Deconstructing st anselm's ontological argument

[FightingFat]

Any one know anything about logic? I’m having a discussion with a smart arse and he’s had the following to say regarding St. Anselm’s famous ontological argument for the existence of God. This is what he has to say: -

there are some very dodgy predicates

firsly that we all accept his definition of god, which i do not

secondly that you believe god exists (this is what Kant called the implicit predicate of all ontological argument)

thirdly he uses very poor aristotilean logic :

god = A (assumtion of existance of god here)

bigger than god = B

B = false as nothing is bigger than god (assumtion)

if A = false

then B = true

SO A = true ??? how come ???

very poor really

ontological arguments can never avoid these strange loops in their logic

Any comments?

Can anyone give me some up to date thinking in this line of logic or useful arguments/ sites/ links etc???

 

[Prodigal_Son]

I just looked at Anselm’s argument, and it seemed a bit sketchy to me, too. (“Words, words, words,” said Hamlet.")

But proving that an argument claiming to prove God’s existence is invalid does not prove anything about God.

God exists, anyway. Proof, schmoof.

 

[FightingFat]

Yes and obviously I’m not really looking at that, nor do I consider St. Anselm to be at the cutting edge of this kind of thinking, It’s more about the argument. You see I’m being accused of not being able to argue a Christian’s perspective vs. logic…

 

[Thal59]

FightingFat:

Yes and obviously I’m not really looking at that, nor do I consider St. Anselm to be at the cutting edge of this kind of thinking, It’s more about the argument. You see I’m being accused of not being able to argue a Christian’s perspective vs. logic…

Forget the argument. Ask him to mix some noxious chemicals together and produce a living entity.

Until he can do that, he has no logical argument against God.

Thal59

 

[Scott_Waddell]

Prodigal_Son:

But proving that an argument claiming to prove God’s existence is invalid does not prove anything about God.

Right, to paraphrase Chesterton, a bad argument in support of God’s existence does not disprove His existence any more than a counterfeit twenty-dollar bill disproves the existence of real money.