Fools say in their hearts, "There is no God” (Psalms 14:1). Anselm's reflection to this has become known as the Ontological Argument. Anselm defines God by saying God is that “which nothing greater can be conceived.” One way to interpret this phrase is to define “God” as maximal perfection, i.e. the greatest possible being. Anselm justifies his argument by using the idea of a painter. When a painter first knows of what it is he or she wants to accomplish, they have it in their understanding but does not yet understand it to exist. They don’t understand it to exist because they have yet to construct their painting. He is trying to say that there is a difference between saying that something actually exists in my mind and saying that I believe that something actually exists. when you hear the word square, you picture a square, or when you hear the word circle, you picture a circle. Anselm argued when humans hear the word God, they think Supreme Being. When I hear the word “God,” I recognize a God that I know from my personal experiences, but I also know that this God of mine is also working through the lives of everyone, not just mine. He has an intimate oneness with all of us, even if we don’t recognize or know it. I don’t think the God I know of is worried about whether people are religious or not. I think this God is interested in exploring experience, through us.

To begin with, Anselm introduces the Ontological argument as a viral component of the religious aspect of mankind. The presence of a God should not be debated. He portrays this God as an all perfect being that represents the divine concept. He argues that no being is greater than God whether imagined or perceived by the human mind. From the human perspective of divinity, God’s existence is merely an idea of the mind. Even though man’s imagination can present an even higher being than God, it fails to make sense in philosophical principles since it is contradictory. Also, the existence of God can be conceptualized. This means that the senses of man are enough to act as proof of the presence of a being higher and more powerful than him. Philosophy allows for proof to be logical and factual as well as imaginative. From this point, the objection to an idea or imagination such as the existence of God makes his

Anselmʻs argument for the existence of God. This objection rejects the premise of my argument that a perfect island as Guanilo delineates cannot be the greatest thing that anyone has ever thought of because it does not possess qualities comparable to a God. The objection would argue that a perfect island could be the greatest thing that has ever been thought of if it were able to provide humans with anything they have ever wanted just as God seems to do for those who abide by him faithfully. This perfect island could essentially be able to create human beings and grant them eternal life. Since the idea of a perfect island could do anything that a God could do, it could be considered one of the greatest things that anyone has ever thought

This argument for God’s existence was developed by the twelfth century theologian and philosopher, Anselm. It is based on Anselm’s declaration that God is “that which nothing greater can be conceived.”

The Ontological Argument presented by Anselm is false because of premise two. Anselm argues that God’s existence is provable in a priori, this means that one knows God exists simply by reason alone and therefore does not need any prior experience to know it is true. In the next section, I will explain the premises and defend Anselm’s point. In the third section, I will explain how premise two is wrong.

In Chapter 2 of Anselm's Proslogian, Anselm offers what was later to be characterized as his Ontological Argument, which is an argument for God's existence he felt was so strong that even a fool as is said in Psalms 14:1- "who has said in his heart, 'There is no God'". Anselm's argument is as follows :

Anselm begins by defining God as “a being than which nothing greater can be conceived';. He continues by stating that “even a fool'; has the capacity to understand this definition of God and that whatever is understood exists in the understanding. Anselm now draws his first intermediate inference based on these initial premises; God must exist in the understanding, and is therefore a possible being. Aneselm next draws on the premise that if something exists in reality, it is greater than if it exists in the understanding alone. At this point in his argument

Throughout Proslogion Anselm defends his argument that “God is which nothing greater can be thought” by providing key elements. Anselm proposes that one cannot imagine a god that is greater, and even non-believers have a conception of the western god. Anselm asserts that since everyone has an understanding of god in their mind, then god exist in reality. This paper will evaluate some of the main key elements that Anselm uses to prove that the ontological argument is correct in Proslogion. I contend that Anselm does not exhibit proper terminology and provides vague statements and therefore his argument that “God is which nothing greater can be thought” is invalid.

Thomas Aquinas also had a critique of the ontological argument, that we as humans cannot know Gods nature, humans will all conceive of God in different ways, some conceptions of God even assign him a body; this argument couldn’t apply to all these conceptions, some of which are contradictory, this would mean it’s impossible to conceive of God in the way that Anselm has put forward. In order for the ontological argument to work you would need to know God perfectly, and since only God knows itself perfectly, only God could use this argument. The phrase “a being than which none greater can be imagined” is far too vague to be used in a strong argument.

We simply just cannot think of anything greater than God, which makes God 'that than which nothing greater can be thought'. Aquinas was another critic who replied to the ontological argument. He said that Anselm's definition of God is not immediately obvious. He said that God's existence is not self evident to human beings. He said that Anselm's move from mind to reality was simplistic and a problem.

Anselm's ontological argument is a philosophical argument which aims to prove God's existence. The ontological argument is an argument for God’s existence based on reason alone. According to this argument, there is no need to go out looking for physical evidence of God’s existence; we can work out that he exists simply by thinking about it logically. (Anon., 2004) Anselm’s argument is a reductio argument, it seeks to demonstrate that a statement is true by showing that an absurd result would follow from its denial. I will be discussing three objections to Anselm’s argument which I will reply to, namely: ‘the perfect island’ objection by Gaunilo; ‘existence is not a predicate’

In his ontological argument, St. Anselm aims to “refute the fool who says in his heart that there is no God” . This ‘fool’ has two important features: 1) he understands the claims that God exists and 2) he does not believe that God exists. Anselm works to show that this combination of features is unstable. Therefore, in his ontological argument, Anselm argues the following: 1) God is that than which no greater can be conceived, 2) if God is that than which no greater can be conceived then there is nothing greater than God that can be imagine; therefore: 3) there is nothing greater than God that can be imagined, 4) if God does not exists then there is something greater than God that can be imagined; therefore: 5) God exists . In this paper,

I will begin my paper by discussing the two major versions of the ontological argument by Anselm presented in the proslogion. The first being “Possible and actual existence”, and the second being “Contingent or Necessary”. One should start off with the first summarized in the standard form as follows: #1 It is a conceptual truth that God is a being than which none greater can be imagined. #2 God exists as an idea in the mind. #3 A being that exists as an idea in the mind and in reality is, other things being equal, greater than a being that exists only as an idea in the mind. #4 Thus, if God exists only as an idea in the mind, then we can imagine something that is greater than God. #5 But we cannot imagine something that is greater than

This conclusion can be demonstrated, not with Gaunilo's island argument, but through a basic question: what if Anselm's fundamental premise -- the definition of God as the that beyond which nothing greater can be conceived -- is false? This question is not asking if the definition of God is inaccurate, which leaves the way clear for Anselm's response to Gaunilo. Instead, the question is keyed to the possibility that God may, indeed, not exist. While the author of this paper denies the question as ultimately untrue (i.e., God does exist), it is a valid one to ask in just this type of a discussion. Anselm's argument requires an initial assumption of God as existing in some state -- at least in the mind. The idea that the thought of God's existence

The debate of the existence of God had been active since before the first philosopher has pondered the question. Anselm’s Ontological Argument was introduced during the 11th century and had stood deductively valid until the 18th century. Then there are the arguments to aim disprove God, such as the Argument from Evil.