Q&A: A Refutation of the Ontological Argument Even When Accepting All the Basic Premises
A Refutation of the Ontological Argument Even When Accepting All the Basic Premises
Question
Hello, I heard your lecture on the ontological argument, in which you explain its advantage if one accepts that existence is part of the parameters of perfection. But there is a flaw here. If that is accepted, then one of the perfections is certainly also the inability to deny the perfection (or existence, or degree of truth) of that same “being” that possesses all perfections. In other words, if you can conceive of something whose existence you can deny (or deny the perfection of its perfections, or the truth in it within your own consciousness), then it is certainly not the being that possesses all perfections. Therefore, any being whose existence one can deny is not the being Anselm is talking about. The point is that then it turns out there is really nothing in the statement. Because you can always deny it, and then it will never be the right being. So either at some point you will find that being which cannot be denied in your consciousness, and that will be the right being (and then you will believe), or not, and then you will remain a skeptic. In other words, this leaves open the possibility that if you find God by other means, then He will indeed fit His own definition; and if you do not find Him, then you need to keep looking, because perhaps you will find Him. And here there is another problem: perhaps the ability to recognize immediately the truth of that being, with no possibility whatsoever of denying it, should itself be one of the perfections, since that is greater than a being whose degree of truth (or whose existence) can theoretically be denied. Therefore, if you do not believe from the very first second, the statement is refuted and there is no such “being.” And if you accept this, and for you there really is a “being” that can never be denied in your consciousness, then that would force you to assume that if someone else denies it, he is lying, or that this “being” exists only in your consciousness, because if it really existed in reality as well, this would apply to other people too.
Answer
You are assuming a premise, and I do not know where it comes from. But beyond that, even if indeed there is no ability to deny it, that does not contradict the fact that there are many fools who nevertheless manage to do so. That says something about them, not about the Holy One, blessed be He. And beyond that, even if someone denies it after reading the proof, he can still see that there is an internal contradiction in his position, and that the denial is rooted in error.
The last claim of yours—that if one can deny Him then perhaps there is something greater (something that cannot be denied)—is also incorrect. Perhaps one cannot conceive of such a being?
Discussion on Answer
I don’t know what is unfair. Your assumption seems entirely baseless to me. That’s all.
The ontological proof proves that the one thinking about it is more perfect than God, since he created God in the vanity of his thought. This fact, this basic premise, requires no clarification. It is clearer than any doubt to the one presenting the proof and to its believers.
“One also cannot conceive of the ‘greatest being’(!); one can only conceive that it is possible to conceive that there is such a thing.” That is not an assumption; it is a fact.
And what is the difference between your answer and the fundamentalism or skepticism that you object to? After all, I explained my position, and you replied without giving a reason.
Rabbi, why can’t the atheist simply say, “Now that I understand that existence in reality is a necessary addition to God’s perfection, I can no longer conceive of such a thing,” and then the argument no longer works?
He certainly can say that. If one denies the premises, then of course one can reject the conclusion. But it is not clear whether he is right. Even if he does not accept the existence of a necessary being, I do not see what has changed regarding his ability to conceive of it. That is the sting in Anselm’s argument. He is not talking about the atheist’s beliefs but about definitions, and there is no reason to think that after the argument the definition becomes empty.
Meaning that in practice the atheist really can conceive of it, and therefore by definition he is committed to it even if he says otherwise out loud, and therefore he is not really an atheist (is that what you mean by exposing him to the diamond inside the safe that you mention in your lectures). But what does it really mean to “conceive of” something? We conceive of something that we do not understand and do not know what it really contains or does not contain (after all, no thought or grasp can apprehend You at all). So then what is the connection between perfection (or greatness) according to my definition and according to someone else’s definition, and how do I even know how to define for myself what it includes? After all, as you agreed, if in practice it included that one of the perfections is also the inability of others to deny the perfection, that would nullify the statement. I understand that you simply do not accept that this is included—but how can one decide? Just one’s own subjective judgment?
We do understand and know, but we do not always understand the implications. If someone knows the axioms of geometry but does not know that the Pythagorean theorem follows from them, do you think he does not really know them? I disagree.
He knows them—that is true. But this is not the Pythagorean theorem—here one of the axioms is not actually clear, only in theory. Are you saying that you understand the *meaning* of perfection in all senses / absolute truth / the greatest possible—and what that means? I am talking about understanding the thing you are talking about—understanding the “being” and what it includes, not the possibility of estimating that there could be a being with such or such exalted parameters. How can one understand the idea of a perfection beyond which there is no greater? Or are you claiming that the mere fact that someone says that he “can conceive that there exists a greatest / most perfect being” in theory already obligates him to fill in for himself what that perfection or greatness includes—and in any case obligates him even if he does not know the details, simply because of the initial admission that he himself can conceive of such a thing?
I see no point in continuing. I explained what I had to explain. We are repeating ourselves.
Have a good week. The answer you gave is a bit unfair (with all due respect). What is more basic within the definition of “greatest”—that it exist in the real world as well, or that it be so great that it cannot be denied that it is the greatest? Pain, for example, is quite an absolute truth in our world, because if you are honest you will never deny it. And even if there is a real skeptic who is just being contrary, he still will not agree to put his skepticism to the test by having someone smash his finger with a hammer in order to prove that there is no pain. In other words, the sensation of pain is a truth that is very, very hard to deny, and therefore very real—so real that no one would want to put himself to a test of doubt regarding it. In addition, it can even be proven to someone who denies it and is unwilling to put himself to any test at all—such as a skeptic, an extreme fundamentalist, or anyone else. Therefore, it seems to me that one of the parameters of absolute truth should be that it cannot be denied in any way whatsoever. Because how can there be truths that are not “absolute truth,” yet their very existence “obligates” you to believe in them more than in that absolute truth? And if so, what exactly is the advantage of that absolute truth? By the way, the fact that people can make mistakes or that there are fools who manage to deny the “being” is irrelevant, because that is contradictory—if the “being” were real enough (absolute truth, absolute existence, etc.), they would not have the *possibility* of denying it (as in the example I gave). And then it also turns out that this “being” and “absolute truth” are different things, and that too is a contradiction in the statement. And of course one can argue concealment (in our case), or maya (among the Indians), or any other claim to resolve this—but then you are already returning to “religious” arguments and not relying on the ontological proof.
As for the second part: one also cannot conceive of the “greatest being”(!); one can only conceive that it is possible to conceive that there is such a thing. For us, infinity is always something big that keeps growing endlessly, even though we understand that this is not what it means. We cannot grasp an infinite idea with the intellect, only assume that it could exist. In other words, I am only saying verbally that I can conceive that there is such a thing, but in practice I have no clue about any detail of that being, because it is beyond me to understand what “the greatest possible being” means. So here too, if I conceived that there is a “being” so great that its greatness or truth cannot be denied, then that too can be conceived.