Does God Exist? 

A Critical overview on the Ontological Argument 

Before one can even begin to critique the ontological argument to God's existence, one must understand exactly what ontological is. Ontological is an area of philosophy that studies the nature of existence or being as such. The Ontological argument is based on the very being of god. Basically ontological arguments are arguments from nothing but analytic, a priori and necessary premises to the conclusion that God exists. The ontological argument is most commonly associated with St. Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, AD 1093 to 1109.

Anselm argues that we can conceive God as "a being than which none grater can be conceived." Yet, if we conceive such a being as existing only in the understanding, a greater being could be conceived, namely, one that also exists in reality. Anselm's strategy, then is to move from the admission that we have a concept of "a being than which none greater can be conceived" to the conclusion that God cannot be conceived not to exist.

Below are Anselm's own words, quoted from Proslogion, chapter 2, 1078.

"we believe that God is a being than which none greater can be thought. Now even a fool knows that 'a being which none greater can be thought' exists at least in his mind. But clearly, 'that than which a greater cannot be thought' cannot exist in the mind alone. It could be thought of as existing in reality as well, and that would be greater. In which case, 'that than which a greater cannot be thought' would be that than which a greater can be though! Since this is impossible, there obviously exists, both in the mind and in reality, something than which a greater cannot be thought." 

The words of Anselm are rather complicated. But in short `God' refers to the perfect being. But if this did not exist, it would not be perfect. Therefore it must exist. Anselm also maintains that it is possible to argue the existence of god through the actual meaning of the word `god'. The aim of this essay is to write a critical overview of the ontological argument, now that one has overview the views of the ontological argument, it can be critiqued.

Philosophers have been critiquing this theory for a number of years. In Anselm's day, a fellow monk, Gaunilo, accused him of making an illegitimate jump from existence in the mind to existence in reality. On such an argument, he said one could define anything into existence. As the argument states that if you suppose something exists in understanding, then it can actually exist in reality, and will then be even better than the one in understanding. A very good example of this would be; I could imagine the perfect holiday island, as it exists in my understanding, as I can imagine it, it may therefore exist in reality, and be even better than the one in my understanding.

On this matter I personally agree with Gaunilo, that it is simply impossible to leap from the existence in the mind into the existence in reality. This is simply impossible in my opinion.

A very simple version of the ontological argument would say that the word 'god' refers to the perfect being. But if this did not exist, it would not be perfect. Therefore it must exist. Simply meaning that god is too good not to be real. My first personal criticism to the argument is; Why? If he didn't exist, then why wouldn't it be perfect? My second personal criticism to the argument is that; If god does exist, and as he exists in reality, not just understanding, he would therefore be perfect, and there would be no better being. Well, what I find hard to believe is that he is perfect, surely if god exists in reality, we would be allowed or able to see or consider his imperfections, meaning that god would not then be perfect, and the whole ontological argument is flawed.

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Another argument that a German philosopher named Immanuel Kant insisted strongly on was that, the word 'exists' may not be used as a simple quality of god. The word 'God' may indeed include goodness, almightiness, wisdom etc, but not 'existence' and therefore the argument that it is possible to dispute the existence of god through the actual meaning of the word `god' is also completely flawed. I also strongly agree with Immanuel Kant. It is simply impossible to define existence of something through the actual meaning of the word. For example I could be trying to define the existence of ...

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