OAE 🤢

Question 1

What is thread 1?

Answer 1

Anselm’s ontological argument + Descartes
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Gaunilo’s perfect island (Anselm specific)
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Kant’s objection based on existence not being a predicate
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Discovering something exists changes our conecpt
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Discovering something exist changes our beliefs, not our concepts

Question 2

What is Thread 2?

Answer 2

Malcolm’s ontological argument
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Empiricist objection to a priori arguments for existence
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Hume’s fork is wrong
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These are not genuine exceptions

Question 3

What is Anslem’s ontological argument

Answer 3

• God is a being that wich nothing greater can be conceived
• The BNGC exists as an idea in the mind
• However, it is greater to exist in reality, than only in the mind
• So if it were to only exist in the mind then we could conceive of something greater than the BNGC of the mind, the BNGC of reality
• So if the BNGC existed it would exist in reality and in the mind
• Therefore the BNGC exists and is God.

Deductive and A priori

Question 4

What is Descartes’ Ontological argument

Answer 4

• I have an innate idea of God as a supremely perfect being
• A supremely perfect being has all perfections
• Existence is a perfection
• So God must exist as he is perfect

Deductive and A priori

Question 5

What is Gaunilo’s perfect island?

Anselm specific

Answer 5

Gaunilo replies with a parallel example:
- Imagine the greatest possible island, everything about it is perfect
- Using Anselm’s logic, the concept of the perfect island, would be greater if it also existed in reality
- So it must exist in reality
- But this is absurd

Question 6

Kant’s: Existence is not a predicate

Answer 6

Anselm says existence is greater than non existance, and Descartes says that existence is perfection:
- However, in both of these cases existence is not adding (and will never add) anything to the concept of god, it isn’t a predicate!
- 100 Thaylers example
- When we think of God, we are already assuming existence in our conception, but ony in our idea. Our idea of God having the attribute of existing doesn’t mean it does exist anymore than the thaylers would.

Question 7

Discovering something exists changes our conecpt

Answer 7

• A predicate would be real if it expanded or changed our concept of the subject.
• So finding out something existed like the loch ness monster, would then change our concept of the subject
• Allowing existence to act as a predicate in that situation.

Question 8

Discovering something exist changes our beliefs, not our concepts

Answer 8

• Discovering that the Loch Ness monster exists doesn’t mean I gain a new predicate, I just realise that my concept has something corresponding to it in reality
• If I became scared after finding this out, it isn’t because my concept has gained a predicate, but because I have realised that it isn’t just a concept

Question 9

What is Malcolm’s ontological argument

Answer 9

• God is defined as an unlimited being
• Either he exists or he doesn’t
• if he doesn’t exist then his existence would be logically impossible, as he couldn’t have just come into existence or been caused by something as this would make him limited
• If God does exist this means he must be necessary (for the same reason as above)
• So God is either impossible or necessary
• If God is impossible then the concept of God is self contradictory (as he would be an unlimited impossible being)
• The concept of God as necessary isn’t self contradictory
• So God’s existence is necessary

Question 10

What is Hume’s fork?

Answer 10

All knowledge is divided into -
Relations of ideas:
- A priori
- True by definition
- Analytic
And Matters of Fact:
- A posteriori
- Empirically verified
- Contingent

Question 11

Empiricist objections to a priori arguments for existence

Answer 11

Malcolm’s ontological argument cannot prove that God exists a priori. This is because:
- All existence claims are matters of fact
- They are only known through experience
- A prioi reasoning only establishes relations of ideas,

Question 12

Hume’s fork is wrong

Answer 12

An exception to Hume’s fork for example is that we can claim that abstract numbers like 7 exist despite the fact that we have never had experience of them.
We know of their existence a priori, and God is the same.

Question 13

These are not genuine exceptions

Answer 13

Abstract numbers do exist and we do have experience of them, we experience them through things that represent their