In which I try to show that St. Anselm is full of shit

[Aranfan]

So in Philosophy class I was introduced to St. Anselm's argument for God's existence. It was basically the following:

* God is defined as the being with all and only perfections
* It is more perfect to Exist than to Not Exist
* Therefore God exists, otherwise we would have a contradiction

I will now attempt to show why this argument is full of shit:

Let Object Z be defined as having the Following Qualities:

* Blueness
* Having the Shape of a regular Octahedron
* Non-zero angular momentum
* Existence
* Side length of 1 inch
* Position 5 inches above you're head
* Being Perceivable by sight and touch
* Always there (above your head)

If there is no blue spinning Octahedron above your head, then Anselm is full of shit, and defining something to exist doesn't make it so.

Please point out any errors in my reasoning.

[rhoenix]

The entire argument St. Anselm puts forth is flawed, merely because of the assumptions it makes, which are:

* There is a God
* Perfection is a pre-existing state
* Perfection is preferable to flaws

Personally, I don't like the very idea of perfection, and for one simple reason - it means that further improvement and discovery is impossible; it means we have hit the limit in that particular area, and can go no further; it means that the entire struggle of science to improve our own understanding of things is finite, which has so far shown to be flatly false. The concept of perfection is stifling to innovation.

As for your argument, you must first prove that object Z is "perfect," which is impossible.

[Kanastrous]

* It is more perfect to Exist than to Not Exist

I have some trouble with that part. Why would existence be more perfect than nonexistence? A nonexistent object cannot possibly have flaws, therefore it is flawless, therefore it's a flawless nonexistent object. 'Flawless' sounds pretty perfect, to me.

[OsirisLord]

This is why I've gotten sick of listening to "logical" proofs for God. St. Anselm, and all others trying to philosophically or logically trying to prove God are full of shit because they have no empirical data or testable predictions that could demonstrate that God is perfect, that God exists, and that existence is somehow more perfect then non-existence.

By the way he failed to define what "perfect" means in this context, since that can be a very vague and subjective term.

[Aranfan]

With the Anselm Proof, I was just repeating what my Philosophy teacher said, and he made it sound like a proof by contradiction. I'm trying to prove that the Contradiction proof doesn't work through Counter Example, that's why I defined Object Z to have the Quality of Existence, so that I can get straight to he heart of the matter without having to worry about the Perfection crap.

[OsirisLord]

With the Anselm Proof, I was just repeating what my Philosophy teacher said, and he made it sound like a proof by contradiction. I'm trying to prove that the Contradiction proof doesn't work through Counter Example, that's why I defined Object Z to have the Quality of Existence, so that I can get straight to he heart of the matter without having to worry about the Perfection crap.

So basically it's just a matter of boiling the argument down to the base concept which is "God exists because I just said he did".

[Stark]

You have to remember, these guys were working with MASSIVE critical blindspots; they were what would be considered modern hobbyists trying to cook up 'logical' proofs based on broken premises. Since none of them were able to actually consider the non-existence of god, unstated and unproven premises crop up all over their work.

What's sad is that anyone in the twenty first century thinks this shit is of significance beyond historical.

[Aranfan]

But is there anything wrong with my rebuttal?

[OsirisLord]

But is there anything wrong with my rebuttal?

No. The flaw in the argument is that stating that God must exist proves God exists. Likewise your rebuttal, while worded differently, still maintains that since part of said object's definition is that it exists, even though it's clear from observation that it doesn't.

[Feil]

Your argument doesn't postulate perfection of the octahedron or a useful substitute, therefore it doesn't work even under Anselm's butchered logic.

1Suppose that Anselm's logic is valid.
2Therefore his conclusion is valid, E.G. God exists.
3Consider a proof than which none, which more perfectly refutes the existence of God, can be conceived.
4Suppose that that proof exists in the imagination alone.
5A proof which perfectly refutes the existence of God more perfectly refutes the existence of God than a conception of such a proof which exists in the imagination alone.
6Therefore, if and only if we have conceived a proof than which none more perfect can be conceived, and one which is more perfect than it.
7This is a absurd.
8Therefore the proof cannot exist in the imagination alone.
9Therefore the proof exists in reality.
10Therefore there exists an irrefutable proof that God does not exist.
11Therefore God does not exist.
12Therefore God exists and does not exist.
13This is absurd.
14Therefore 1 is false.

[Tahlan]

St. Anselm's thinking is flawed because he inherently begin's with a concept of God. He's looking to prove what he already believes.

Why they still teach this stuff isn't such a mystery. We build "mental muscles" by thinking about this stuff, going through the exercise of critical thinking. Just there's so much crap to wade through to get to the good stuff.

[Darth Wong]

Anselm's so-called proof of God looks like this, in plain English:

1) God is defined as a Supreme Being.
2) A real Supreme Being would be more Supreme than an imaginary Supreme Being.
3) Therefore, a Supreme Being would have to be real, not imaginary.
4) Therefore, God is real.

Notice the giant logical disconnect between step 3 and 4. Yes, Anselm is correct in saying that any Supreme Being would have to be real in order to fit the definition of a Supreme Being. But that says nothing at all about why such a being should exist. It only says that if it did exist, it would have to be real: a truly vacuous statement at best.

[Aranfan]

Your argument doesn't postulate perfection of the octahedron or a useful substitute, therefore it doesn't work even under Anselm's butchered logic.

Why do I need to postulate that Object Z is perfect? Isn't it enough to postulate that it exists?

[Adrian Laguna]

You have to remember, these guys were working with MASSIVE critical blindspots

To wit, their view of the world was largely shaped by Plato; someone once commented that the entire history of Philosophy is a series of footnotes to The Republic.

At least to the extent that it proves the existence of a being he chooses to call God, who is not necessarily the Christian God, St. Anselm's logic is actually pretty good, if the world is as conceptualized by Plato, which is one very large if. At its essence the proof is an attempt to define God into existence, you cannot do this in a material universe, but you can in a Platonic one. Thus, St. Anselm's chief failure is that his fundamental conception of the world was quite simply utterly wrong. This is a perfectly understandable failure, because so was everyone else's, and it took a very long time before empiricism began developing and eroding the foundation upon which the ontological proof stood.

I think it important to take into account the fact that by now we have the benefit of centuries of empirical thought to inform the way we see the world, something that was not true back then. To paraphrase Newton, we see so far because we stand on the shoulders of giants. I see Anselm's proof as being childish more than anything, the result of our collective philosophical childhood at the time. Given the circumstances that produced it I find the ontological proof to be a very charming and elegant argument, despite it being completely wrong.

[petesampras]

Your argument doesn't postulate perfection of the octahedron or a useful substitute, therefore it doesn't work even under Anselm's butchered logic.

Why do I need to postulate that Object Z is perfect? Isn't it enough to postulate that it exists?

I thought this argument was by Descartes? Anyway. I think the idea is that you cannot concieve of a perfect being as not existing, because existance is a necessary property of perfection. So, if you are concieving of god not existing, what you are imagining cannot be god. Therefore, you cannot concieve of god not existing. Therefore god exists.

As far as I can see, it is a clever little trick, that relies on turning god from an entity which can or cannot exist, into a statement that is true or false. God, defined in this way, is actually a statement. You are stating something about the world. You can't say god doesn't exist, if he is necessarily defined as existing. But you can say the concept it false.

[Aranfan]

Your argument doesn't postulate perfection of the octahedron or a useful substitute, therefore it doesn't work even under Anselm's butchered logic.

Why do I need to postulate that Object Z is perfect? Isn't it enough to postulate that it exists?

I thought this argument was by Descartes? Anyway. I think the idea is that you cannot concieve of a perfect being as not existing, because existance is a necessary property of perfection. So, if you are concieving of god not existing, what you are imagining cannot be god. Therefore, you cannot concieve of god not existing. Therefore god exists.

As far as I can see, it is a clever little trick, that relies on turning god from an entity which can or cannot exist, into a statement that is true or false. God, defined in this way, is actually a statement. You are stating something about the world. You can't say god doesn't exist, if he is necessarily defined as existing. But you can say the concept it false.

And you can't say that Object Z doesn't exist, because, hey, Defined as Existing. But the point of the exercise was to show that the line of reasoning doesn't work, because there isn't an octahedron floating above your head.

[petesampras]

And you can't say that Object Z doesn't exist, because, hey, Defined as Existing. But the point of the exercise was to show that the line of reasoning doesn't work, because there isn't an octahedron floating above your head.

Sure, but that is because you have defined it as existing. There is equally an object identical to Object Z, or any similar such object, that does not exist. The idea behind the perfect being argument, is that you cannot concieve of a perfect being that does not exist. These guys relied on the intuition that existance was a necessary property of perfection. Which is not the same as just defining an object to exist. Well, ultimately it is, but just done a little more subtly. It's a poor argument, but a nice little trick - in my opinion.

[Kuroneko]

Alselm is the reason that in modern logic, existence is not a predicate. But while recognizing that the "property" of existing has a nature quite different from being blue or octahedral or whatnot is important, it's not the whole story.

In a previous time the ontological argument came up on this board, modal logic was more or less a footnote. I've thought about it since then, and I now think that it would be much more fair to Anselm. For modal logics (M='possible', L='necessary') in which possibilities are necessarily possible (Mp→LMp), necessity is distributive (L(p→q)→(Lp→Lq)), and necessary things are the case (Lp→p), the following is a theorem: [Mp & (p→Lp)]→p. In other words,
(1) it is possible for God to exist, and
(2) if God exists, then God exists necessarily.
jointly imply
(3) God exists.
The background of Anselm's argument is actually a defense of Psalms 14:1, in that his purpose was to show that an atheist who understands the term "God" is being the fool by disbelieving. Anselm's distinctions of "existing in the understanding" as opposed to "actually existing" is akin to the possible existence in (1); he also emphasized his definition that God was a being for which a greater or more perfect one is outright inconceivable, rather than one that simply happens to be greatest, mirroring (2). Therefore, although Anselm had no concept of modal logic per se, the modal reading of his argument is more faithful to the original than a definitional sleight of hand.

In any case, it is at least more interesting. It is of course possible to deny the versions of modal logic in which the theorem obtains (particularly the axiom Mp→LMp), but it's clear that the real workhorse is (1). It's one thing to say that it is possible that the universe has an intelligent creator, but Anselm's definition of "God" is by far more restrictive--it may be that there is no limit to conceivable "greater" beings, just as there is no greatest integer or largest set, etc. The previously mentioned Gödel's version of the ontological argument formalizes what it might mean for a being to be "greater" or have a "perfection" in terms of "intrinsically positive" properties, but it doesn't actually prove (1).

Notice the giant logical disconnect between step 3 and 4. Yes, Anselm is correct in saying that any Supreme Being would have to be real in order to fit the definition of a Supreme Being.

On a lighter note, someone once observed that as successfully overcoming hardships is a mark of superiority and non-existence is obviously the greatest possible handicap to performing any task whatsoever, a nonexistent creator is Superior to an existent one. Therefore, God doesn't exist.

[Rye]

So in Philosophy class I was introduced to St. Anselm's argument for God's existence. It was basically the following:

* God is defined as the being with all and only perfections
* It is more perfect to Exist than to Not Exist
* Therefore God exists, otherwise we would have a contradiction

I will now attempt to show why this argument is full of shit:

Let Object Z be defined as having the Following Qualities:

* Blueness
* Having the Shape of a regular Octahedron
* Non-zero angular momentum
* Existence
* Side length of 1 inch
* Position 5 inches above you're head
* Being Perceivable by sight and touch
* Always there (above your head)

If there is no blue spinning Octahedron above your head, then Anselm is full of shit, and defining something to exist doesn't make it so.

Please point out any errors in my reasoning.

I preferred the following:

* A perfect million pound bank balance belonging to Rye is defined as a bank balance that is perfectly formed.
* It is more perfect to Exist than to Not Exist.
* Therefore Rye's bank balance has at least one million pounds in it, otherwise we would have a contradiction.

Alternatively, you could also point out that "perfection" is an abstraction and not a "quality" of real things in and of itself, it is a value judgement. As a matter of fact, ever since Plato people have been able to recognise that real things are never "perfect"; and Plato's ontology said that all the perfect things lived in a "heaven of ideas" or something like that, where all knowable, observable things in the real world were "imperfect reflections" of their perfect versions. Now, I would point out that this is backward; we come up with abstracts after observation as a sort of memory/imagination "shorthand" for what we've seen. Abstracts like "perfect beings" only exist in the mind, thus we can conclude that any being claimed to be a "perfect being" is probably imaginary.

Additionally, I would point out that humans, by their nature imperfect animals, using imperfect language and imperfect brains, would not be able to recognise a "perfect being" because their view of the world is never complete and language is a nest of approximate values that we share with one another. The notion of something being ultimately perfect is an unattainable maximum, and as such it's a pretty useless and imaginary term.

[Surlethe]

Gödel's version of the ontological argument formalizes what it might mean for a being to be "greater" or have a "perfection" in terms of "intrinsically positive" properties, but it doesn't actually prove (1).

We had a seminar presentation about that at our department a few years ago. The general consensus was that either Gödel was proving something inconceivably trivial, like "modal logic holds for all possible worlds where modal logic holds", or he was unjustifiably assuming that perfection means "is true in all possible worlds". Or something along those lines.

I think that's a general rule of thumb for these sorts of logical proofs that God exists: either "God" is so loosely defined, the proof really says something silly like the universe exists or logic exists, or it has a non-sequitur in it. In a lot of practical applications, the non-sequitur is the jump between the proof and the Biblical, Christian God.

[Darth Wong]

In any case, it is at least more interesting. It is of course possible to deny the versions of modal logic in which the theorem obtains (particularly the axiom Mp→LMp), but it's clear that the real workhorse is (1). It's one thing to say that it is possible that the universe has an intelligent creator, but Anselm's definition of "God" is by far more restrictive--it may be that there is no limit to conceivable "greater" beings, just as there is no greatest integer or largest set, etc. The previously mentioned Gödel's version of the ontological argument formalizes what it might mean for a being to be "greater" or have a "perfection" in terms of "intrinsically positive" properties, but it doesn't actually prove (1).

Don't all ontological arguments fall into the category of "in order to prove my assumption of God's existence, I will manufacture a different assumption and show that God logically follows from that?" They're all shell games, of varying complexity.

Notice the giant logical disconnect between step 3 and 4. Yes, Anselm is correct in saying that any Supreme Being would have to be real in order to fit the definition of a Supreme Being.

On a lighter note, someone once observed that as successfully overcoming hardships is a mark of superiority and non-existence is obviously the greatest possible handicap to performing any task whatsoever, a nonexistent creator is Superior to an existent one. Therefore, God doesn't exist.

I like that one. Looking at Zuul's post after yours, one could perform a similar trick with perfection. While real beings are not perfect as Zuul said, we do have comprehensible and real definitions of perfection. For example, thermodynamic perfection would be a process which produces no entropy. The efficiency of this process would therefore be 100%, and it would be perfect.

However, assigning thermodynamic perfection to God would actually reduce the idea of him in many ways, since it would limit his outputs to his inputs. God is typically conceived as being freed from any constraints, and paradoxically enough, Perfection is actually a constraint. Ergo, God could be Perfect, but if he were Perfect, then he would not be omnipotent. Or he could be omnipotent, but if he is omnipotent, then he would lack perfect thermodynamic balance, and would not be Perfect

[Stuart]

Another argument is even simpler. The Buddhists define perfection as non-existance (I know that's grotesquely simplified but it'll do for this argument).

Therefore, if God is perfect, he doesn't exist.

If God is not perfect, then by Annie-bubba's definition, he isn't God and therefore doesn't exist.

[General Zod]

Another argument is even simpler. The Buddhists define perfection as non-existance (I know that's grotesquely simplified but it'll do for this argument).

Therefore, if God is perfect, he doesn't exist.

If God is not perfect, then by Annie-bubba's definition, he isn't God and therefore doesn't exist.

I think I'm going to steal that.

[Junghalli]

Frankly, the argument is blatant linguistics-whoring just on its face. I define God as perfect, I say to be perfect it has to exist, OMG I just proved it exists! It should just be blatantly obvious to any neutral observer that that's an absolutely shit way of proving the existence of anything.

If you want to illustrate the absurdity, say there's a perfect tea cup sitting on the other person's keyboard and insist that it MUST exist despite the fact it obviously isn't there because otherwise it wouldn't be perfect and you'd have a contradiction. It's the exact same retardo logic.

[Adrian Laguna]

If you want to illustrate the absurdity, say there's a perfect tea cup sitting on the other person's keyboard and insist that it MUST exist despite the fact it obviously isn't there because otherwise it wouldn't be perfect and you'd have a contradiction. It's the exact same retardo logic.

You're thinking like an empiricist, if you want to understand Anselm's argument you have to see it with Platonic eyes. According to Plato, the perfect cup does exist, just not here where you can interact with it. It is rather in a realm were perfect and idealized originals of all objects, called "forms", reside. Here on Earth, what we see is but a crude copy of each form. Above the level of forms is a realm of abstract ideas which give rise to the forms, and above the forms is "the Good", an indefinite thing from which everything arises.

Now here's the fun part, the higher up in the scale something is, the more real it is. In other words, not only does the perfect teacup exist, it is more real than any teacup you can actually use, those are all fakes, copies, imitations.

Given Plato's beautifully crafted monument of lunacy, and the belief that pure reason is the best way to arrive at truth, the ontological argument makes perfect sense.