The Ontological Argument Essay

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

Anselm goes on to justify his assumption by using the analogy of a painter. In short, when a painter first conceives of what it is he wants to accomplish, he has it in his understanding but does not yet understand it to exist. He doesn’t understand it to exist because he has yet to construct his painting. His point in general is that there is a difference between saying that something exists in my mind and saying that I believe that something exists. Anselm goes on to introduce another assumption that could be considered a new version of the argument. He tries to show that God cannot possibly exist in the understanding alone by contrasting existing in the understand with existing in reality.

Descartes’ ontological argument is an echo of the original ontological argument for the existence of God as proposed by St. Anselm in the 11th century. To illustrate the background of the ontological argument, Anselm’s argument works within a distinct framework of ontology that posits the existence of God as necessity by virtue of its definition. In other words, for the mind to conceive of an infinite, perfect God, ultimately implies that there must indeed be a perfect God that embodies existence, for perfection cannot merely exist as a mental phenomenon. God is, according to Anselm, self-evident in the mind. Criticisms to this argument can be found in Anselm’s contemporary, Gaunilo, who argues that such an argument can be used to - put

The ontological argument can be stated in this way: “God is the greatest being imaginable. One of the aspects of perfection or greatness is existence. Thus, God exists.” Or put another way—“The fact that God can be conceived means that he must exist.”

The next point Anselm makes is that God existing in reality as well as understanding is greater than just understanding alone. Anselm then follows that with his next point: that it can be thought that God can exist in reality. “So even the fool must admit that something than which nothing greater can be thought exists at least in his understanding, since he understands this when he hears it, and whatever is understood exists in the understanding. And surely that then which a greater cannot be thought cannot exist only in the understanding. For if it exists only in the understanding, it can be thought to exist in reality as well, which is greater” (Proslogion Chapter 2). The first point is self-explanatory. Proving God exists would be much easier if God existed in reality and understanding compared to understanding alone. Similarly, proving a cyclops existed would be much easier if you saw, captured, and defined it as a cyclops than just being able to define a cyclops. It is a reasonable assertion.

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 :

Prior to reconstructing the argument, I will inspect the 'a priori' ontological argument, an argument that is solely justified through reasoning alone and based upon concepts and logical relations. To begin with, Anselm introduces "the fool", one that denies the existence of a greater conceivable being. He argues that this "fool" understands what is conceived but does not believe it to actually exist. The fool merely conceives of such a being to exist in his mind, because he has been told of its existence. Anselm adopts "the fool's" understanding of God's existence to prove his a priori argument, as if God exists in the understanding alone, but can be conceived to exist in reality, then God must exist in reality.

Existence being am inherent property of God’s essence is why Anselm believes God’s existence to be self-evident. However, as Anselm states “the fool has said in his heart, There

St. Anselm defines God as the greatest being that can ever be thought of. He then explains how people who believe in God, and people who do not believe in God, all have God in their understanding. This means that these people understand that God is that being in which nothing greater can be thought. Then St. Anselm explains that existing in the understanding, and existing in reality are not the same. He believes that existing in reality is actually greater than existing in the mind alone.

The ontological argument was first developed by St. Anselm. In his address, Anselm considered the Fool of Psalm 14, who held the belief that there is no God. He justified that the Fool’s argument was indeed self-undermining. In the ontological argument, Anselm argued that denying that God exists shows that God does exist. He labeled God as a unique perfect being; all-knowing, all-good, and all-powerful. In his argument, Anselm draws the distinction between “existing in the mind” and “existing in reality”. The example provided was when a person intends on doing something, it exist in the mind; whereas when a person has actually done something, it exist in reality. However, there are many things that exist only in reality such as the example

730012506 PHIL 134H Paper # 1 Anselm’s Ontological Argument Eleventh century French monk, Anslem of Catenbury, offered a deductive argument proving the existence of God. In order to truly grasp the argument, we must first attempt to understand the philosopher and his own ideologies. Anslem preludes his proof by stating his profound faith in God, consequently affirming that it is only through God’s enlightening that his understanding can reach as high as God. He also adds that he who says in his heart that there is no God is a fool, per the Bible.

Now, based off of these proofs made by Anselm, he believes that since God is that which nothing

Anselm in this case defines God as “a being than which nothing greater can be conceived” (Anselm 30). Ontological arguments tend to be a priori, which is an argument that utilizes thoughts as opposed to empirical evidence to prove validity. Anselm addresses the Atheist fool in an attempt to disprove him “since the fool has said in his heart, There is no God?”(Anselm, 30). Anselm stressed that it is obligatory to recognize God as a perfect being that cannot be improved upon, and if someone understands the concept of God, then God exists in that person’s understanding. It is greater to exist in reality than just simply the understanding. The fool understands the concept of God. Therefore the fool has God in his understanding. Suppose God exists only in the understanding of the fool and not in reality. We could then think of something exactly as it existed in the fools understanding but it can also exist in reality, and the being we conceived of would be greater than the being that exists in the fools understanding. Therefore God exists not only in the understanding of the fool but also in reality. By showing that God exists in reality as well as in the understanding, we see that it is imperative that we should believe in God and that it is indeed reasonable.