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The Scriptorium

Saturday, March 10, 2012

The Ontological Argument (Paper)

This is a short essay written for the class of Dr. Thomas Williams, University of South Florida, Medieval Philosophy and involves the response of Anselm to his critic Gaunilo in his work The Proslogion. From this argument stems the current ontological view. Enjoy.


    Anselm's reply to Gaunilo, as illustrated in the Prosologion is, in effect, a restating of his earlier remarks in a slightly clearer manner. By this it is meant that the interpretation of Gaunilo's objections that Anselm uses portrays Gaunilo as saying, “... That something than which a greater cannot be thought is in the understanding no differently than from that which cannot be be thought according to the true nature of anything at all...{and} that it does not follow (as I say it does)that that than which nothing greater can be thought exists in reality as well simply because it exists in the understanding...”1In response to this thesis on the part of Gaunilo, Anselm replies that, “Furthermore, if it can be thought at all, it necessarily exists.”2 Therefore the reader can assume that according to Anselm, any thing can be thought of of which nothing greater can be thought, that it must exist.
   
   The philosophical principle behind this lays in many different sources but Anselm argues that, in accordance with divine simplicity, if you can think of God (i.e. that than which nothing greater can be thought) he must exist have always existed because otherwise you would have brought the idea of God into existence thereby giving God a beginning. However God is the essence of Beginninglessness because he is a perfect being. Therefore if God does not have a beginning then God would have existed before you thought of Him, thereby making Him a Necessarily Existent being.

   Anselm goes further in saying that it is absurd to think that than which nothing greater can be thought could exist only in the understanding. In order for that than which nothing greater can be thought to exist in the understanding it exists there because it is understood, comprehensible. He supports this by saying that if the idea exists in the understanding then it must have been thought. For a person to have something that they do not understand in their understanding is a negation. From there he lays out the idea that if it were to exist solely in the understanding then it is not that than which nothing greater can be thought but rather that than which something greater can be thought.
    
   At this juncture he refers to the lost island idea. He says that it is impossible for someone to think of a lost island, the most perfect island in existence, as not existing because when it is described to a person they understand what it is. If they were thinking of something that than which nothing greater can be thought, they would be thinking something that cannot be thought. Therefore he says they would in essence not be thinking at all.3 Because of this that than which nothing greater can be thought cannot be thought not to exist.4

   Anselm's final argument in support of his idea for the existence of that than which nothing greater can be thought to exist in reality, he says that the argument that that than which nothing greater can be thought is impossible to think due to our lack of understanding is not correct. He points out that when we think of good we compare goodness based on things that are familiar to us and that we understand. We use these understandings to formulate the highest good. He says that the same thing applies when we think of anything in relation to God.


1Hyman, Arthur, James J. Walsh, and Thomas Williams. "Proslogion." Philosophy in the Middle Ages: the Christian, Islamic, and Jewish traditions. 3rd ed. Indianapolis: Hackett Pub., 2010. 161-181. Print. p. 176a
2ibid
3Ibid pp 177b
4ibid

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