The Ontological Argument

The Ontological Argument

The ontological argument claims to demonstrate that the statement 'God exists' is analytically true- meaning that it would be simply nonsense or incoherent to doubt God's existence. 

Onto= 'being'

Analytic statements

An analytic statement is a statement which is impossible to think it is false. For example, a triangle having three internal angles adding up to 180 degrees is an analytic statement because, it is impossible and ridiculous to think of a triangle in any other way. 

''An analytic or logically necessary proposition is one which it would be incoherent to suppose to be false; 'all squares have four sides' and 'red is a colour' are logically necessary, because it would ve incoherent, make no sense to suppose that red could be anything except a colour, or that a square could have only three sides''- Richard Swineburne

Synthetic statements

A synthetic statement is a statement in which the statement's truth or falsity depends on evidence which has to be collected. 

Anselm

St Anselm (1033-1190) never doubted the existence of God. His argument for the existence of God is an a prior arg because, it relies on knowledge gained from reasoning and not from sense. 

Anselm responded to the opening of Psalms 14 and 53 which begin 'The Fool says to himself, ''There is no God,''. Anselm set out to prove the foolish atheist was wrong. He began with his definition of God which says it is impossible for there to be a more perfect being 

''God is 'a being than which nothing greater can be conceived.''- Anselm

Anslem's first onto arg

1. God is the greatest possible being which can be conceived (thought) of.

2. God may exist either in the mind alone (in intellectu) or in reality (in re) as well.

3. Something which exists in reality and in the mind is greater than something that exists as an idea in the mind alone

4. Therefore, God must exist in reality and in the mind

Anslem's arg is a reply to the fool who says there is no God, for the fool to say ''there is no God'' the fool has to have an idea in her or his mind of what God 'is'. Anslem suggests that this definition in mind is that God is the 'greatest possible being'.

A then points out that it is greater to exist in reality than in the mind alone. What matters for A is that what exists in reality as well as in the mind is greater than something that is only an idea in the mind. 

Existence is a predicate

The word 'predicate' in philo is udes to indicate an intrinsic property or quality of something, it tells us something about the nature of a thing. 

A claims that it is part of God's nature that God exists; a predicate of God is God's existence. He claims that existence is a predicate of God therefore, God, being the greatest possible being, has to exist, since an idea in…