Well I'm agnostic. I was a philosophy major in college and wrote several papers on the existence of a god. In order to preserve a logical and civil debate I have included a paper I wrote that refuted our ability to concieve of a god. It is rather long for this post but if your interested here it is.
Semper,
Jester
God: Is He Really in the Understanding?
For centuries there have been philosophers and theologians attempting to prove the existence of a God. Some of their arguments have been based a posteriori on the presupposition that there is a reason or cause for the universe we live in. Consequently these arguments have been termed teleological and cosmological arguments for the existence of God. However, the other argument for god’s existence that has been around for nearly nine hundred years relies totally a priori on the conception of God to prove Its existence. This argument has been the center of inquiry and criticism by many philosophers since it was first put forth by St. Anselm during the eleventh century AD. There have been many philosophers, such as Descartes, that have agreed with the premises of the argument but refuted its logic and in turn revised it in an attempt to provide a sound version of the argument. At the same time there are many other philosophers that refute the logical validity and the premises of Anselm’s argument along with Descartes revised version of it. I suggest that it is impossible to attain a clear and universal idea or conception of a being than which no greater can be conceived. However, I cannot get into the criticisms of the argument until I first explain it as it was put forth originally by St. Anselm, and latter by Descartes revision of it.
In the Proslogium, St. Anselm is on a quest to attain a better understanding of God as well as provide a logical argument for Its existence. It is the later that he attempts do first, doing so completely a priori, by means of a proof by contradiction. First, in chapter two, Anselm defines god as “a being than which nothing greater can be conceived.” Then he goes on to say that by this definition it is absurd to deny god’s existence. He states, “…this very fool, when he hears of this being of which I speak-a being than which nothing greater can be conceived-understands what he hears, and what he understands is in his understanding; although he does not understand it to exist.” Anselm argues, God, being that which nothing greater can be conceived, is in the understanding, but it can also be understood to exist in reality. But to have god-a being in which a greater is inconceivable-exist in the understanding alone and at the same time understand this same god to exist in reality, argues Anselm, is to understand a being that is greater than the being than which no greater can be conceived. According to Anselm this absurd, for a being in which no greater can be conceived could only be the greatest of all beings if it existed. So, for god to exist in the understanding alone would make it inferior to a greater being, a being that exists. Therefore, god exists both in the understanding and in reality.
The first criticism of this argument to surface was based on the claim that Anselm’s argument could be applied to any object, in which no greater could be conceived. It was included in Anselm’s Proslogium in which Anselm gave a rebuttal to the criticism. The criticism written by Gaunilo, a monk of Marmoutier, was entitled On Behalf of the Fool. In it Gaunilo argued against the logic of Anselm - that real existence could be shown merely by the understanding of the being than which no greater can be conceived. Gaunilo wanted to suggest that such a being should first be proved to exist and then, from the fact that no greater can be conceived, that it exists necessarily. He says “For it should be proved first that this being itself really exists somewhere; and then, from the fact that it is greater than all, we shall not hesitate to infer that it also subsists in itself.” With this he gives an example of a lost island that is greater than all lands. In other words it is an island in which no greater can be conceived but cannot be found. Now he argues that if someone were to tell him of such a place he would have no trouble understanding what is meant of such an island. But by the logic of Anselm this island would have to exist in reality because to exist in reality is better than just existing in the understanding alone. Well, Gaunilo says that he would be the greater fool to believe that such was true, for first he would need it to be proved that the “hypothetical excellence” of such an island actually existed. Basically Gaunilo argues that he is capable of having conceptions in his understanding that do not posit their existence.
In response to Gaunilo’s criticism Anselm argues that his argument only applies to the one being in which no greater can be conceived. It only works for such a being because to deny that a being in which no greater can be conceived exists in reality would require that it does not exist in the understanding as well. But Anselm argues that a being in which no greater can be conceived does exist in the understanding, for one understands what is meant by such a being. And to understand such a being means that one understands such a being to exist. Thus, a being that exists necessarily cannot be conceived not to exist, to do so would result in a contradiction. In general there can only be one being than which no greater can be conceived, so the argument only works for this one being.
On behalf of Anselm I think the argument is valid in that the subject of the argument, that is, a being than which no greater can be conceived, only applies to that particular being. For such a being to be understood it has to be such that it can’t compare to anything else. I think the idea Anselm has of god is such that its greatness is infinite. The concept of such a being would have to include existence on the basis that existence of a being is greater than its nonexistence. This of course depends on the object, for it could be argued that some things are better not to exist, such as nuclear weapons for example. But when one is talking of a being in which no greater can be conceived this being must include all the goodness required of such a being. For a morally right being is greater than a morally wrong being. In such a case it would be better for a morally right being to exist than not exist. But one must be careful to attribute such qualities and suppositions to such a being from the definition that Anselm has provided. By his definition his intentions were not to have the concept of god rely on only what we can conceive. Rather his definition of god is meant to keep god incomprehensible. But nonetheless, according to Anselm the concept of god is meant to be easily found in the understanding.
A latter objection to the argument is based on the rationale that the concept of god together with the thought of it existing does not posit its existence. This observation was put forth by Descartes in the “Fifth Meditation” of his Meditations on First Philosophy. To explicate this further, Descartes’ objection to the argument is that the existence of god does not rest on the premise: god cannot be conceived to exist in the understanding without it also existing in reality. Rather the necessity of god’s existence lies within itself. In other words the fact that one cannot think of god without thinking of god existing does not necessitate its existence. God’s existence necessarily follows from the essence of god. In Meditation V Descartes writes, “…I cannot conceive God without existence, it follows that He really exists; not that my thought can bring this to pass, or impose any necessity on things, but, on the contrary, because the necessity which lies in the thing itself.” Descartes gives an example using the concept of a mountain and valley. He says that he cannot conceive of a mountain without thinking of a valley, but just because this is so does not mean that a mountain and valley actually exist.
From this objection of Anselm’s argument Descartes puts forth a revised version of the argument that relies completely on the concept or essence of God. His argument is as follows:
1.) I have in my mind the idea of God-an infinitely all perfect being.
2.) Existence is a perfection.
3.) Therefore, God exists.
By no means did Descartes’ revision rid of any problems or criticisms of the argument. Some have argued that the definition or concept of God must be shown to be a true definition before God’s existence can be proved. Others have argued that existence is not a predicate for any definition of a subject. It was Leibniz that argued the former and Kant the later.
In his essay entitled Meditations on Knowledge, Truth, and Ideas Leibniz agrees that existence can be predicated from the concept of an infinitely all-perfect being. But he goes on to say that only if God is possible can it be shown that he exists. He writes, “Therefore existence can be predicated of God. But one must realize that from this argument we can conclude only that, if God is possible, then it follows that he exists.” Leibniz argues that it must first be shown that the definition given of God is a “real definition”. Furthermore, Leibniz says, “And so, in the same way, the fact that we think about a most perfect being is not sufficient for us to assert that we have an idea of it.” To me it seems that Leibniz is denying that we can have an idea of God. For the ontological argument rests on the supposition that we can have an idea of God, to deny that we have an idea of God would refute the conclusion of the argument. But he goes on to define a true idea or real definition as a thing which is possible, not to include a contradiction. With that he says that God-a most perfect being-is possible, so God exists necessarily.
In Critique of Pure Reason Kant argues, what I think are, his two main objections against the ontological argument. First, that it is not a contradiction to deny the existence of God. Second, that existence is not a predicate of any definition or concept of a thing. The first objection Kant raises argues that to deny Gods existence is the same as denying the concept of God. Kant writes, “Annihilate its existence in thought, and you annihilate the thing itself with all its predicates.” To deny the existence of God does not affirm its attributes, rather it denies them.
Kant continues by arguing that the predicate of existence adds nothing to the concept of God, rather it just affirms the possibility of the concept, God, existing with all of its predicates. This makes up his second objection to the ontological argument; that existence is not a predicate of the concept of God. For Kant the concept of a particular thing existing is not contained within the concept of the thing itself. The existence of a particular thing adds no more to the concept of a thing than does its nonexistence. Kant writes, “Thus the real contains no more than the possible.” So, the existence of God does not in any way increase the perfection of God, it only posits Gods existence with all of its predicates.
All of the criticisms so far explained have either attacked the predicts within the concept of God or the logic leading from the concept of God to the conclusion that God exists. However, is the argument valid, and furthermore is it sound? I find that both Anselm’s argument and Descartes version of the argument are valid. If all the premises taken together were to be true then the conclusion would have to be true. The problem with the argument that makes it unsound however, is the presupposition that one can have an idea of a perfect being. The entire argument, both versions, in order to make it a true proof for God’s existence, requires that the idea of a perfect being be in the understanding. But how can anyone have in their understanding an idea of God. If God is defined as a perfect being or a being than which no greater can be conceived, one must have a true idea of perfection regardless of which definition is used. But perfection in itself is often found to be subjective. What one individual finds to be a better, or greater, attribute another individual finds to be negative attribute. For such a concept of God to hold, perfection would have to be something all in its own separate from everything else. But I think that perfection is sometimes dependent upon the observer. Of course one could argue that some things can be conceived to be perfect due to the concept or definition of the thing. For example, one can conceive of a perfect circle by understanding that of all of its radii must be equidistant from its center. However, no one could ever recognize a perfect circle because one would have to measure all of its radii, in which there are an infinite number. When one speaks of God-an all perfect being-they attribute all possible perfection’s to It. Now some perfections are subjective, as I stated previously. So which perfection is more perfect? Now this is an absurd question, because something cannot be more prefect than perfect. To be perfect is to be perfect. But if one has in their understanding an idea of God they assign all possible perfection’ to it. So one individual’s understanding of God is different from another individual’s understanding of God. So who has the correct understanding of God? Well, to use Anselm’s definition of God-a being than which no greater can be conceived-the concept of God does not depend on what an individual can conceive. But Anselm still affirms that this concept of God is in the understanding. But as I have already argued this isn’t possible because there are so many different understandings of the same concept. Whereas the concept of a perfect circle is understood only by the mathematical axioms that determine it to be a perfect circle. Therefore, since the idea of God cannot be in the understanding it is not a contradiction to deny that God exists.
There are many critics of the ontological argument as well as many in favor of the argument. It has been the subject of criticism and revision for nearly nine hundred years. Yet, it has never had the persuasive power to make a nonbeliever a believer and vice versa. Nonetheless, the argument is very intriguing in that it attempts to prove its conclusion completely a priori from the mere concept of the object of the conclusion. However, I don’t think that just concepts alone, of such a being, could ever completely convince one that it actually existed, in the same way that the concept alone of any thing else, actually existing, could convince one that it did in fact exist. It’s a nice effort though.
The most reasonable idea of how life came about, counter to Creationism, that I've ever heard is that we are a statistical probability. In the BILLIONS of stars that are out there, there will be planets...millions if not billions...at some point the required ingredients for life would come together. Makes a bit of sense, eh?
