If God is a perfect being, God must necessarily exist bec a perfect being cannot not exist & be perfect ?

Question

This is the *ontological argument* proving by logical reasoning that God exists. It was proposed by St Anselm. Where is the flaw that refutes the *proof*?

Its called an indirect proof or proof by contradiction.

I can see alot of hurting heads, hence the natural tendency to dismiss it all as nonsense. Any-body or more accurately any-mind that has grappled with this ontological argument/ontological proof always feels the MENTAL strain., It is a topic in the philosophical branches of logic and metaphysics. It tries to prove the conclusion that God exists (in the physical world) because God "already* exists apriori(in the mind). Thus the metaphysical issue of the physical existence of God follows from logical reasoning from premises(which are assumptions (ideas in the mind) ) that combine logically to automatically lead us to the Big Conclusion. The 3 premises are 1)God is perfect and 2), Anything perfect by definition(by meaning of the word "perfect" in the mind) must exist because existence is a necessary attribute of being perfect and 3) anything that exists in the mind is there, if and only if, it already exists in reality.

Now do you see the flaw? The parentheses provide the clues.

BTW, I have used the shorter word "perfect" as a subtitution for Anselm's much longer phrase " a being, than which nothing greater can be conceived."

I think Choice of Best philosophical A is between Poisoned Enchantress and ScaliaAlito.

My Q was based on my reading of a 1960 paperback book entitled _Six Secular Philosophers_ by Lewis White Beck. Specifically it was based on this quoted paragraph: "The ontological argument was invented by St.Anselm in the 11th century, but was rejected by St Thomas Aquinas. It was revived in the 17th century by Descartes & was used by Spinoza. It is meant to prove the existence of God from the definition of God as a perfect being. Any characteristic (predicate) which is implied by the definition of a thing must apply to it. A perfect being, the argument runs, must possess all perfections, for otherwise it would not be perfect. Existence is a perfection; therefore, God exists. Just as a "triangle that does not have 3 sides" is a self-contradictory concept, so also a "nonexistent perfect being" is said to be self contradictory."

I believe my Q properly addresses the ideas in the paragraph & it is a shorter version of the argument that poisoned enchantress' A accurately summarizes

Beck in the next paragraph following the one just quoted writes: "Kant refutes this argument by showing that "exists" is not a predicate at all, & therefore it cannot be a predicate of a perfect being, even if a perfect being should in fact exist. Though in grammar the word "existent" is as good as a predicate as the word "perfect" & each obeys all the grammatical rules for the use of adjectives, logically, from the standpoint of how these words behave in inference, they are quite different. When one says of something that it exists, one is not ascribing a property to it, as when he says it is blue or it is perfect; **a concept of a nonexistent thing X contains all the predicates that the concept of an existing X contains, for "existence" is not a predicate contained in , & therefore to be proved by, a concept.** Kant's demonstration of this is sound, but it is very complicated- Kant is never easy to read- ....

...so we shall present a modern version of the critique of the ontological argument which is simpler & easier to follow. " Portion between the double asterisks is my emphasis of the key point.

Beck goes on to give the simpler version of Kant's critique ---in much the same way I went about giving my simplified version of Anselm's argument.

So the Best A honor goes to:

Answer 1

Hello!

This question (or varients thereof) appears to have circled the Maypole more than a few times and I guess it's because quite a few folks consider it good for target practice.

Be that as it may, the "refutations" I've seen grossly mischaracterize, for various reasons, Anselm's argument. For starters, you state, "...the metaphysical issue of the physical existence of God follows from logical..." Traditional Christianity has NEVER asserted the "physical" existence of God. God is a Spirit Being (John 4:24). Perhaps you meant "actual" (distinct from the idea) existence? If so, then you made a typo and we may proceed.

Anselm describes distinct types of existence: necessary, contingent and impossible. He also describes existence in the intellect *in intellectu* and in reality *in re*. Something can exist in the mind or in reality, or both. A one-thousand sided plane exists in the former, but not the latter. The moon, however, exists in both.

Gaunilo's Perfect Island counterexample misfires because he either unwittingly echos Anselm or he puts his "island" in the wrong category. If the Perfect Island is a NECESSARY existence, then it is indistinct from God and, as such, is not a counterexample. If it is a *contingent* existence, then it is irrelevant because Anselm never argued that contingent beings must exist if they can be conceived to exist. For example, we can envision a world without the Statue of Liberty, but of course it *does* exist. We can also envision another Statue of Liberty in Los Angeles (intellectu, not re) yet we can conceive of a world with or without her. Nothing here is contradictory.

The critical component of Anselm's argument is existence is greater than nonexistence. This is where Kant comes in. Kant insisted existence is not a predicate and, hence, could not be considered *greater* than nonexistence. Perhaps this works for *contingent* beings like Hitler & Stalin, but Anselm is referring to a *Necessary Being*. The greatest Being conceivable is one that actually exists, for a non-existing God would have no knowledge or power.

If a Necessary Being exists, then it exists *necessarily*. It is impossible for a Necessary Being, if one exists, to *not* exist. It is a *must* be and not a *can* be. It is the essence of a Necessary Being to exist for there can be no contingency in what exists necessarily. Hence, when one conceives that which nothing greater is possible (i.e. a Necessary Being, maximal existence), one is conceiving a Being Who actually exists; and the Ontological Argument demonstrates that the conception such a Being does not exist logically reduces to absurdity.

There may be a flaw in Anselm's argument, but it's not nearly as easy to locate as some would allege.

Best wishes,
Scalia

Answer 2

For the ontological argument to be true, a number of core assumptions have to be true. But first, I'd like to restate what you said to something closer to what St Anselm said, if I may.

His argument goes a little more like this:
- God is the greatest thing imaginable.
- Existance is greater than non-existance.
- Therefore, God exists.

The first postulate is more a definition than anything else. But even this is arguable. If I find a brain-damaged person who is incapable of imagining anything greater than a pair of pants, does this suddenly mean that God is a pair of pants? Hardly.

As you can see, some would also dispute the existing is necessarily better or more perfect than not-existing. Certainly many of our ideas of perfection can be found in mathematics, which also does not physically exist in the real world either. And in many senses to exist is to be prone to change, corruption, and decay, if only to a minute degree. None of these qualities are typically ascribed to a god, and certainly not to an all-perfect one.

There is a third, implicit assumption in the argument which is that our imagination correlates to reality. This is essentially Gaunilo's "Perfect Island" refutation. If we accept that existance is necessarily greater than non-existance, then ANYTHING that we imagine to be perfect MUST exist by the same argument. We can imagine an island with a stripper factory and a beer volcano, but this imagination does necessarily make it so.

So basically the argument SEEMS difficult to refute at first, but perhaps that is only because EVERYTHING it says is completely questionable. Contrariwise, even if none of this is so, it doesn't prove either that there is no God... just that this argument doesn't hold up. Hume made a nice argument once demonstrating that you could never prove ANYTHING existed in this way. Check it out.

As for me... I'm just going to keep imagining that stripper factory.

Answer 3

Ahhh The agrument goes

1. That which nothing greater can be thought can be thought
2. Even the fool has an understanding of that which nothing greater can be thought
3. That which nothing greater can be thought is god
4. It is greater to exist in reality than understanding
Therefore
5. That which nothing greater can be thought exists in understanding and reality
6. therefore god exists

For me i'd firstly attack premise three. god is not close to my idea of what the greatest thing can be thought is and i have many friends who agree with me
premise 4...how do we even know this world is the 'real' world? And who knows i'm sure there is at least one person that thinks its greater to exist in understanding than reality. I don't like ruling by majority in philosophy so i'd say thats a valid flaw
Our idea of that which nothing greater can be thought is limited to the realm of this world and our knowledge. So just because we think its the greatest thing that can be thought doesn't mean it actually is

Man i'm sure theres more but I really can't remeber damnit
Hope that helps anyway :)

Answer 4

Its LOGICALLY solid, however the statement: God is a perfect being, may or may not be true; that will therefore cause the argument to breakdown or not. That simple. Oh and I do believe that God exists, but I find the Unmoved Mover argument a much more solid argument.

Answer 5

"We don't know if we can correctly comprehend a perfect being." Is the rebuttal to the famous ontological proof of God.

There IS however, an ontological disproof of God.

- The universe is the ultimate creation
- There is more merit to doing something with a handicap than not having one
- The ultimate handicap is non-existence
- Therefore, in order for God to be the supreme being, he must have created the universe while not existing

ergo, God does not exist.

Answer 6

The flaw is that everything in that statement is an assumption.

Assumption 1: God being perfect
Assumption 2: A perfect being cannot exist and be perfect

Here's an argument that refutes god is perfect.

Jealousy is the sin that got the devil cast from heaven. If god is perfect, why does he proclaim to be a jealous god?

Another...

How can something perfect, create something imperfect (humans)?

Another...

How can something perfect be bound by the laws of anything (nature)? God can't perform contradictory tasks...like create a rock to heavy for him to lift, etc...

There are infinite more arguments against the existence of god.

My favorite...If god is as loving, just, perfect, whatever as everyone says, how can he stand to watch a soul suffer for eternity for 100 years of sin? That's about as long as any of us are gonna live.

Bottom line, god doesn't exist. You can make up an infinite number of "proofs" for why he does, but the bottom line, is they are just questions, not proofs. Like the one above.

**EDIT**

Here's another assumption you have to deal with. Why does something have to exist in order to be perfect. Don't you think that existence can be a flaw in an of itself? This whole ontological argument is stupid. You can't just think of sh*t and because you did prove it exists. I like the example of the stripper factory and the beer volcano. It's horse sh*t and a waste of my damn time to answer this stupid question.

Answer 7

What is a perfect being?Good and evil must exist so that perfect can have any value.If Satan is perfectly evil and God is perfectly Good where does that leave us in the middle?There is no, if God is the perfect being, he is perfect for his purpose.The proof u seek is in what we become through our choices.If through our choice we become evil then Satan exists and if through our choice we became good then God exists.From the result we measure our proof.

Answer 8

The only form of perfection is non-existence. Anything that exists has degrees of existance (more or less). Only non-existence is perfect.

For example, either you have a vacuum, or you have something less than a vacuum. You have darkness, or you have something less than darkness.

So your premise that a perfect being cannot both "not exist" and "be perfect" is incorrect.. Non-existence is perfect, by definition.

Answer 9

It is not a proof, it is nonsensical. What people call God is a multi-dimensional field - in which we are all embedded -that is responsive to consciousness. They personify it as a "being" out of childishness. Read St. Augustine, Meister Eckhart or Erasmus.

Answer 10

a perfect being can actually not exist and remain perfect, simply by being a hypothesis of a perfect being, not a real perfect being. The ontological argument is not logical, just a flawed piece of semantics.