ভূমিকা

Shiavault - a Vault of Shia Islamic Books Philosophy of Religion (booklet) The Ontological Argument “But clearly that than which a greater cannot be thought cannot exist in the understanding alone. For if it is actually in the understanding alone, it can be thought of as existing also in reality, and this is greater...

Without doubt, therefore, there exists, both in the understanding and in reality, something than which a greater cannot be thought.” [St Anselm, Proslogion, Chapter 2] The ontological argument attempts to prove God’s existence through abstract reasoning alone. The argument is entirely a priori, i.e. it involves no empirical evidence at all. Rather, the argument begins with an explication of the concept of God, and seeks to demonstrate that God exists on the basis of that concept alone.

The argument is ingenious. It has the appearance of a linguistic trick, but it is a difficult task to say precisely what, if anything, is wrong with it. All forms of the argument make some association between three concepts: the concepts of God, of perfection, and of existence. Very roughly, they state that perfection is a part of the concept of God, and that perfection entails existence, and so that the concept of God entails God’s existence.

The ontological argument was first formulated in the eleventh century by St. Anselm in his Proslogion, Chapter 2. Anselm was a Benedictine monk, Archbishop of Canterbury, and one of the great medieval philosopher-theologians. Anselm’s ontological argument rests on the identification of God as “that than which no greater can be conceived”. Once it is understood that God is that than which no greater can be conceived, Anselm suggests, it becomes evident that God must exist.

A form of the ontological argument also constitutes the crux of Rene Descartes’ Meditations. Having presented the argument from dreaming - the sceptical argument that we are not justified in believing that there exists an external world on the basis of sense-perception because one might have the same sense-perceptions in a dream - Descartes rescues himself from scepticism on the basis of his belief in God.

God is no deceiver, Descartes argues, and so our clear and distinct perceptions of the external world can be trusted. Descartes arrives at the belief that there exists a trustworthy God via a form of ontological argument. The most prominent modern advocate of the ontological argument is Alvin Plantinga.