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# Ontological argument/Talk

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My own objection to the ontological argument is simply this: The only thing that it proves, is that we can conceive the greatest conceivable being to really exist. If we conceive that this greatest conceivable being really exists, it does not get any greater in our conception by really existing outside my conception.

From a wholly different angle, the argument uses the premisse that we can conceive this greatest conceivable being. It is very much the question whether we can conceive the greatest conceivable being. I think many theists would agree if I said that God cannot be completely conceived by us at all. There is also the question whether there even exists something like a 'greatest conceivable being'. There might well be for every conceivable being a greater one. Or there might be two beings such that neither is greater than the other, nor any being that is greater than both.

-- Andre Engels

Ontological Argument: Bias

You asked me to point to evidence of bias in this article.

  I was not clear enough. I was not pointing to the article as an example of an unbiased one (I think it is quite obviously biased!), though the following could very easily have been construed that way: "Suppose you go to the ontological argument (where I have presented the argument) and you spot something that hints at my own bias. Then you point it out to me; and I remove the alleged hint. Where bias is perceivable, it is also removeable." By the way, I think the latter, which was the point, is entirely true. Thanks for your comments. I'll get to work on it later. --LMS

I think in this article, the evidence is pretty clear. My first piece of evidence is that the article is that devotes 3 paragraphs to the formulation of Anselm's argument, , at least 11 paragraphs (depending on how you count them) to various critiques of the argument, and 0 paragraphs to it's contemporary defenders.

Moreover you preface the original presentation of Anselm's argument with "now, just for the sake of argument," which immediately tips the reader off that you are distancing yourself from the argument you are about to present. In one sense this is fair and appropriate, you aren't presenting your own view, you are presenting what you take to be Anselm's view. You could do the same work, by prefacing your presentation of Anselm's argument with something like "Anselm argues that:." On the other hand the form of your presentation of Anselm's argument diverges enough from the way he himself presents it that you could be accused of putting your words in Anselm's mouth, if you did not rework the entire paragraph. (This is not a critique of your presentation – I think you do a reasonable job of communicating the core of Anselm's argument to a modern audience.)

Your cite traditional arguments against the ontological argument, but then don't cite the counter arguments presented by later theistic philosophers. Nor do you mention that the ontological argument is only one of Anselm's arguments for the existance of God. Moreover, you don't even mention the prominent theory that Anselm's ontological argument is not a part of anything resembling contemporary apologetics, and was likely not intended to convince non-theists. Proponents of this view have a comprehensive interpretive strategy for reading Anselm's works in terms of his own comments that they were about "faith seeking understanding." Which they take to mean that many of the "proofs" are demonstrations which show the rational coherence of a theistic worldview which was presupposed.

Another objection to the whole article is that it takes the first (and arguably the weakest) formulation of the ontological argument as the definitive case. Modern philosophers (at least one of whom I respect) have reworked the argument in far more sophisticated form, and these arguments (even if they are flawed) deserver more than a passing nod of the head in the final sentence.

  By the way, I also never claimed on behalf of the article that it needed no further work. ;-) It sounds like you're certainly the man to revise it. As to my own objection, I was planning on removing that entirely. --LMS

Ok. So I hope I've explained why I think this work does not have a [Neutral Point of View]?. But of course, this is less troublesome to me than to you. I think it's a perfectly good starting place. And I'd like to see someone who is more supportive of the argument put their contributions to the mix, so that the two sides can work together to make a more complete, accurate, and fair, presentation of all sides on the issue.

For me, the key virtues we should strive for are 1) Accuracy, 2) Fairness, 3) Generosity, and 4) Humility.

I think the value of accuracy speaks for itself, though I think what is most troubling to me is when someone puts their own ideas in the mouth of someone else, and this is sometimes very easy to do. Fairness is also simple enough to explain, you have to present the best arguments of both sides on an issue. By Generosity, I mean something very much like Positive tone. Last, but not least, I think there's a responsibility you have when reporting on someone else's work, to remain in the background as much as possible, which is part of what I mean by saying that we should strive for humility.

Most of the problems you point out, could be avoided through the application of these four virtues, which are positive, and which I see as achievable (at least in theory), while I still think [Neutral Point of View]? is conceptually impossible to achieve.

I'm not sure we can go much farther with this discussion, but I'll start adding to the philosophy section of the Wikipedia and we can see if my contributions fit your standard… I have to believe that they will be fine, since so much else on the Wikipedia seems to OK to you, and biased to me. --MarkChristensen

  Er, no, I don't think a lot of stuff on Wikipedia is perfectly unbiased; but I think a lot of it makes a reasonable first pass at being so. Almost all of these articles need a lot more work. This is a work-in-progress (which is one of the things that makes Wikipedia so much fun to work on). The ontological argument, though, as I said on Larrys Text, doesn't even make a reasonable first pass at being so. :-) By the way, the first thing you might do is help to revise the ontological argument. It obviously does need revision. I thought you did an excellent job with the rationality of atheism. --LMS

     I moved all this talk from [The Ontological Argument/Talk]?, since I thought it was valuable, and that page now redirects to this one...

I've also done a bit of work on the article, and I think the first half is a bit better. I've removed the first and second person references, and done a little work on set up. I don't think I've made substantial changes to the logic of Larry's presentation, (though by removing the second person, the argument now relies not on the reader's ability to have a concept of God, but on "someone" having that ability), but I have tried to clarify the presentation, and formalize it just a bit. I don't have time to do a throurogh re-working of the objections to the arguemnt, but if the changes in the first part pass muster, I'll try to do at least something to improve the second part. In an ideal world, I'd like to see several things happen to this page:

1. A subpage discussing how to understand Anselm's argument, and discussing the ways that the text is interpreted by contemporary scholars.
2. lLnks to contemporary reformulations like Goedels ontological proof as well as to pages which describe the counter arguments of people like Russel and Hume.
3. Some information about the presupositionalist interpertation of Anselm's notion of "faith seeking understanding" as it relates how we should understand his "proofs." Karl Barth is the key figgure here.
4. A link to the text of Anselm's argument in translation, and in it's origonal form.

BTW, Larry, unless you're against it, I'll have to move the contents of your personal objection over here to the talk page. --Mark Christensen

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